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Tag: unicorns

  • Meet the new European unicorns of 2026 | TechCrunch

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    January was such a long month that it has already brought us five fresh European unicorns: from Belgium to Ukraine, several tech startups raised funding at valuations above the $1 billion threshold.

    But before we take a closer look at who joined the club, two caveats.

    First: This count includes startups that may be incorporated elsewhere but have their roots or a large part of their team in Europe. Until a pan-European corporate structure exists (often called “EU Inc”), this split will remain common — and we’ve decided to overlook it. Take Lovable, which is incorporated in Delaware but cannot be dissociated from Stockholm’s startup scene.

    Second: valuation doesn’t equal commercial success, and it is too early to tell whether all of these companies will achieve the kind of traction that Lovable has, with the company recently crossing $300 million in annual recurring revenue. But in the current climate, the fact that VCs were willing to invest in them at unicorn valuations is a strong signal of where the appetite is. 

    With these caveats out of the way, let’s dive in.

    Aikido 

    Belgium-based cybersecurity startup Aikido Security reached unicorn status with its $60 million Series B funding round. Valuing the company at $1 billion, the round was led by DST Global, with participation from PSG Equity, Singular, Notion Capital, and others.

    According to a press release, the funding will help Aikido enhance its platform, which was built to unify security across the entire software lifecycle and is already used by more than 100,000 teams globally. The company also reported “five-times revenue growth and nearly three-times customer growth” over the last year.

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    In a blog post, the startup celebrated this milestone and its significance. According to its team, “in an industry dominated by Palo Alto and Tel Aviv heavyweights, Aikido shows that Europe can build a world-class software security company and win globally.”

    Cast AI 

    Cloud optimization company Cast AI is headquartered in Florida, but has Lithuanian roots and a major office in Vilnius — which explains why many now consider it to have become Lithuania’s fifth unicorn.

    Cast AI’s valuation now exceeds $1 billion following a strategic investment from Pacific Alliance Ventures (PAV), the U.S.-based corporate venture arm of Korean conglomerate Shinsegae Group. In April 2025, Cast AI raised a $108 million Series C that had reportedly already brought the company close to unicorn territory.

    Alongside its latest funding round, the company also introduced OMNI Compute for AI, which aims to help users deploy more AI workloads on fewer GPUs and remove regional capacity constraints.

    Harmattan AI 

    French defense tech company Harmattan AI was only founded in 2024, but is already worth $1.4 billion, according to its latest funding round. The $200 million Series B was led by Dassault Aviation, maker of the Rafale fighter jets, and also ties into a broader partnership.

    Before securing this key partner, Harmattan AI had already signed agreements with the French and British ministries of defense and with Ukrainian drone maker Skyeton, amid growing appetite for autonomous defense aircraft.

    Osapiens 

    German ESG software firm Osapiens raised a $100 million Series C led by Decarbonization Partners, a joint venture between BlackRock and Temasek, which valued the company at over $1.1 billion.

    Founded in Mannheim in 2018, Osapiens now has more than 2,400 customers worldwide, including large multinational companies that rely on its platforms and tools for sustainability reporting and data compliance, but also to mitigate supply chain risks.

    Preply

    The 14-year-old language learning marketplace Preply is now a unicorn valued at $1.2 billion — a milestone that also embodies Ukrainian resilience. The edtech company was founded in the United States, but its founders are Ukrainian and supporters of their home country, where Preply has a team of 150 employees.

    According to its CEO, Kirill Bigai, who believes in AI-enhanced learning, proceeds from the $150 million Series D round will help the startup hire more AI talent across its four offices — now located in Barcelona, London, New York, and Kyiv.

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    Anna Heim

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  • Substack, Lovable, and More: 10 of the Newest Unicorns to Hit $1 Billion

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    The third quarter was an active one when it came to generating unicorns. Just shy of 30 companies closed funding rounds that saw their valuation top $1 billion. And, yes, plenty of them were in the AI space, but there were also several other types of companies catching the eyes of backers.

