India has highest number of unicorn start-ups outside the US

Key highlights:

• India has the second highest number of unicorn start-ups in the world
• India currently has 9 unicorn start-up firms
• So far in 2017, there have been 42 companies added to the global unicorn club

Outside the US, India has the second highest number of unicorn start-ups in the world. While China has the highest unicorn start-ups firms after the US, India still was ahead of countries such as the UK, Germany and South Korea, according to a CB Insights report.

India currently has 9 unicorn start-up firms including Flipkart, Hike, InMobi, Ola Cabs, Paytm, ReNew Power Ventures, ShopClues, Snapdeal and Zomato.

CB Insights

“Following China, the most unicorn-rich countries are India and the UK, respectively. No “Other” country takes more than 2% of the world’s unicorns located outside the US,” said the report.

While China has 52% of the unicorn companies located outside the US, India has 9% and UK with 8% of the unicorn companies.

Today’s global unicorn club is comprised of 214 private companies that are each valued at $1 billion. Collectively, this cohort of the world’s most valuable private enterprises is worth approximately $745 billion.

While US has had the most number of unicorns, in recent years more and more unicorns have been popping up outside of the US.

CB Insights

In 2014, 37% of all companies that achieved their first $1 billion valuation were based outside the US. In 2015 that number rose to 53%, and last year rose again to 58%. So far in 2017, there have been 42 companies added to the global unicorn club; of those, 24 are based outside of the US, said the report.

Outside of the US and China, the most valuable private companies are the Indian e-commerce platform Flipkart (most recently valued at $11.6 billion), followed by music streaming service Spotify in Sweden ($8.5 billion) and daily deal site Snapdeal in India ($7 billion).

China has far and away the greatest number of private unicorn companies, at 55 total. The country is also home to the world’s top 3 most highly valued private non-US companies, led by $50 billion ride-hailing company Didi Chuxing. Rounding out the top 3 are electronics company Xiaomi ($46 billion) and online lending platform Lu.com ($18.5 billion).

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