Carrie Calhoun

Carrie Calhoun is a Partner at CenterOak Partners, a Dallas-based private equity firm founded in 2014 that makes control-oriented investments in lower-middle-market companies across the industrial, consumer, and business services sectors. She serves on the firm's Investment Committee and leads its business development and investor relations functions — meaning she sources and evaluates deal flow and manages relationships with the firm's limited partners. She appears on the current CenterOak website under the name Carrie Hamilton.

Before CenterOak, Calhoun worked as an investment professional at NGP Energy Capital Management, a well-known Dallas/Irving-based energy-focused private equity manager, and earlier at Credit Suisse. This combination of institutional investment-banking and private-equity experience underpins her dual capital-formation (LP-facing) and deal-origination (business development) mandate at the firm.

She earned a Bachelor of Business Administration in Finance from Texas A&M University. CenterOak's broader team has a long shared history — the investment and operating principals have worked together for roughly two decades — and the firm has completed well over 100 platform and add-on acquisitions representing several billion dollars of transaction value.

*Note: The originally supplied stub described Calhoun as an "angel investor" focused on "seed rounds" with the title "Principal, Business Development." Primary sources (the firm's own team page and press) show she is a Partner in business development and investor relations at a middle-market private equity buyout firm — the "angel/seed" characterization does not match the verified record.*

• CenterOak makes control (majority) investments in lower-middle-market companies, partnering with management teams to drive "financial, operational and strategic growth initiatives" — the opposite of passive minority/seed checks.
• Sectors: business services, industrial services/growth, and consumer services — with a demonstrated appetite for multi-location, route-based, and franchise/service-network businesses (automotive services, pest/lawn control, HVAC/plumbing, infrastructure maintenance).
• Target economics: platform companies generally in the ~$7–35M EBITDA range, with enterprise values roughly $50–500M; growth is pursued through both organic expansion and buy-and-build add-on acquisitions.
• Value-creation model: the firm emphasizes operational improvement and "creating significant value through operational improvement," positioning itself to founder/family-owned sellers as an operationally engaged partner.
• Calhoun's specific role is origination and LP capital formation — she is typically the first point of contact for intermediaries, bankers, and potential sellers bringing deals to CenterOak, and for institutional investors evaluating the funds.