Cette entreprise sous-radar de Berlin est l'investisseur le plus actif dans les nouvelles licornes jusqu'à présent en 2023

Editor’s note: Data is from La planche licorne Crunchbase, a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more, based on disclosed fundings in Crunchbase. 

When you consider the investors putting money into new unicorn startups, maybe you think of storied Silicon Valley names like Sequoia Capital ainsi que Kleiner Perkins, or large New York firms like Tiger Global ainsi que Partenaires Insight that in recent years have dominated startup investment.

But in another sign of how much the market tides have shifted, the top investor leading rounds for new unicorn startups so far this year is none of those. Instead, it’s a relatively small, under-the-radar investor based in Berlin.

Entreprise d'investissement en phase de démarrage b2venture was the most active investor in new unicorn startups in the first half of 2023, Crunchbase data shows. The firm participated in nine funding rounds across three new unicorn startups — a significant portion of the only 44 total new unicorns minted in H1 2023.

B2venture is followed by multistage venture firms Index Ventures, Google Ventures ainsi que Andreessen Horowitz — all tied for the rank of second-most active, with eight investments each in the new unicorns that joined La planche licorne Crunchbase dans la première moitié de 2023.

This lineup looks very different from the firms that amassed a huge portfolio of unicorn companies in the last few years — namely Tiger Global, Accel, Andreessen Horowitz and Sequoia.

Of these four firms, Andreessen Horowitz still made the leading H1 2023 list, with three portfolio companies and eight investments in this batch.

B2venture also stands out on this list for investing in all three of the newly anointed unicorns from Germany so far this year. It has also been a consistent investor in these new unicorn companies. The firm started investing as early as 2009 and continued into 2023 in translation company DeepL, technologie financière Raisin and sustainable energy company 1Komme5°, with initial investment at seed or Series A and participation in follow-on funding rounds.

Baisse de 80%

New unicorn counts fell 80% year over year in the first half of 2023, with just 44 companies earning that title — a far cry from the 251 companies that joined the Unicorn Board in H1 2022 and the 295 in H1 2021. The decline in new unicorns underscores the precipitous decline in late-stage financings au cours des 12 derniers mois.

The U.S. remains the largest market for new unicorns. Of this year’s new unicorn companies, half are headquartered in the U.S., a quarter are in China, and six are based in Europe.

The AI moment

For the new batch of unicorns the leading sector was — no surprise — AI. Companies in the sector make up 25% of new unicorns this year.

Corporate investors have been actively investing in AI. Nvidia and its venture arm NVentures combined have participated in five investments in newly minted AI unicorn companies this year. Another corporate investor, Salesforce Ventures 1, participated in funding three of these AI unicorn companies in 2023.

Consistent investors

Other consistent investors include Index Ventures in Adhérer and Raisin; Google Ventures in Gentilhomme ainsi que Police de caractères; Andreessen in KoBold Metal ainsi que Répéter; A.CapitalVentures in Caractère.ai; Manteau in Notre prochaine énergie; MMC Ventures in Synthesia, Fonds de libération in Bleupha; Aqua Spark in ePêche; AlbionVC ainsi que HSBC in QuantexaEt Partenaires Valor Equity ainsi que Entreprises S3 in Atmosphère.

These investors stand to gain the most from potential future exits as they continue to invest to maintain their equity stakes in some of their most highly valued companies.

Gros enjeux

Despite their more recent pullback in unicorn investing, lead investors who have built a large portfolio of highly valued private companies won’t lose their perch as the most active investors anytime soon. Consider that Tiger Global still has the highest count of current unicorn portfolio companies with more than 220 (though it’s reportedly working to offload some of its stakes.)

While Tiger Global has a much larger unicorn count in highly valued private companies when compared to other leading investors, those firms still have massive unicorn portfolios of their own. Andreessen Horowitz, for example, has 108 unicorn portfolio companies, per Crunchbase. Insight Partners has 107. And Sequoia Capital and Accel each have around 100 current unicorn portfolio companies.

These companies’ rankings likely will not shift anytime soon, as a smaller number of new unicorns join the herd in the current market. But each of these firms still has a lot of value tied up in private markets — and each is no doubt eagerly waiting for the IPO market to open once again.

Requêtes liées à la licorne Crunchbase

Méthodologie

La planche licorne Crunchbase est une liste organisée qui comprend des sociétés privées de licorne avec des évaluations post-money de 1 milliard de dollars ou plus et est basée sur les données de Crunchbase. De nouvelles entreprises sont ajouté au tableau Licorne alors qu'ils atteignent la barre d'évaluation de 1 milliard de dollars dans le cadre d'un cycle de financement.

Le tableau des licornes ne reflète pas les évaluations internes de l'entreprise – telles que celles fixées via un processus 409a pour les options d'achat d'actions des employés – car elles diffèrent d'un cycle de financement tarifé et sont plus susceptibles d'être inférieures à celui-ci. Nous n'ajustons pas non plus les valorisations en fonction des dépréciations des investisseurs, qui changent tous les trimestres, car différents investisseurs n'évalueront pas la même société de manière cohérente au cours du même trimestre.

Le financement aux entreprises licornes comprend tous les financements privés aux entreprises qui sont étiquetées comme licornes, ainsi que celles qui ont depuis obtenu leur diplôme Le plateau de la licorne sortie.

Veuillez noter que toutes les valeurs de financement sont exprimées en dollars américains, sauf indication contraire. Crunchbase convertit les devises étrangères en dollars américains au taux au comptant en vigueur à partir de la date à laquelle les cycles de financement, acquisitions, introductions en bourse et autres événements financiers sont signalés. Même si ces événements ont été ajoutés à Crunchbase longtemps après l'annonce de l'événement, les transactions en devises étrangères sont converties au prix au comptant historique.

Illustration: Dom Guzmán