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Liyuan Woo is no stranger to disruption. In fact, she thrives on working for category creators like TOCA Football.
With a career that’s spanned billion-dollar fashion brands to facial-tech startups, Woo has built a reputation for steering companies through restructuring, high growth and reinvention.
That experience proved invaluable when she joined Costa Mesa-based TOCA Football about 18 months ago. The Southern California-based company, founded by former U.S. soccer pro Eddie Lewis, is the largest operator of indoor soccer centers in North America.
Woo stepped in at a critical juncture. TOCA had grown quickly through acquisitions but was tight on liquidity. Within months, she led the restructuring of the company’s operations, synergized the global overhead by a third without sacrificing innovation and secured a $100 million Series F funding round and a $20 million refinancing deal with JPMorgan Chase.
On May 8, her work at TOCA earned her a Business Journal CFO of the Year Award in the private company category.
A Love for Complex Deals
A Beijing native who moved to the U.S. to attend Bentley University in Massachusetts, Woo began her American career with a 13-year tenure at Deloitte M&A, where she worked across industries and deal sizes—from startups to $44 billion power deals, spanning sectors from technology to manufacturing to financial services.
“I always wanted to do M&A because I like transactions. I like complex deal dynamics,” she told the Business Journal.
She later jumped into the consumer side with roles at Bebe, Gymboree, and SharkNinja.
At fashion retailer Bebe, she helped launch global e-commerce and expansion initiatives. Later, she led Gymboree through a near-billion-dollar restructuring while spearheading new market entries in India and China. At SharkNinja, Woo witnessed firsthand what true hypergrowth looks like. The company grew from no revenue to $2 billion in five years.
“It’s insanity,” she said of the fast-paced growth. “It shocked me to the core.”
In 2020, she was named executive vice president and chief financial officer of The HydraFacial Company. She helped take the brand public, raised close to $1 billion in capital, closed five deals and expanded it into 15 direct countries.
Move Fast to Own the Market
Most of the companies she’s chosen to work for all have one thing in common.
They are category creators with a “breakthrough mindset,” she said.
“They have to dare to dream to own the market,” she said.
And to do that, you must move fast.
“To own the category, speed is the name of the game. You have to move faster,” she said.
When she arrived at TOCA, the company had completed 23 acquisitions of indoor soccer facilities, growing its portfolio to about 40 soccer centers. High-profile investors included England captain Harry Kane, U.S. National Team players Alyssa and Gisele Thompson, and chess champion Magnus Carlsen.
But operationally, it was disjointed, she said.
TOCA’s U.S. soccer centers and its U.K.-based TOCA Social venues—an immersive, tech-forward Topgolf-style business for players of all ages and skill levels—were operating as separate entities. Woo consolidated the divisions under one cohesive system and process.
“We were able to centralize the entire architecture and design,” she said. “I was able to take out one-third of the overhead but not sacrificing innovation, not sacrificing growth, not sacrificing all the important stuff.”
Licensing Opportunities Ahead
With the 2026 FIFA World Cup and the 2028 Summer Olympics on the horizon—and soccer fandom surging in the U.S.—TOCA is well-positioned for expansion. It plans to open its first TOCA Social in the U.S. later this year in Dallas.
The company is also exploring growth through licensing. Woo sees potential for TOCA Soccer technology to be licensed to many of the more than 10,000 indoor
centers in the U.S. TOCA Social is part of that mix with licensing opportunities at stadiums, music festivals or on cruise ships.
“It’s endless, limitless expansion.”