Sequoia Capital most successful unicorn investor in the world: Hurun Report

• ByStartupStory     |    September 7, 2022

The Hurun Global Venture Capitalists is compiled by the Hurun Research Institute. The Hurun Research Institute on Tuesday released the Hurun Global Venture Capitalists 2022 Half-Year Report, a ranking of the world’s most successful venture capital investors based on the number of unicorns and gazelles in their portfolio. The cut-off date used was 30 June 2022. Hurun Research has been tracking unicorns and venture capitalists since 2017. Hurun Research then analysed the number of these start-ups that investors had in their portfolio.

Unicorns and gazelles represent the cream of the world’s start-ups. Both are start-ups founded in the 2000s and not yet listed on a public exchange. A unicorn has a valuation of over US$1bn, whilst a gazelle is worth over US$500mn and most likely to ‘go unicorn’, i.e. hit a valuation of US$1bn, within three years.

There are 1933 unicorns and gazelles in the world today, of which 1312 are unicorns and 621 are gazelles.

Hurun Report Chairman and Chief Researcher Rupert Hoogewerf says – “The Hurun Global Venture Capitalists is targeted at investors who are looking to know which venture capitals houses are best at identifying the current crop of fastest-growing start-ups in the world. The opportunity for innovation remains vast. The impact of technology is no longer just in computers but across all parts of the business world. Venture capitalists play a critical part in the start-up ecosystem, bringing money, advice and connections to help start-ups grow into global-scale business.”

“For most investors, managing to find just one of the Hurun Unicorns or Hurun Gazelles is enough for a lifetime, but the Hurun Global Venture Capitalists make it look easy, investing into hundreds of the world’s current crop of best start-ups. They have shown that they are not just a one-trick pony, getting lucky once with a big win and then coasting on their reputation.”

“How do these Venture Capitalists attract the best deals?Now is the era when their genuine expertise translates into value add for founders, especially helping them with recruitment, strategy and a war chest to grow.”

“Becoming a partner in one of the Hurun Global Venture Capitalists is the pinnacle of the venture capital world.”

If a city or country can attract the world’s most successful entrepreneurs, companies and investors to set up shop there, that will have a roll-on effect. Entrepreneurship is infectious and cities with lots of rolemodels are likely to attract the brightest and best young entrepreneurs. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy.

Hurun’s ‘startup series’ has four main components. It begins with the Hurun U30s Entrepreneurs to Watch, a list of the top entrepreneurs under the age of 30. Next up are two ‘future unicorn’ lists: Hurun Cheetahs, most likely to ‘go unicorn’ within 5 years and currently with a valuation of over US$300 million, and Hurun Gazelles, most likely to ‘go unicorn’ within 3 years and currently with a valuation of over US$500 million. The Hurun Global Unicorn Index is the pinnacle of the world’s start-ups. Behind all these start-ups lie the Hurun Global Venture Capitalists, the ‘entrepreneurs behind the entrepreneurs.”

Top ten successful venture capitalists in the world

Sequoia Capital is top by a long shot, investing into 328 of the Hurun Global Unicorns and Gazelles, up 43 in 6mths. Key bets include ByteDance, Shein, Vision Energy, Canva, Stripe, Instacart, Chime, FTX, BYJU’s and Citadel Securities. Investment legend Don Valentine founded Sequoia Capital in Menlo Park 50 years ago, just as the term ‘Silicon Valley’ was being coined

 SoftBank. Japan’s SoftBank has invested into 217 Unicorns and Gazelles, helping it overtake Tiger Global to second place. Legendary founder Masayoshi Son is known for placing big bets on start-ups, making his name especially with Alibaba. Other recent notable investments include Revolut, OYO, Better.com, Automation Anywhere, Biofourmis, Kushki, Material Bank, Agile Robots, and Ola Electric.

Tiger Global. New York-based Tiger Global manages over US$20 billion and benefitted from the rise in share prices of tech companies such as Zoom during the pandemic. Founded in 2001 by Chase Coleman III, Tiger Global was one of the earliest VCs to invest in start-ups across the world and is known for its fast decision-making and so-called ‘Tiger Vouchers’, that give its portfolio access to services from world-class consultants.

Tencent Investment. Shenzhen-based Tencent Investment seems to be the odd-one out in the Top 10, in that it is a corporate venture arm of a one of the world’s largest tech companies Tencent Holdings. The firm prefers to invest in the wireless internet, new media, online games, social networks and e-commerce sectors. It has funded more than 1,300 companies worldwide to date, including Scalapay, Blockstream, CMR, Surgical, Discord, GO-JEK, Lydia, Nowports and Swiggy.

CICC Capital is 5th,Headquartered in Beijing, CICC Capital was founded in 2017 and has grown into one of China’s leading private investment managers. CICC has invested in unicorn companies such as United Imaging and Horizon Robotics, as well as gazelle companies such as CH Biomedical and Dera.

Accel Founded in 1983 in Palo Alto by Jim Swartz and Arthur Patterson, made its name especially with Facebook and today has a strong global outreach.

Y Combinator Founded in 2005 by four partners, led by Paul Graham and Jessica Livingstone, Y Combinator had early successes with Dropbox, Airbnb, Stripe, Doordash, Teespring, Heroku, Optimisely and Reddit.

Andreessen Horowitz. Menlo Park-based Andreessen Horowitz was a late comer to the venture capital party, starting out only after the financial crisis in 2009 when seasoned entrepreneurs Ben Horowitz and Marc Andreessen came together but has grown aggressively into a Top 10 player.  Early hits included Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Skype, Okta and Slack.

Insight Partners. New York-based Insight, founded over 25 years ago, has almost US$100 billion in total assets under management. Prominent portfolio hits include FTX, Automattic, Checkout.com, Databricks, BigPanda, BlaBlaCar, Dataiku, and Sisense.

Lightspeed Venture Partners. Menlo Park-based Lightspeed started out after the dotcom bubble burst in 2000. Early successes were built around enterprise software, including Nimble Storage, Nutanix, MuleSoft and AppDynamics, but it was Snapchat that really made its name.

A Gazelle is a start-up founded in the 2000s, worth over US$500mn, not yet listed on a public exchange and most likely to ‘go unicorn’, i.e. hit a valuation of US$1bn, within three years.

About Hurun Inc. 

Established in the UK in 1999, Hurun is a research, media and investments group, promoting entrepreneurship through its lists and research. Hurun provides research reports co-branded with some of the world’s leading financial insitutions, real estate developers and regional governments.

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