Ever seen how little kids glee about unicorns (a white horse with a conical horn on its forehead), whether it's on tv or just a printed image? Well, we can tell you for sure that entrepreneurs also do the same thing when they come across a startup that has attained unicorn status.

In both cases, a unicorn means different things but the one thing in common is that it is always shiny, beautiful, strong, and could be thought to represent excellence and grace. Follow us as we discuss what a unicorn startup is, and see a list of these companies in 2023.

What is a unicorn startup?

A unicorn startup - in very simple terms - is a company that has attained unicorn status. This status is attributed based on two factors: the first is a company’s valuation and the second looks at the type of ownership that is in place, that is, whether it is privately owned or not.

To get unicorn status, a company must be valued at over $1 billion. Also, the company must be privately owned, meaning that it has not been listed in a stock exchange market. Considering these factors, we can describe a unicorn startup as one that is both privately owned and has a valuation of over $1 billion.

There are only a handful of unicorn startups in the world. To be precise, this CB insights database makes mention of only 1,206 global unicorn companies, with the numbers shrinking due to a public sale or bankruptcy.

Brief History of a Unicorn Startup

Unicorns weren't always a thing. They may have existed for a long time in mythology and have come alive through films, animations, and cartoons but they only recently made entry into the business world.

The description of a business as a unicorn started ten years ago in 2013 when the reputable venture capitalist and angel investor Aileen Lee used the term in her publication titled “The Unicorn Club: Learning From Billion-Dollar Startups”.  

10 Unicorn Startups in 2023

Take a look at ten (10) startups that have attained unicorn status and are making big with the investments they receive.

WIZ

Wiz is one of the latest unicorn startups in the cybersecurity space. In addition, it is the fastest tech company to reach a $10 billion valuation. The cybersecurity company arrived at this remarkable milestone in just 2.9 years beating Deel which made the record in 3.3 years.

Wiz was founded by Assaf Rappaport. It serves both security and development organizations by helping them achieve stable management of their cloud structures.

Some of its products include CSPM which detects critical cloud infrastructure in real-time, IaC scanning that secures the cloud from source to production, CIEM which enforces the least privilege across the cloud, as well as compliance automation and executive report generation.

The platform is also really flexible as it “connects through API to AWS, Azure, GCP, OCI, Alibaba Cloud, VMware vSphere, Red Hat OpenShift, and Kubernetes across virtual machines, containers, serverless functions, and data stores like public buckets, data volumes, and databases.”

QUANTEXA

Today, Quantexa brings more value to Artificial Intelligence through its Decision Intelligence (DI) solutions.

The British tech company which offers anti-money laundering, fraud, credit risk, customer intelligence, and know-your-customer solutions, hit a valuation of $1.8 billion after it successfully raised $129 million in a Series E funding round.

Quantexa was founded in 2016 by Imam Hoque and Vishal Marria. It moved to acquire the Dublin-based AI company Aylien in February 2023; employs a whooping 600 staff in offices located in Brussels, Singapore, and the UAE; and it also actively offers its services in over 70 different countries.

RAZOR GROUP

Razor Group is a blazing startup in the Customer and Retail industry.

The company operates by increasing the full potential of its client’s brand through a fair evaluation of their current portfolio and a discussion around their potential and growth ideas, an analysis & deep dive into their financial and operational setup, and a closing & integration operation that will see the company operate under them.

In a recent Series C funding round, Razor Group received $88 million to reach a valuation of $1.2 billion. The Berlin-based company also went forward to acquire one of its major competitors Stryze Group, cementing its stand as a dominant force in the industry.

STRIPE

Fintech has attracted a lot of attention in recent times and Stripe is no doubt one of the big names in this area.

The company offers a suite of APIs that power the payment processing needs of e-commerce and other Internet businesses.

Its products include customizable payment UIs, no-code payment links, billing and subscription management, data warehouse synchronization, sales tax and VAT automation, carbon removal, and startup incorporations among others.

Stripe first gained unicorn status in 2021 when it received a boost of $600 million through a funding round. More recently, the company announced a new valuation of $50 billion after a Series I funding round that brought in over $6.5 billion.

JAGUAR MICROSYSTEMS

The evolving hardware industry has prompted the development of some amazing tech. However, there are relatively fewer companies in this area compared to other tech-related industries. One company that has not just braced the climate in this environment but also stands out in terms of its valuation is Jaguar Microsystems.

