AI Startups Made Up Nearly Half of New Unicorns in 2024 - Doubling Their Share from the Previous Year

February 26, 11:43 am

In 2024, 83 companies joined the global unicorn club, a sharp decline compared to the unicorn frenzy of 2022 and 2023, when hundreds of startups crossed the $1 billion valuation mark. Although becoming a unicorn has become much harder, the AI sector defied this trend, producing more unicorns than any other industry.

According to data presented by AltIndex.com, AI companies made up nearly half of all new unicorns in 2024, doubling their share from the previous year.

AI Unicorns Surged by 66% Year-over-Year, Defying the Broader Market Slowdown

The number of unicorns, or private startups valued at $1 billion or more, has skyrocketed over the past decade, climbing to 1,258 by the end of last year. Still, achieving unicorn status has become much harder despite the billions in venture capital funding flowing into startups. The annual count of new billion-dollar startups has been slowing down for some time now, and 2024 was no exception.

According to CBInsights, 83 companies joined this club last year, 16 more than in 2023, but a steep decline from the peak of 255 in 2022. However, this negative trend didn`t affect the AI sector, delivering more unicorns than any other industry and more than the previous year.

Statistics show AI startups accounted for 45% of all new unicorns in 2024, with 36 out of 83 companies making the list. That’s a massive 66% increase from 2023, when just 22 AI startups reached unicorn status, proving that investor appetite for artificial intelligence remains stronger than ever.

The number of new AI unicorns is even more interesting when compared to other sectors. For instance, the fintech and crypto sectors produced only 16 new unicorns, representing just 20% of the total or half of AI’s market share. Other sectors lagged even further behind. Enterprise software, cybersecurity, and transportation tech markets produced only 10,6 and 2 unicorns last year, respectively.

Total AI Unicorn Count Has Tripled in Just Four Years

With 36 new AI startups joining the unicorn club in 2024 alone, the total number of AI unicorns has surged to 245. This represents a trifold increase since 2020 when their number stood at 78. In global comparison, more than 60% of these companies are headquartered in the United States, five times more than in Asia or Europe. By the end of 2024, Asia counted 37 AI unicorns, just two more than Europe, highlighting the US dominance in AI innovation.

In terms of valuation, OpenAI remains the undisputed king. According to CB Insights, the company behind the ChatGPT more than doubled its value in a single year, reaching a staggering $157 billion. Also, that is 2.5 times more than the valuation of Databricks, the second-largest AI unicorn worth around $62 billion. Anthropic, Elon Musk`s xAI, and CoreWeave follow, with values of $60 billion, $50 billion, and $23 billion, respectively.

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