Emerging Unicorn Board

Emerging Unicorns include private companies with known valuations of $500 million or more but less than $1 billion. A startup achieves this status by first demonstrating its ability to provide value in the form of a product or service that attracts paying customers or users at scale. This traction attracts investors who want to invest in the company based on the belief that its offering has a big enough market to provide a sizable return should there be an exit event, such as an IPO. As the startup raises capital and grows key success metrics, such as annual recurring revenue, its valuation increases and it moves closer to becoming one of the next unicorn startups.

The graph shows a skewed distribution of founding dates of emerging Unicorn companies, with companies heavily clustered in 2014 (43 companies) and 2015 (49 companies). What this reveals is the fact that a startup normally takes 8 years before it becomes a Unicorn.

The graph above shows top industries by emerging Unicorn counts. At the moment, fintech & software dominate. But my own prediction is that in the mid to long term, more Unicorns will emerge from science industries ( growing emphasis on & awareness of social, health and environmental issues).

The graph above shows funding to current emerging Unicorns. (Again, 2021 was such a great VC year)

A few examples of current emerging unicorns that could become the next tech unicorns include Affinity (a relationship intelligence platform built to expand and evolve the traditional CRM), HackerRank (an interview platform), Brightline (providing behavioral healthcare services for children and their families) and Typeform. These potential future unicorns have found product market fit, have a scalable product or service, and have raised millions of dollars in venture capital. These potential future unicorns have found product market fit, have a scalable product or service, and have raised millions of dollars in venture capital.