Is the South VC's Next Big Move?

On the Show Lisa Calhoun, Host — Founder & Managing Partner, Valor Ventures (Atlanta, GA) David Hall — Managing Partner, Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, Revolution (Washington, DC) Karl R. LaPan — Director, UF Innovate | Accelerate, University of Florida (Gainesville, FL) Chris Rhodes — Executive Director, UGA Innovation District, University of Georgia (Athens, GA) Companies and Organizations Mentioned in this Ep: Funds and investors: Revolution / Rise of the Rest Seed Fund · Valor Ventures · Atlanta Ventures · Georgia Research Alliance · UF Innovation Fund and Commercialization Fund · UGA follow-on investment fund and proof-of-concept fund Startups: Hermeus (Atlanta) · Stord (Atlanta) · FreightWaves (Chattanooga) · BuildForce (Rise of the Rest portfolio — building the electrician workforce behind the data center boom) · Haddy (Tampa — sustainable-materials 3D printing, founder Jay Rogers) · Autonoma (Auburn, AL — high-fidelity simulation with Delta and Cisco) · Aetos Imaging (Georgia Tech spinout — automating power-facility buildout with Southern Company) · Arpio (Durham, NC — cloud backup and disaster recovery for the AI era) · Precision BioSciences (co-founded by Chris Rhodes; NASDAQ IPO) Hyperscalers and the AI buildout: OpenAI ($20B campus, Savannah) · Google ($8B, LaGrange) · Amazon ($11B, Georgia) · Meta ($50B, Mississippi/Louisiana) · xAI Colossus (Memphis) Corporates: John Deere · AGCO · Delta Air Lines · Cisco · Southern Company · BMW · Disney · Bloomberg Universities and institutions: University of Georgia (Innovation District, College of Agriculture, Institute for Integrative Precision Agriculture, One Health, new School of Medicine, 600-student entrepreneurship program) · University of Florida (UF Innovate | Accelerate, College of Medicine, engineering, international soft-landings program) · Georgia Tech · Auburn University · Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport · South Downtown Atlanta