Strong global growth in venture capital investment has increased the number of startups known as unicorns that have been valued at $1 billion or more. Over 500 unicorn startups exist now, including well-known companies like Uber, Airbnb, and Pinterest, according to reports.
The increase in unicorns is evidence of a thriving and expanding venture capital market. It also shows that venture capitalists are ready to stake a lot of money in businesses with strong growth prospects.
For startups, the rapid increase in VC funding on a worldwide scale is encouraging. Startups have a higher chance of obtaining the finance they require to promote their cutting-edge goods and services if there is more cash available.
Considering that the global venture capital investment market size is expected to reach US$ 233.9 billion in 2022, you might wonder who the 2023’s industry’s biggest players are.
World’s top 15 venture capital firms for 2023 are listed below:
- Sequoia Capital
Location: Menlo Park, CA
AUM: $28B
The mere name of Sequoia Capital as the main investor tends to attract other investors, as it is arguably the most well-known of all VC companies. They rarely get it wrong. The companies Apple, Cisco, Google, Instagram, LinkedIn, PayPal, WhatsApp, and Zoom are well-known for their investments.
- Andreessen Horowitz
Location: Menlo Park, CA
AUM: $35B
Andreessen Horowitz, whose name is linked to some of the biggest names in technology, was only established in 2009, making it a relative newcomer to the field. The company has made significant investments in companies like Facebook, Groupon, Twitter, and Zynga.
- Kleiner Perkins
Location: Menlo Park, CA
AUM: $6.8B
In 2023, Kleiner Perkins will turn 51, and throughout that time, it has had many remarkable triumphs. America Online, Amazon, Electronic Arts, Google, Netscape, Sun Microsystems, and Compaq are a few of them. The business has invested early in around 1,000 different technology businesses.
- Khosla Ventures
Location: Menlo Park, CA.
AUM: $15B
Khosla Ventures was founded in 2004 by Vinod Khosla, a former general partner of Kleiner Perkins, and is closely related to KP. Khosla Ventures not only finances technology companies but also makes investments in cleantech. Among its notable investments are DoorDash, Square, instacart, Stripe.
- Battery Ventures
Location: Boston, MA
AUM: $13B
Boston’s iconic venture capital firm, Battery Ventures, was established in 1983, 40 years ago. It makes investments in consumer, industrial, and life sciences technologies as well as application and infrastructure software. Among its well-known investments are Groupon, Glassdoor, Databricks, CoinBase, and Glassdoor.
- New Enterprise Associates (NEA)
Location: Chevy Chase, MD.
AUM: $20B.
NEA is an outlier on this list despite having a presence in Menlo Park like the majority of the other organizations. But given that it has been around for close to 50 years, many new firms turn to it. It has agreements with more well-known companies including Patreon, Plaid, Upstart, and UpWork.
- Founders Fund
Location: San Francisco, CA.
AUM: $11B
Inextricably related to the names behind Founders Fund are Peter Thiel and Sean Parker, who founded Napster, OpenAI, Palantir, and PayPal, respectively. Along with its most well-known investment, Facebook, the Founders Fund has also made investments in Lyft, Deepmind, SpaceX, Stripe, and Spotify.
- First Round Capital
Location: San Francisco, CA.
AUM: $3B
First Round sets itself apart from the majority of the larger VC companies on the west coast by investing at the seed stage as its mode of operation. On its website, it expressly acknowledges that Series B and C companies are already too old for their investments. Rover, WarbyParker, Uber, and Blue Apron.
- Accel
Location: Palo Alto, CA.
AUM: $50B+
Accel, a well-known VC firm that was established in 1983, was able to expand internationally by setting up offices in China and Europe as a result of its success in California. It continues to maintain a wide range of investments, from consumer to infrastructure. Among its well-known investments are Atlassian, Rovio, Braintree, Etsy, and Rovio.
- Greylock Partners
Location: Menlo Park, CA.
AUM: $3.5B
The oldest company on the list is about 60 years old. Greylock’s executive team, which includes Reid Hoffman, a co-founder of LinkedIn, is credited with helping the investment firm regularly re-energize and change its investing strategy. Among its well-known investments are CoinBase, Facebook, Figma, and Discord.
- Tiger Global Management
Location: New York, NY.
AUM: $125B
Tiger Global has been the most active US venture capital fund since before the start of the epidemic, even though it also engages in private equity, hedge funds, and other forms of investment. Among its well-known investments are Chime, and Data Bricks.
- Index Ventures
Location: San Francisco, CA.
AUM: $13B
Although Index Ventures has two headquarters, one of which is in San Francisco, it is more typically recognized as a European venture capital firm. It was established in 1996, over three decades ago, and makes technological investments with a focus on e-commerce, fintech, mobility, gambling, infrastructure, and security. Betfair, MySQL, Facebook, and Zendesk are a few of its more well-known investments.
- Softbank Vision Fund
Location: London, UK.
AUM: $154B
About five years ago, it seemed like any promising new technology-based company was doomed to failure unless Softbank Vision Fund had backed them. Even though the novelty of Softbank’s activities has somewhat worn off after a few bad investments, it is still a venture capital fund to be taken seriously. Known investments include WeWork, ByteDance, DoorDash, and Revolut.
- Lightspeed Venture Partners
Location: Menlo Park, CA.
AUM: $18B
In 2000, just as the venture capital industry was on the verge of a dot-com crash, Lightspeed Venture Partners was established. After surviving that extremely volatile time, it significantly expanded, concentrating on multi-stage investments in business, consumers, and health. Lightspeed has made well-known investments in companies like Grubhub, Flixster, Cameo, and Giphy.
- Spark Capital
Location: San Francisco, CA.
AUM: $5B
With a broad mandate to invest in early-stage consumer, retail, FinTech, software, frontier, and media firms, Spark Capital was established in 2005. The business acknowledges that it has been successful in giving all partners, not just the partner allocated to the deal, an overview of each contract utilizing project management software like DealRoom. It has invested in well-known companies like Twitter, Tumblr, Oculus, and Snap.
