AI, Web3 And E-Commerce Led For New Unicorns In April 2024

Gené Teare @geneteare

Eleven companies joined The Crunchbase Unicorn Board in April 2024 — a big jump up from the six companies that joined in April 2023 but still a fraction of the 40 added to the board in April 2022.

The AI, Web3 and e-commerce sectors each added two companies to the board, Crunchbase data shows.

Of the 11 new unicorns created last month, six are U.S.-based, with one each from Germany, France, Brazil, Cayman Islands and Australia.

The largest round among the new unicorns was raised by Xaira Therapeutics, which announced an initial funding of $1 billion as it launched out of stealth.

Two of the new April unicorn companies were valued at a billion in their first year: Xaira Therapeutics and Cognition.

Two unicorn companies also exited the board at valuations above their last private value. Cybersecurity company Rubrik and cash reward company Ibotta both went public in April on the New York Stock Exchange.

And four companies already listed as unicorns increased valuation from prior rounds. Island, a secure browser company, doubled its valuation from its previous funding round six months ago. And FloQast, Rippling and Ramp each raised up rounds from prior fundings.

Let’s look at the new unicorns in April by sector.

AI

Cognition, maker of Devin, an AI software engineering teammate, raised a $175 million Series A funding led by Founders Fund. The less than 1-year-old San Francisco company was valued at $2 billion.
San Francisco-based Perplexity AI raised a $63 million funding led by Daniel Gross, former lead of AI at Y Combinator. The 1-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.

E-commerce

Berlin-based Autodoc, an online auto parts dealer, raised a minority funding led by Apollo. The 15-year-old company was valued at $2.5 billion.
Social video commerce app Flip raised a $144 million Series C led by Streamlined Ventures. The 4-year-old company based in Los Angeles was valued at $1.2 billion.

Web3

Blockchain platform Berachain, a 2-year-old company based in the Cayman Islands, raised a $100 million Series B. The funding, led by Framework Ventures and Brevan Howard Digital, valued the company at $1.5 billion.
New York-based Monad, a 1-year-old company, raised a $225 million Series A funding. The company is a layer 1 blockchain that can process Ethereum transactions faster. The funding was led by crypto investor Paradigm and was valued at $1 billion.

Healthcare

AI drug discovery platform Xaira Therapeutics, based in San Francisco, launched with a $1 billion Series A funding. The company was incubated by Arch Venture Partners and Foresite Capital, which led the funding.

Security and privacy

New York-based data security platform Cyera raised a $300 million Series C led by Coatue. The 2-year-old company was valued at $1.4 billion.

Professional services

Paris-based business forecasting platform Pigment raised a $144 million Series D that valued the company at $1 billion. The funding was led by Iconiq Growth. The 4-year-old company announced it had tripled its revenue and doubled its customer base in the last year.

Financial Services

São Paulo-based QI Tech, a financial services infrastructure company, raised an undisclosed amount in a Series B extension led by General Atlantic that valued the 5-year-old company at $1 billion. General Atlantic also led its $200 million Series B funding six months earlier. QI Tech provides businesses with the ability to offer credit and banking services to customers.

Food and beverage

New South Wales-based Guzman y Gomez, a Mexican-themed restaurant chain in Australia, raised $135 million at a value of $1.7 billion. The 17-year-old company plans to expand to the U.S. market.

Related Crunchbase unicorn queries

The Crunchbase Private Unicorn Company List (1,532)
Unicorns in the U.S. (741)
Unicorns in Asia (493)
European unicorns (209)
Unicorns from LatAm (35)
Emerging unicorn leaderboard (387)
Exited unicorns (453)

Methodology

The Crunchbase Unicorn Board is a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more and is based on Crunchbase data. New companies are added to the Unicorn Board as they reach the $1 billion valuation mark as part of a funding round.

The unicorn board does not reflect internal company valuations — such as those set via a 409a process for employee stock options — as these differ from, and are more likely to be lower than, a priced funding round. We also do not adjust valuations based on investor writedowns, which change quarterly, as different investors will not value the same company consistently within the same quarter.

Funding to unicorn companies includes all private financings to companies that are tagged as unicorns, as well as those that have since graduated to The Exited Unicorn Board.

Exits analyzed here only include the first time a company exits.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. Crunchbase converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to Crunchbase long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

Illustration: Dom Guzman