Closed an Oversubscribed Series E in Her First Year, Valuing Runway at $5.3B
Runway builds real-world intelligence: foundational models that understand, simulate, and act in the world, serving a global customer base and Fortune 500 enterprises. Within her first year as CFO, Liu closed an oversubscribed $308M Series E at a $5.3 billion valuation, with General Atlantic, Fidelity, NVIDIA, Adobe Ventures, and AMD Ventures among investors.
Before Runway, as CFO of Applied Intuition, Liu helped scale ARR 100x to $400M profitably, a global team 30x to over 700 employees, led more than $1 billion in capital raises and M&A, and drove the take-private of Nasdaq-listed Embark Trucks.
At Runway, she runs an AI-native finance organisation that closes the books in under five days and automates strategic insights informing planning and resource allocation across the company. Her mandate covers the full office of the CFO: strategic finance and FP&A, corporate development, investor relations, accounting, global tax and treasury, procurement, and GTM finance, as Runway accelerates from breakthrough research into production-grade products across industries.
Finance is one of the most under-leveraged growth levers a startup has.
The best finance leaders don't just keep the books. They extend runway,
structure capital that changes what a company can do next, and build the
systems that let it scale across borders.
Startup Finance 30 is the first list built to recognise that work.
Beginning in 2026 and continuing annually, we name 30 finance leaders at
venture-backed, globally ambitious startups. The operators shaping how the
next generation of companies grow.
What Startup Finance 30 is
“
Who's doing the most consequential finance work in the startup world right now?
This list is the answer.
FAQ
More information on how SF30 works.
Who's behind Startup Finance 30?
Startup Finance 30 is published by Airwallex. We built it because we work with globally ambitious companies every day, and the finance leaders driving that growth deserve more recognition than they get. Selection sits with the committee.
Who selects the final 30?
A committee of operating CFOs and finance leaders. They score every candidate against a five-part merit rubric and ratify the final list. See the full
selection methodology.
Is there a fee? Can I pay to be included?
No. It's free to enter, and recognition is earned on merit.