    July saw 13 new unicorns, bringing the total list to more than 1,600 for the first time. August was a desert, with just four joining the club. But things opened up again in September, with a dozen more companies crossing the threshold. (And while it’s technically the fourth quarter, October is off to a solid start with five new unicorns, including Polymarket and Reflection AI. Year to date, CB Insights says 86 startups have joined the unicorn list. )

    Here’s a look at 10 of the freshly minted unicorns from the third quarter.

    Substack

    Arguably one of the better-known new unicorns, San Francisco-based Substack (which currently boasts more than 5 million paid subscriptions on its publishing platform) raised $100 million in a Series C round in July. Bond and The Chernin Group led the round for the 8-year-old company, which was founded by Chris Best, Jairaj Sethi, and Hamish McKenzie. That put its valuation at $1.1 billion.

    Lovable

    Few companies can claim unicorn status in under two years, but vibe coding startup Lovable hit the mark in July, just 8 months after Anton Osika founded it. That came following a $200 million Series A round led by Accel, which put a $1.8 billion valuation on the Stockholm, Sweden-based company. Annual recurring revenue has already topped $100 million and the company says it has 180,000 paying subscribers.

    Xpanceo

    Dubai-based Xpanceo, founded by Roman Axelrod and Valentyn S. Volkov, is working on a smart contact lens, which it says will offer everything from night vision and the ability to visually zoom in to health tracking. In July, it closed a $250 million Series A round led by Hong Kong’s Opportunity Venture, which put the four-year old company’s valuation at $1.35 billion.

    Decart

    Decart, founded by Dean Leitersdorf, made it halfway to unicorn status last December, hitting the $500 million mark. In August, though, the San Francisco-based company, which transforms live footage into immersive digital environments in real time, raised another $100 million in a Series B round. That raised its value to $3.1 billion. Previous investors Sequoia Capital, Benchmark and Zeev Ventures along with newcomer Aleph took part in the round.

    Field AI

    This Mission Viejo, Calif.-based robotics company raised $314 million in August, bringing its valuation to $2 billion valuation. Founded by Ali Agha, it counts Bill Gates among its backers, and has investments from Jeff Bezos’ family office and Nvidia’s venture arm. Its staff also includes former employees of DeepMind, NASA, Tesla and SpaceX. The company creates models that control robotics, largely in industrial industries, including construction.

    Kriya Therapeutics

    Kriya Therapeutics, founded by Shankar Ramaswamy and based in Palo Alto, Calif, is a gene therapy biopharmaceutical company that is working to eliminate a variety of chronic diseases and expand clinical trials. In late July, it raised $313 million in Series C round, quickly following that up with a Series D round in September of $320 million. That one-two punch led to a valuation of $1.7 billion.

    Etraveli

    Based in Uppsala, Sweden, Etraveli is a travel technology company that operates several platforms to book flights in Europe. It also powers flight reservations for Booking.com. Founded by Mathias Hedlund and Christer Wallberg, the company closed a private equity funding in July led by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR), which bumped its value up to $3.1 billion.

    Ambience Healthcare

    Ambience Healthcare, in late July, closed a Series C round for $243 million. That increased the San Francisco-based company’s valuation to $1.3 billion. Ambience, founded in 2020 by Nikhil Buduma and Mike Ng, has created a platform that uses AI for documentation and point-of-care medical coding. It’s currently used by 40 health systems in the U.S., including Cleveland Clinic, UCSF Health, and Houston Methodist.

    Also

    A spinoff from EV manufacturer Rivian, Palo Alto-based Also plans to build products in the e-bike and so-called micromobility sector. The company raised $200 million in July, securing unicorn status with a $1 billion valuation. The July raise came just four months after it secured $105 million from Eclipse Ventures.

    Eve

    One of the newest unicorns on the list, Redmond City, Calif-based Eve offers legal AI solutions for law firms. Those can range from drafting legal documents for plaintiffs to managing the discovery process to case intake management. The goal is to help firms handle their caseloads quickly and accurately. Eve, founded by Jay Madheswaran, Matt Noe and David Zeng, currently processes more than 200,000 legal cases annually and says it has helped firms recover over $3.5 billion in settlements and judgments. Founded in 2023, the company is currently valued at $1 billion, following a $103 million Series B funding round at the end of September.

