Technology

The 57 Startups That Became Unicorns in 2017

Published

4 years ago

December 29, 2017

Jeff Desjardins

Chart: The 57 Startups That Became Unicorns in 2017

57 New Unicorns in 2017

Collectively, they’re now worth $116.5B

The Chart of the Week is a weekly Visual Capitalist feature on Fridays.

For a startup, reaching the coveted $1 billion unicorn valuation is an important milestone – but as we’ve found out in recent years, it’s not necessarily a guarantee of future success.

In 2017, there were 57 startups that crossed the unicorn threshold, and they range from well-known companies, such as Reddit or Quora, to rapid-risers like China’s Toutiao (now valued at $20 billion), which has seemingly come out of nowhere.

Investors have conviction that these companies will provide the platforms and products of the future, and they are placing big bets on them to deliver.

Will they live up to the hype, or will they ultimately end up in the unicorn graveyard?

Unicorn Births by Year

With 57 new unicorns, this year ranks third overall in terms of births per year.

Year	# of Unicorns	Notable Unicorn Birth
2009	5	BloomEnergy
2010	6	Groupon
2011	15	Airbnb
2012	13	Pinterest
2013	20	Uber
2014	62	Slack
2015	81	Vox Media
2016	43	Compass
2017	57	Reddit

While 57 unicorns in 2017 is still a high number, it’s also clear that the froth has died down from the unicorn bonanza that occurred in 2015.

Venture capitalists have clearly dialed it down a notch, re-focusing on the selective quality of investments rather than the overall quantity of big bets.

Notable Unicorns in 2017

Based on data from PitchBook, we’ve included the full list of unicorns in the chart today.

However, here are some that caught our eye:

Toutiao (China)
Valuation: $20 billion

Founded in 2012, Toutiao is the behemoth on this year’s new unicorn list. Based in Beijing, Toutiao is a news and information platform that focuses on recommendations using AI technology. The company pushes content to users based on previous user interactions as well as the detailed analysis of new content. The platform has 120 million active users and has also gone on a recent buying spree, acquiring names like Flipagram and Musical.ly.

Coinbase (United States)
Valuation: $1.6 billion

The cryptocurrency sector is exploding with growth, and Coinbase has been along for the ride since 2012. The most important crypto platform in the U.S. has such a strong influence in the sector, that the “Coinbase Effect” is now a talking point for traders everywhere. Whenever Coinbase introduces a cryptocurrency to its base of 10 million users, the added visibility and liquidity can make the price go bananas. It’s happened with Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash so far, and now every move by Coinbase is closely tracked by crypto power users and influencers.

Alisports (China)
Valuation: $1.0 billion

Alibaba’s foray into sports isn’t going unnoticed. In conjunction with Sina Corp (a Chinese telecom) and Yunfeng Capital Co (venture capital), Alibaba hopes that Alisports will carve out a huge chunk of the RMB 5 Trillion Chinese sports market. It’s also worth noting that Alisports sees e-sports as having huge potential, and as a central piece of its platform.

Related Topics:china startups unicorns 2017 toutiao coinbase

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Technology

Apple’s Colossal Market Cap as it Hits $3 Trillion

Apple’s market cap recently hit $3 trillion. To put that scale into context, this visualization compares Apple to European indexes.

Creator Program

Published

7 days ago

January 10, 2022

Nick Routley

Apple’s Colossal Market Cap in Context

In January of 2019, Apple’s market capitalization stood at $700 billion.

While this was perceived as a colossal figure at the time, when we fast forward to today, that valuation seems a lot more modest. Since then, Apple has surged to touch a $3 trillion valuation on January 3rd, 2022.

To gauge just how monstrous of a figure this is, consider that Apple is no longer comparable to just companies, but to countries and even entire stock indexes. This animation from James Eagle ranks the growth in Apple’s market cap alongside top indexes from the UK, France, and Germany.

Let’s take a closer look.

Apple Takes On Europe

The three indexes Apple is compared to are heavyweights in their own right.

The FTSE 100 consists of giants like HSBC and vaccine producer AstraZeneca, while the CAC 40 Index is home to LVMH, which made Bernard Arnault the richest man in the world for a period of time last year.

Nonetheless, Apple’s market cap exceeds that of the 100 companies in the FTSE, as well as the 40 in each of the CAC and DAX indexes.

