Venture Capital: Unicorns and Where to Find Them
According to the Pitchbook Unicorn companies list & tracker (as of 2025-10-01), there are 1,539 active unicorns globally. The Crunchbase Unicorn Company List reports 1,623 unicorns (as of 2025-09-10).
A “unicorn” is a privately held company that has achieved a valuation of $1 billion or more. These companies are typically high-growth and technologically disruptive.
Currently, between 10 and 20 new unicorn companies emerge every month. We examined where these companies establish themselves and reach the unicorn status.
We analyzed the exits and unicorns that emerged in 2024.
Silicon Valley remains the undisputed global leader in generating the highest number of new unicorns. However, when it comes to the total number of successful exits, London edges ahead.
Following closely in annual exit numbers are US hubs like Los Angeles, New York, and Boston, along with Paris.
A significant contrast emerges when comparing the value of these exits. While Silicon Valley’s average exit value sits at $155 million, cities like San Diego ($256M), Chicago ($245M), and Denver-Boulder ($238M) significantly exceed this figure. Despite delivering higher-value average exits, these three cities trail far behind Silicon Valley in the volume of new unicorns they produce.
In Europe, London leads on multiple fronts. It currently produces the highest number of new unicorns (6), slightly surpassing Paris. It is also the clear frontrunner in the exit race, recording 619 exits compared to Paris’s 336. Other major European centers—including the Netherlands, Stockholm, Munich, and Berlin—lag considerably, trailing London by a factor of 5.5 to 6 in total exits.
Furthermore, London also dominates capital attraction, boasting an average funding round size of $71.4M. This is significantly ahead of Stockholm ($40.9M), Munich ($30.1M), and Paris ($26.8M).
While the list of top-performing Startup Ecosystem Cities remains largely consistent, the true insight lies in the individual trajectory of each location. Over the past decade, many of these cities have shown remarkable progress, significantly boosting their appeal to scaling startups and achieving metrics that far exceed their historical performance.
When looking at the Startup Ecosystem Cities that demonstrated the largest increase in the number of unicorn companies relative to their 2019 levels, Dallas, Texas stands out with a 6.5-fold growth. Dublin also showed significant progress, with its number of unicorns rising 5.5 times—from 2 to 11. Meanwhile, New York City reached a new high of 220 unicorns, representing a 3.4-fold increase compared to 2019.