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    Chris Morris

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  • Raising $100 million is easier than $1 million — a tragedy for early-stage companies | Fortune

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    Recently, my company, XPANCEO, closed a $250 million Series A round at a $1.35 billion valuation. It was the largest Series A ever raised in the MENA region, and the largest in the AR/VR and wearables spaces worldwide.

    But the real story here is what this round reveals about the state of venture capital today. Raising $100 million has, in many ways, become easier than raising $1 million.

    Venture capital has quietly inverted. The early-stage checks that once launched bold ideas have gradually disappeared, while capital continues to flow, if you can survive long enough to earn it.

    The venture capital hourglass

    In the 2000s and 2010s, small funds and angel syndicates thrived. Tens of millions of dollars were freely distributed, and founders armed with a pitch deck and big dreams could walk out of a meeting with $250,000. The assumption was simple. In a fast-growing internet economy, a small bet on the right team could scale into something extraordinary.

    Conviction funding is gone. Investors now expect founders, especially in deep tech, to show working hardware, patents, early traction, and a clear roadmap just to be considered. This is what I call the “hourglass effect.” At the top, massive pools of capital remain eager to back proven winners. At the bottom, scrappy individuals still chase ideas. The middle — traditionally where seed and early Series A funding helped promising startups survive the “valley of death” — has thinned out. Instead of nurturing bold concepts through this early stage, investors are now implicitly asking that entrepreneurs crawl through it alone.

    From conviction to caution

    Why is early-stage funding dwindling? First, the market matured. Two decades ago, a startup could add millions of new users. Today, Facebook competes with platforms like Twitch and Reddit for the same finite base. Growth now comes from stealing market share, not from adding new users. The same is true across industries — content platforms, computers, or smartphones.

    Second, scandals have scarred the system. Ventures like Theranos and Nikola became shorthand for unchecked hype. Investors began to fear not only fraud, but also the “serial fund-raiser” — a founder who raises capital, lives off it, burns cash, and repeats the cycle without ever turning a profit or building durable value. 

    Finally, safer, faster-growing alternatives emerged. Why wire $250,000 into a seed-stage company when it feels like a gamble and you could ride a rocket in the public markets with Tesla during COVID or with NVIDIA now? 

    Market inevitability as the only proof

    For deep tech founders, the stakes of this early-stage funding crunch are higher. A software startup can point to user / revenue metrics to demonstrate “product-market fit.” Deep tech ventures cannot. Their only path is demonstrating market inevitability. You need to show that the problem you are solving must be solved, and that your approach is credible enough to get there. 

    Here, evidence is what gets founders through the door. Patents, prototypes, and scientific validation don’t necessarily prove that there is a market today, but they prove you can move from theory to execution. This trust and credibility have become the way into serious conversations.

    The recent wave of nine-figure rounds — OpenAI, Perplexity, Anthropic — reflects this extreme filtering. Larger amounts of capital come from investors who are willing to pay a higher risk premium for a company that has already proven to have solid odds of success. This is driving the boom around AI.

    The ladder of needs

    These biggest players now sit at the top of what I describe as a ladder of needs, together with hardware manufacturers. Around them is XR, positioned as the interface layer for the next generation of computing. AI is treated as the foundation, so to say as a system that interacts with users through multiple interfaces.

    Capital follows accordingly. Valuations in the hundreds of billions and investments in the hundreds of millions (sometimes billions) are justified by the hope that these ventures will be ultimately acquired by larger companies. 

    The effects of this reach beyond the capital markets. At a recent wedding, I met several people who had moved to Los Angeles during the pandemic. Now, driven by AI FOMO, they are looking to move back, either to get jobs at firms like Google or to build their own AI ventures. At least there’s a silver lining — San Francisco’s housing market is heating up again, so now the overpriced coffee isn’t the only thing thriving.

    How the companies of 2030 can survive the first ‘valley of death’

    So, in this landscape, what can early-stage founders do? The fundamentals are the same, but the bar is higher. Founders must be willing to invest personal resources until the point where they can build a prototype, secure a patent, or showcase some tangible progress. The era of “we need $2 million to hire McKinsey to write a report on how to test our first hypotheses” is over. Investors want evidence, not theory.