Stock/Index	Market Cap ($T)	Country of Origin
Apple	$3.00T	🇺🇸
FTSE 100	$2.90T	🇬🇧
CAC 40 Index	$2.76T	🇫🇷
DAX 40 (Dax 30) Index*	$2.50T	🇩🇪

*Germany’s flagship DAX Index expanded from 30 to 40 constituents in September 2021.

It’s important to note, that while Apple’s growth is stellar, European companies have simultaneously seen a decline in their share of the overall global stock market, which helps make these comparisons even more eye-catching.

For example, before 2005, publicly-traded European companies represented almost 30% of global stock market capitalization, but those figures have been cut in half to just 15% today.

Here are some other approaches to measure Apple’s dominance.

Apple’s Revenue Per Minute vs Other Tech Giants

Stepping away from market capitalization, another unique way to measure Apple’s success is in how much sales they generate on a per minute basis. In doing so, we see that they generate a massive $848,090 per minute.

Here’s how Apple revenue per minute compares to other Big Tech giants:

Company	Revenue Per Minute
Amazon	$955,517
Apple	$848,090
Alphabet (Google)	$433,014
Microsoft	$327,823
Facebook	$213,628
Tesla	$81,766
Netflix	$50,566

Furthermore, Apple’s profits aren’t too shabby either: their $20.5 billion in net income last quarter equates to $156,000 in profits per minute.

How Apple Compares To Countries

Lastly, we can compare Apple’s market cap to the GDP of countries.

Country (excluding Apple)	Total Value ($T)
Apple	$3.0T
Italy	$2.0T
Brazil	$1.8T
Canada	$1.7T
Russia	$1.7T
South Korea	$1.6T
Australia	$1.4T
Spain	$1.4T
Mexico	$1.3T
Indonesia	$1.1T

What might be most impressive here is that Apple’s market cap eclipses the GDP of major developed economies, such as Canada and Australia. That means the company is more valuable than the entire economic production of these countries in a calendar year.

That’s some serious scale.

Technology

Companies Gone Public in 2021: Visualizing IPO Valuations

Tracking the companies that have gone public in 2021, their valuation, and how they did it.

Published

1 week ago

January 7, 2022

Omri Wallach

Companies Gone Public in 2021: Visualizing Valuations

Despite its many tumultuous turns, last year was a productive year for global markets, and companies going public in 2021 benefited.

From much-hyped tech initial public offerings (IPOs) to food and healthcare services, many companies with already large followings have gone public this year. Some were supposed to go public in 2020 but got delayed due to the pandemic, and others saw the opportunity to take advantage of a strong current market.

This graphic measures 68 companies that have gone public in 2021 — including IPOs, SPACs, and Direct Listings—as well as their subsequent valuations after listing.

Who’s Gone Public in 2021?

Historically, companies that wanted to go public employed one main method above others: the initial public offering (IPO).

But companies going public today readily choose from one of three different options, depending on market situations, associated costs, and shareholder preference:

Initial Public Offering (IPO): A private company creates new shares which are underwritten by a financial organization and sold to the public.
Special Purpose Acquisition Company (SPAC): A separate company with no operations is created strictly to raise capital to acquire the company going public. SPACs are the fastest method of going public, and have become popular in recent years.
Direct Listing: A private company enters a market with only existing, outstanding shares being traded and no new shares created. The cost is lower than that of an IPO, since no fees need to be paid for underwriting.

The majority of companies going public in 2021 chose the IPO route, but some of the biggest valuations resulted from direct listings.

