Valo Ventures

Valo Ventures

Valo Ventures began investing in 2018 when Scott Tierney, a former partner at Capricorn Investment Group, founded the firm in Palo Alto. The fund's thesis was shaped by the conviction that the next generation of scaled technology companies would be built around solving climate and resource scarcity challenges. The name "Valo" — Finnish for "light" — signals an investment philosophy centered on illuminating overlooked sectors of the economy where carbon-intensive legacy systems are ripe for disruption. The firm runs a concentrated early-stage strategy, writing initial checks into Seed and Series A rounds, with reserves for follow-on through growth. The portfolio spans electrification, sustainable agriculture, industrial decarbonization, and circular-economy infrastructure. Known positions include Form Energy, the multi-day battery storage developer backed by Breakthrough Energy Ventures and ArcelorMittal, and Pivot Bio, a microbial nitrogen company that has displaced synthetic fertilizer across millions of US farm acres. Valo's geographic focus centers on North America and Europe, where regulatory tailwinds like the IRA and EU Green Deal create pull for the firm's portfolio companies. Valo operates with a lean partnership group. Scott Tierney leads the team alongside partner Julia Brady. The firm does not publicly report total assets under management or headcount. In October 2024, Form Energy announced a $405 million Series F round with continued participation from existing investors including Valo, extending the firm's commitment to long-duration energy storage as a core grid-infrastructure asset class (per Form Energy, October 2024). Valo's structural edge lies in its emergence from Capricorn's multi-billion-dollar impact ecosystem. Capricorn, which manages capital for the late Jeff Skoll and other tech founders, incubated Valo as an independent firm, granting it a sourcing pipeline into deep-tech climate startups that typically bypass generalist venture funds. This lineage gives Valo's partnership access to diligence networks and follow-on capital relationships that early-stage climate firms rarely command at fund size.