    I actually see this trend as positive. It’s a natural filter — one that rewards founders who are determined, goal-oriented, and stubborn enough to carry the load. Using your own grit and determination, your own savings, friends and family, even mortgaging apartments and cars if needed, you crawl your way to your product.

    Survival depends on four pillars. Founders must articulate a clear vision of the future and how their product fits into it. Then, they need a team capable of delivering that vision. The third essential is a very clear roadmap — broken down into the maximum number of achievable milestones, with a concrete plan for what comes next at each point.  And the final — and very important one — is persistence. More than ever, entrepreneurs must have the will to keep moving, especially when momentum slows.

    In the past, a company could raise capital while lacking one of these. Today, the absence of any can end the journey. The first years of a startup’s life have become a test of all four. And only after real progress do investors begin to believe.

    The truth is that the most valuable companies of the 2030s won’t come from inside the system — they’ll come from the outsiders who endured long enough to earn belief. It is belief, after all, that has always driven venture capital. Every dollar raised is an act of faith in a version of the future. What has changed is the burden of proof. The first dollar is the hardest, and every subsequent milestone is a test of whether the future you describe is one the world is prepared to trust. 

    The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.

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    Roman Axelrod

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  • How the Shutdown Threatens to Disrupt IPO Market Momentum

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    A U.S. government shutdown threatens to stall the IPO market’s long-awaited comeback, just as strong investor demand and successful debuts had breathed life back into new listings.

    The U.S. government shut down much of its operations on Wednesday as deep partisan divisions prevented Congress and the White House from reaching a funding deal.

    With the Securities and Exchange Commission running only essential functions on a skeleton staff, the agency will stop processing IPO paperwork, leaving companies primed for Wall Street debuts such as actress Jennifer Garner’s baby food company Once Upon a Farm and electric-aircraft maker Beta Technologies in limbo.

    The fall window has been gathering momentum, with a wave of successful debuts, raising hopes that 2025 could be a breakout year for IPOs after high interest rates and volatility stalled the market for nearly three years.

    “A shutdown grinds the SEC to a halt, which means no prospectus reviews, no comments cleared and no green lights for going public,” said Michael Ashley Schulman, partner and CIO at Running Point Capital Advisors.

    “It’s bureaucratic purgatory at the worst possible time, just as the IPO market was beginning to thaw from a deep freeze,” Schulman added.

    U.S. IPOs have raised $52.94 billion from 263 listings as of September 29, the highest since 2021, according to Dealogic. The largest listings of the year included LNG giant Venture Global, buy-now-pay-later lender Klarna , and AI cloud firm CoreWeave.

    In addition to Once Upon a Farm and Beta Technologies, life insurer Ethos Technologies was also among the biggest companies to file for an IPO recently. Representatives for the three companies did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Tuesday.

    The pipeline for the rest of 2025 and going into 2026 features several other high-profile would-be issuers, including medical supplies giant Medline, SoftBank-backed PayPay, and corporate travel management platform Navan.

    “Already this is shifting timelines back for deals that were on the fence,” said Matt Kennedy, senior strategist at Renaissance Capital, a provider of IPO-focused research and ETFs.

    “If it lasts more than a week, the IPO market will grind down to a halt, cutting short the rebound we were expecting.”

    U.S. IPO market rebounds in 2025

    Temporary Setback

    While government shutdowns are typically short-lived, the longest in history — 35 days spanning December 2018 to January 2019 — occurred under President Donald Trump’s previous administration.

    At the time, the IPO market came to a virtual standstill. But a few companies sidestepped the SEC by locking in their IPO prices weeks in advance, allowing them to proceed with listings despite the shutdown.

    While the shutdown lasts, the IPO freeze could ripple across Wall Street, delaying deals for banks and limiting listing fees for exchanges.

    Still, as with 2019, listings are likely to bounce back, said some market watchers. Strong investor demand, hefty inflows into IPO-themed funds and the best after-market performance in years will continue to lure companies to the market, said Lukas Muehlbauer, research analyst at IPO research firm IPOX.