Jaguar Microsystems was started in 2020 by Dr Sunny Siu. The company is currently leading the way in addressing the latest and most challenging requirements in cloud and data center infrastructure by developing a new generation of advanced DPUs and silicon solutions.

Two years after it began operations, Jaguar Microsystems hit unicorn status. This happened through a funding investment of $200 million.

EPIC GAMES

If you’re a fan of video games, you would have probably interacted with one of Epic Game’s products. Epic Game is an American Video Game and software developer and publisher which has successfully remained on top of the charts for a very long time.

The North Carolina company started quietly in 1991 but as of June 2022, the company hit a milestone valuation of $31.5 billion, turning it into a big gun as much as the gaming industry is concerned.

The funding investment of $2 billion came from Sony Group Corporation and the Lego-backing company known as KIRKBI. It is intended to boost Epic Games’ activities in the metaverse, as all three companies are looking to gain significantly advance the physical and virtual experience of their users.

INFOBIP

Infobip has been in existence since April 2006. The mobile and telecommunication company was started by Silvio Kutić; Roberto Kutić, and Izabel Jelenić, and it is headquartered in London, United Kingdom.

While it did not receive any external capital in its first fourteen years of operation, its big break came in July 2020 with an investment funding of over $200 million.

Infobip offers clients impressive “ömnichannel” communications through customer data, chatbot building, customer engagement, and cloud contact center applications which it currently operates.

This enables businesses to reach their customers anytime, any day. The basic setup for most of these applications is through easy-to-install APIs.

An impressive thing about the unicorn startup is that it has 450 billion + interactions per year, 9,700+ global connections, 40+ data centers worldwide, 75+ offices in six (6) different continents, 24/7 support service, and a remarkable level of compliance.

TRAVEL PERK

January 2022 saw Travel Perk, a corporate travel management company, attain unicorn status after receiving an investment worth $115 million in a Series D funding round. The Spanish company was launched in 2015, and at present, it has a valuation of $1.3 billion.

Travel Perk serves business travelers, travel managers, and financial controllers. For the first set of people, it enables booking entire trips, canceling anytime, anywhere; and enjoying travel flexibility.

Travel managers that use the service get to time and stay in control, achieve full travel policy compliance, and view or track travel data in real time.

MASTER CONTROL

The Internet Software and Services industry is receiving good attention these days with companies like Master Control becoming unicorns and improving development and infrastructure in this field. Master Control was founded in 1993.

The company takes care of quality management by improving training cycles, reducing CAPA times, maintaining data control, and speeding up approvals.

On the other hand, it also enables manufacturing execution systems by creating error-proof production, accelerating product release, simplifying recipe management, and monitoring all processes in real time.

Master Control ran a Series A funding program in December 2022 from where it realized an investment of $!50 million, increasing its valuation to $1.3 billion.

According to Global News Wire, the financing will help it “to continue to build and enhance its solutions while also placing more focus on technology that will predict and prevent quality events, and enable true AI-assisted manufacturing optimization.

Investing in new technologies like AI, machine learning, and natural language processing will improve customers’ business outcomes and reduce the time and cost of compliance and red tape, getting life-changing products to patients in timeframes that were previously not possible.”

CLASS JOJO

Class Jojo emerged as a unicorn in the Edtech industry in July 2022. This happened when the company received over $125 million in a series D funding round led by Tencent. With the investment, the education technology reached a $1.25 billion valuation.

Class Jojo was founded in August 2011 and all it does is connect teachers, parents, students, and school leaders, creating a community that now has well over 50 million participants.

The platform offers a messaging service that makes it easy for learners, teachers, and guardians to communicate, with automatic translation into 35 languages. Secondly, the platform allows teachers to share their impressive stories of hard work, love, and patience with students.

Furthermore, classroom and other events are easily scheduled and can be seen by all relevant participants to keep everyone up-to-date. There’s also the points and big ideas feature for social learning as well as the Teachers’ toolkit that includes everything from attendance sheets to timers.

Final Word

The business world is becoming more and more interesting with the evolution of terms such as unicorns, and the activity of different companies in several different industries achieving and losing this status.

In recent times, however, the global economic situation will likely see unicorn companies fall below the $1 billion valuation mark. What do you think it’s going to be? You can leave a comment under this post to tell us.

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