Apparently I didn't have clarity on the technicalities of a "Partner". Always imagined it as someone with a percentage stake of the company and/or here, someone who was also investing their own coin.

The investors of a VC fund are known as "Limited Partners" or LPs. They put up the money but do not select the investments, sit on the boards of portfolio companies, or generally do anything except collect their money at the end of the fund.

The managers of the VC fund are known as "General Partners" or GPs. They are the ones who decide on what to invest in, take an active role in advising those portfolio companies, and are paid a management fee as well as a percentage of the positive returns (the "carry").

So "Partner" doesn't mean anything, unless prefixed with "Limited" or "General".