    A weeks-long shutdown could potentially dampen market sentiment and spur volatility, but the fall window was generally the strongest for IPOs and would likely shrug off a shutdown blip, according to Anthony Saglimbene, chief market strategist at Ameriprise Financial.

    “IPO activity should be pretty solid and dominate any near-term hiccups around a shutdown,” Saglimbene added.

    A bar chart showing the US government shutdowns since 1976 and their duration.
    Three of the four longest U.S. government shutdowns happened since 1996.

    Reporting by Manya Saini and Niket Nishant in Bengaluru; editing by Michelle Price and Krishna Chandra Eluri.

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    Reuters

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  • Over the last decade, we’ve invested in over 20 unicorns. The machines will take millions of jobs—but they’ll never lead like a human can | Fortune

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    The World Economic Forum’s latest report produced news of 92 million jobs being eliminated due to AI by 2030. But in that same report was the prediction of an estimated 170 million new jobs, which will create a net gain of 78 million. As leaders who have invested in over 20 unicorns over the last decade and advised hundreds of companies on technological shifts and transformation for decades, we have seen that panic of job loss and skyrocketing unemployment dominate headlines and drive the news cycles, but the whole story always tells a different tale. 

    Yes, we will see disruption and job displacement — that’s inevitable. We’ve lived through the tech boom of the ’90s, the birth of the internet, cloud computing, and waves of automation over the past 35 years. Has any of this led to the predicted dystopia? Consider this: in 1991, the global unemployment rate was 5.1%. After three decades of technological revolution and exponential AI growth, the global unemployment rate in 2024 was 4.89%. If you believed only the headlines that followed every technological breakthrough of the past 35 years, you’d assume half the world would be unemployed by now. 

    The truth? Technology always creates more than it destroys. 

    Increased AI adoption across sectors

    That same report from the WEF shows that adoption of AI is growing rapidly, albeit unevenly, across sectors. This isn’t adoption for adoption’s sake. The labor market is being driven in this direction by four powerful forces. 

    ● AI automation: Almost 60% of firms (nearly 85% of large firms) implemented automation over the last 12 months. 

    ● Economic pressures: For companies to stay competitive, they are looking for efficiency in every aspect of their operation. The use of AI is the surest and fastest way to achieve measurable increases in efficiency. 

    ● Green transitions: The combination of changes in climate and energy demand is causing enterprises to lean more into green technologies to slow the amount of overhead they must commit to energy. 

    ● Demographics: Demographic shifts are driving the need for increased roles in the caregiving industry. Aging populations need humans to help them in ways no machine can. Plus, these new and increased roles require entirely new management approaches.

    These four forces are already affecting hiring pipelines, budgets, and boardroom strategy. 

    Where jobs are emerging

    Apart from the aforementioned care-giving sector, a historic employment boom is coming to IT and engineering. Unlike earlier tech booms, this surge is not about speculation and hype, but structural reinvention. The IDC projects AI spending will increase to $632 billion by 2028, signaling not a bubble but the emergence of sustainable growth. 

    AI-native product development will come more to the forefront as we see the growth of products being enabled by AI andcompletely designed around it. AI product managers, AI UX designers, and prompt engineers are already becoming fixtures, supported by platforms like Microsoft Copilot, Salesforce Einstein, and Google Duet AI. These roles speak to the coming era of intelligent software. These are tools that learn, adapt, and anticipate. They will in turn, require builders who can manage and adapt to human needs with machine learning in real time.

    The infrastructure aspect of this new age is just as transformative. AI-driven Cloud and DevOps (collectively called AIOps) will change how enterprises manage scale. New categories such as MLOps engineers, AI Cloud architects, observability engineers, and incident prediction analysts are emerging and growing in demand. The humans in these positions must be able to design systems that can anticipate failures, self-optimize, and operate with resilience at levels far beyond human monitoring. This moves the cloud from being elastic to being predictive.

    There will be an increased risk associated with this growth. Cybersecurity and AI trust will be as integral to competitive advantage as innovation. As governments roll out the EU AI Act, National Institute of Standards and Technology standards, and similar regulations, companies will need AI cyber analysts, LLM red teamers, and AI risk officers to safeguard not only networks but the algorithms that drive them. Leaders whoexperience the most success now will be those who build trust into their products with as much thought and strategy as they build in features. They will understand that explainability and compliance are strategic assets.