Listing Date	Company	Valuation ($B)	Listing Type
08-Jan-21	Clover Health	$7.0	SPAC
13-Jan-21	Affirm	$11.9	IPO
13-Jan-21	Billtrust	$1.3	SPAC
14-Jan-21	Poshmark	$3.0	IPO
15-Jan-21	Playtika	$11.0	IPO
21-Jan-21	Hims and Hers Health	$1.6	SPAC
28-Jan-21	Qualtrics	$15.0	IPO
09-Feb-21	Metromile	-	SPAC
11-Feb-21	Bumble	$8.2	IPO
26-Feb-21	ChargePoint Holdings	-	SPAC
03-Mar-21	Oscar Health	$7.9	IPO
10-Mar-21	Roblox	$30.0	Direct Listing
11-Mar-21	Coupang	$60.0	IPO
23-Mar-21	DigitalOcean	$5.0	IPO
25-Mar-21	VIZIO	$3.9	IPO
26-Mar-21	ThredUp	$1.3	IPO
31-Mar-21	Coursera	$4.3	IPO
01-Apr-21	Compass	$8.0	IPO
14-Apr-21	Coinbase	$86.0	Direct Listing
15-Apr-21	AppLovin	$28.6	IPO
21-Apr-21	UiPath	$35.0	IPO
21-Apr-21	DoubleVerify	$4.2	IPO
05-May-21	The Honest Company	$1.4	IPO
07-May-21	Lightning eMotors	$0.82	SPAC
07-May-21	Blade Air Mobility	$0.83	SPAC
19-May-21	Squarespace	$7.4	Direct Listing
19-May-21	Procore	$9.6	IPO
19-May-21	Oatly	$10.0	IPO
26-May-21	ZipRecruiter	$2.4	Direct Listing
26-May-21	FIGS	$4.4	IPO
01-Jun-21	SoFi	$8.7	SPAC
02-Jun-21	BarkBox	$1.6	SPAC
08-Jun-21	Marqueta	$15.0	IPO
10-Jun-21	Monday.com	$7.5	IPO
16-Jun-21	WalkMe	$2.5	IPO
22-Jun-21	Sprinklr	$3.7	IPO
24-Jun-21	Confluent	$9.1	IPO
29-Jun-21	Clear	$4.5	IPO
30-Jun-21	SentinelOne	$10.0	IPO
30-Jun-21	LegalZoom	$7.0	IPO
30-Jun-21	Didi Chuxing	$73.0	IPO
16-Jul-21	Blend	$4	IPO
21-Jul-21	Kaltura	$1.24	IPO
21-Jul-21	DISCO	$2.5	IPO
21-Jul-21	Couchbase	$1.4	IPO
23-Jul-21	Vtex	$3.5	IPO
23-Jul-21	Outbrain	$1.1	IPO
28-Jul-21	Duolingo	$3.7	IPO
28-Jul-21	Riskified	$3.3	IPO
29-Jul-21	Robinhood	$32.0	IPO
22-Sep-21	Toast	$22.0	IPO
22-Sep-21	Freshworks	$10.1	IPO
23-Sep-21	Remitly	$6.9	IPO
28-Sep-21	Amplitude	$6.4	Direct Listing
29-Sep-21	Warby Parker	$6.0	Direct Listing
14-Oct-21	GitLab	$11.0	IPO
27-Oct-21	Rent the Runway	$1.7	IPO
29-Oct-21	Udemy	$4.0	IPO
03-Nov-21	Allbirds	$2.2	IPO
04-Nov-21	NerdWallet	$1.2	IPO
10-Nov-21	Rivian	$66.5	IPO
10-Nov-21	Expensify	$2.2	IPO
11-Nov-21	Winc	-	IPO
11-Nov-21	Weave	-	IPO
17-Nov-21	UserTesting	-	IPO
17-Nov-21	Braze	$6.0	IPO
18-Nov-21	Sweetgreen	$3.0	IPO
09-Dec-21	Nubank	$41.0	IPO

Though there are many well-known names in the list, one of the biggest through lines continues to be the importance of tech.

A majority of 2021’s newly public companies have been in tech, including multiple mobile apps, websites, and online services. The two biggest IPOs so far were South Korea’s Coupang, an online marketplace valued at $60 billion after going public, and China’s ride-hailing app Didi Chuxing, the year’s largest post-IPO valuation at $73 billion.

And there were many apps and services going public through other means as well. Gaming company Roblox went public through a direct listing, earning a valuation of $30 billion, and cryptocurrency platform Coinbase has earned the year’s largest valuation so far, with an $86 billion valuation following its direct listing.

Big Companies Going Public in 2022

As with every year, some of the biggest companies going public were lined up for the later half.

Tech will continue to be the talk of the markets. Payment processing firm Stripe was setting up to be the year’s biggest IPO with an estimated valuation of $95 billion, but got delayed. Likewise, online grocery delivery platform InstaCart, which saw a big upswing in traction due to the pandemic, has been looking to go public at a valuation of at least $39 billion.

Of course, it’s common that potential public listings and offerings fall through. Whether they get delayed due to weak market conditions or cancelled at the last minute, anything can happen when it comes to public markets.

This post has been updated as of January 1, 2022.