Growth Warrior Capital recently raised $26 million for its first fund from investors like Bank of America, the George Kaiser Family Foundation, and Pivotal Ventures, the investment firm founded by Melinda French Gates.
Promise Phelon launched Growth Warrior in 2020 in Charlotte, North Carolina to support underrepresented and overlooked entrepreneurs. Since then, the firm has written checks up to $3 million and has a portfolio of 11 companies. These include Capitan, an AI insurance claim platform that raised $104 million, and ForceMetrics, an AI platform for first responders.
Supporting underrepresented entrepreneurs
Growth Warrior Capitol closed its first fund of $26 million in February. This new investment will help Growth Warrior bring back startups with AI features for industrial jobs, including manufacturing, mining, plumbing, and recycling. Phelon calls the entrepreneurs “dangerous founders,” – seasoned operators with decades of experience in jobs that aren’t glamorous.
“They’re great at doing more with less. You don’t expect them to be dangerous. They learn a lot, and they learn it quickly,” Phelon says.
Investing in the AI software market
Investors examine the AI software market by looking at it in layers. OpenAI, Anthropic, xAI, and Chinese AI startup DeepSeek can be considered the foundation of AI and the core of what’s causing the (Gen AI) transformation,” according to Phelon. However, the middle layer is connectivity or companies understanding how to connect mountains of data to LLM. At the top layer are applications like ForceMetrics leveraging the layers below.
In 2023, Growth Warrior Capital launched Elevo, an AI-powered pitch deck generator, to help founders secure funding for their startups. Phelon came up with the idea for Elevo after being overwhelmed by the sheer volume of pitches she received from startup founders.
Phelon teamed up with her venture partner Ashley Pilipiszyn, an applied scientist-turned-entrepreneur and deep tech angel investor who previously worked at OpenAI as one of its very first employees.
Image: Tony Rican for Growth Venture Capital
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