Lisa Calhoun

Lisa Calhoun is an experienced leader in venture capital whose many accolades include:

• Atlanta Investor of the Year 2024 from Startup Atlanta

• Top 10 Female Founding Managing Partner by Bridge Funding Global in 2024

• Business Insider’s best 30 women seed investors in 2023.

She founded and leads Valor Ventures, a proud Atlanta venture capital firm now investing its second institutional fund.

Strategic courage

Valor’s strategy is unique: the firm focuses on leading first rounds in software companies building in the South. It is the only pure focus first round lead fund in the region and one of the only venture capital firms fully committed and focused on the South.

Valor’s portfolio employs just over 1,000 people across the South, and Valor startups have a footprint in 25 countries. Under her leadership, Valor leverages a portfolio of AI and SaaS software companies based in the South that are frequently celebrated as forerunners in their fields, including Saile.AI, a G2 Top 100 Fast Growing Technology of 2025; Visalaw.AI, winner of the 2024 American Legal Technology AI Innovation Award; FinQuery, a 2025 G2 Best Real Estate Software (acquired), Allelica, a 2023 GHG Global Excellence in Polygenic Risk Score award winner; Arpio, one of the 10 Hottest Data Storage Startups of 2024; Aetos Imaging, a Georgia Top 10 Innovative Company, and, STEMuli, winner of the 2024 global United Nations AI for Good competition.

Venture Capital Community Leadership
Lisa is a Kauffman Fellow (Class 23), recipient of the Kauffman Fellows Leadership Award for Class 23, and frequent speaker. She’s spoken recently for NASDAQ, SuperReturn, KPMG, the Kauffman Leadership Summit, WPO, and Venture Atlanta. Her insights have been featured in Forbes, Inc., and the Venture Capital Journal. She also shares insights as co-host and founder of the Atlanta Startup Podcast .

Valor is “VC-famous” for developing Vic, a visionary AI-powered investment management platform integrated with industry leaders like Salesforce, Carta, and PitchBook.

Valor funds are backed by notable institutional investors as well as thoughtful private capital.

Venture Capital Investing Themes

In Lisa’s board work, she is privy to multi-year trends and insights on issues including the pricing of enterprise AI, the corporate adoption curve of AI,  risks around AI and AI augmentation, and use cases in the global Fortune 1000 for artificial intelligence. The growing A-list investors who invest alongside or after Valor include Draper, Bezos Expeditions, Blumberg, Goldman Sachs, Mackenzie Scott, Google, Mastercard, the Gates Foundation, S3, Lewis & Clark, and Open Prairie.

She focuses on artificial intelligence as a way to center and humanize experience, by leveraging synthetically intelligent processes to support and accelerate human journeys and joys.

Paying It Forward

Philanthropically, Lisa’s passion for discovering top investments from visionaries from all backgrounds led her to establish the Startup Runway Foundation in 2016, a nonprofit (501c3) for introducing underrepresented founders to their first investors. Startup Runway is underwritten by organizations committed to equity in early stage investing, including the American Family Institute, NCR Foundation, Cox Enterprises, and the National Science Foundation. Startups from under-represented founders who have gone through the program have raised nearly $100M.

Lisa is also active in her local community through her board work for the nonprofit Heart of South Downtown, an economic empowerment organization in her home city.

Prior to founding Valor in 2016, Lisa founded a digital marketing agency that was recognized by HubSpot as a top 10 firm for startups. She helped guide founders to successful exits and IPOs through developing meaningful sales funnels and communication platforms. Earlier in her career, Lisa specialized in building enterprise IT software, consulting for leading IT departments including GDOT and UPS.

Lisa holds an MBA in management science with a concentration in statistics from the University of Texas. Her BA with honors is from Baylor University, which she attended on National Merit Scholarship. Her hobbies include vibe coding, yoga, dressage, and gardening. She’s a USDF Bronze Medalist and FEI competitor.

Find Lisa’s latest activities on LinkedIn.