Once upon a time, a startup worth $1 billion or more was considered to be a rare, almost mythical thing — a unicorn. But in the past few years, unicorns have become far more plentiful, more like horses.
A year ago, the venture capital industry looked like it was going to tighten its belt and bring valuations back to earth. But in 2017, venture investment continued to flow heavily and is on track to match or exceed dollars deployed in 2016, says PitchBook, a database that tracks such deals.
Mega deals, where investors poured giant sums into one company at a high valuation, made up less than 1% of total transactions, but, by the third quarter, PitchBook says they accounted for 22% of the total deal value.
All of that means that new unicorns were plentiful in 2017. Dozens of startups were crowned with unicorn status worldwide, including these 23 US companies, according to CB Insight’s list of unicorns. (We took the valuations of these companies from Pitchbook.)
Some of them, you’ve likely heard of. Others may have slipped under your radar.
Valuation:
$1 billion
Select investors:
Goldman Sachs, Leonardo DiCaprio, Promecap
Rubicon allows business to order trash collection from a variety of waste haulers when they need it, and helps them recycle more.
Valuation:
$1 billion
Select investors:
BNP Paribas, Goldman Sachs, Google
Symphony is a cloud-based communications platform for the financial services sector that lets people communicate and share documents.
Valuation:
$1 billion
Selected investors:
Foxconn Technology Company, Khosla Ventures, Moore Capital Management
Katerra offers software for the construction industry for building design, logistics and purchasing. It is currently working on a new round of financing seeking a $2.5 billion valuation, the WSJ reports.
Valuation:
$1 billion
Select investors:
Sequoia Capital, Qualcomm Ventures, Emergence Capital Partners
Zoom offers online video and web-conferencing services.
Valuation:
$1.02 billion
Select investors:
Australian Future Fund, GE Ventures, Data Collective
Desktop Metal makes 3D printers that can print metal.
Valuation:
$1.05
Select investors:
Warbug Pincus, capitalG, Accel Partners
CrowdStrike offers cybersecurity software that uses artificial intelligence to protect against hackers.
Valuation:
$1.10 billion
Select investors:
Lockheed Martin, Khosla Ventures, Bessemer Venture Partners
Rocket Lab offers a rocket-for-hire launch vehicle used to launch satellites.
Valuation:
$1.17 billion
Select investors:
Meritech Capital, Lead Edge Capital, Benchmark
Duo is a cloud service that logs people into services (otherwise known as two-factor authentication) and makes sure devices are virus-free before they connect to the corporate network.
Valuation:
$1.20 billion
Select investors:
Google Ventures, Sequoia Capital, First Round Capital
Clover Health is a new option for health insurance that includes real-time monitoring and big data analysis to help manage chronic illness.
Valuation:
$1.30 billion
Select investors:
Greylock Partners, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Khosla Ventures
Rubrik offers data backup, recovery, and search software for companies that store data both in the cloud and in their own data centers.
Valuation:
$1.30 billion
Select investors:
Google Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, DST Global
Robinhood offers an app for “free stock trading” allowing people to buy stocks without paying commissions.
Valuation:
$1.38
Select investors:
Y Combinator, Data Collective, MassVentures
Ginkgo BioWorks calls itself the organism company. It designs custom microbes for all sorts of applications, from crops that fertilize themselves to fermented ingredients for fragrances.
Valuation:
$1.40 billion
Select investors:
Activant Capital Group, Alaska Permanent Fund, Baillie Gifford & Co.
Indigo is using big data to improve crop yields. It determines which microbes a crop will need, then treats seeds with those microbes.
Valuation:
$1.40 billion
Select investors:
Temasek Holdings, Charlotte Angel Partners, TPG Growth
AvidXchange makes software that automates a company’s bill payments, approvals, and other manual tasks.
Valuation:
$1.41 billion
Select investors:
True Ventures, Tiger Global Management, L Catterton
Peloton offers an exercise bike that streams on-demand classes.
Valuation:
$1.41 billion
Select investors:
Makena Capital Management, TPG Growth, Breyer Capital
C3 IoT offers a cloud service that hosts big data, AI, and Internet of Things applications.
Valuation:
$1.50 billion
Select investors:
General Atlantic, Index Ventures, Accel Partners
Squarespace offers a service for building and hosting websites.
Valuation:
$1.60 billion
Select investors:
Y Combinator, Union Square Ventures, DFJ Growth
Coinbase is an online exchange that allows users to purchase and store their cryptocurrency.
Valuation:
$1.60 billion
Select investors:
GAM Holding
Afiniti offers contact center software that uses artificial intelligence to pair customers with customer service agents.
Valuation:
$1.70 billion
Select investors:
Y Combinator, Matrix Partners, Benchmark
Quora is a question-and-answer website.
Valuation:
$1.74 billion
Select investors:
Google Ventures, Sequoia Capital, Wakefield Group
Carbon3D manufactures 3D printers that use a sophisticated technology that allow them to produce polished final results.
Valuation:
$1.80 billion
Select investors:
Y Combinator, Sequoia Capital, Coatue Management
Reddit is website that bills itself as “the front page of the internet,” where people share and discuss links to articles, photos, forum posts, and videos.
Valuation:
$1.80 billion
Select investors:
Andreessen Horowitz, Khosla Ventures, Singapore Wealth Fund
Affirm is a finance company that allows online stores to offer monthly payment plans to their customers.
Avots: Business Insider