    As the growth of AI infrastructure increases, data engineers and knowledge designers will become as central as application developers once were. Enterprise knowledge ecosystems from retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) pipelines to vector databases and knowledge graphs are poised to create new categories of work. Plus, in nearly every vertical (finance, healthcare, legal, HR), AI specializations will generate hybrid roles where you not only need to master the functions of that role, but you’ll also need to be an expert in how to leverage AI to augment your duties and increase your output and efficiency. These types of positions will be drivers of industry-specific disruption.

    Adaptation is non-negotiable. Software engineers must evolve into AI-assisted developers, DevOps professionals into AIOps specialists, and product managers into AI-native strategists. UX designers will focus on explainability and trust design, reshaping how people interact with intelligent systems. Those who move fastest will define the rules of the AI economy itself.

    Humans have to lead

    Hybrid Intelligence Operations demand executives who can create synergies between human creativity and machine execution that neither could achieve alone. AI cannot replace leadership, judgment, ethical decision-making, or vision. AI is a tool, perhaps the most powerful ever created, but it is useless without proper human oversight and leadership. 

    In the arena of AI Ethics and Governance, leaders will need to serve as directors of societal responsibility. They must decide what constitutes ethical AI deployment and have the courageand backbone to stop when profit optimization crosses the line into human cost. These decisions cannot be algorithmic. They demand judgment, empathy, and ethics.

    Cross-Functional Integration is becoming critical as we see traditional org charts becoming less and less relevant. Leaders have to be able to speak to and negotiate between technical, financial, regulatory, and human teams to foster solutions across age gaps, personality differences, and functional silos. 

    AI can forecast trends, but only leaders can paint compelling pictures of the future that inspire teams to embrace change rather than resist it. Creating a strategic vision and being able to emotionally sell it to the team via storytelling is something no AI will ever be able to do as well as a human. Machines can execute, but they’ll never lead; humans must combine AI scale with human leadership.

    How to win the future

    The age of a leader delegating tasks and managing workflows no longer exists in successful businesses, as AI can handle most operational tasks. Leaders must evolve or risk becoming as automated as the roles they once managed. To do this, focus on uniquely human capabilities in your employees and hone those skills. These will be the core assets of an AI-driven world.

    Begin redesigning your organization now around human skills and phase out traditional hierarchies. Drill down and find out what your people bring that is uniquely human. Double down on developing those attributes to their maximum potential. 

    Then, teach and show teams that AI is a human multiplier, not a human replacement. Prove to them that technology is a competitive advantage that helps them become the most powerful version of themselves at work. Your teams need to understand not just how AI works, but how it helps them while also helping the company. The more they understand, the less they fear, and the more they buy in. 

    The winning leaders of this decade will be those who recognize and show their teams that AI isn’t a threat to human jobs, it’s an augmentor of human capability. The leaders and companies that accomplish this will remember 2025-2030 not for jobs lost, but for becoming pioneers of the age of human-AI partnerships, reshaping entire industries.

    The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.

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    Navin Chaddha, Mark Minevich

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  • Europe must build better public markets for fintechs and not chase the bubble | Fortune

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    Europe is home to more than 9,000 fintechs. It has produced global champions such as Wise, Klarna, and Adyen in payments, Revolut and Monzo in banking, and Mambu in B2B software. Across the Atlantic, the United States plays host to more than 13,000 fintechs, with leaders like Stripe, PayPal, and Chime. Both continents coexist and compete to produce the most influential companies in financial technology, though the paths taken and outcomes achieved often vary widely.  

    European fintechs raised €3.6 billion in the first half of 2025, 23% higher than in the same period in 2024, with funding on track to reach €7.6 billion for the year. In 2021, this total reached almost €16 billion. But 2021 was an anomaly, a sugar-high: a liquidity-driven bubble when venture investment hit record highs. We don’t expect to see those levels for another five to seven years, nor should we seek to recreate that. What matters now is building stamina, not chasing another rush. European fintech funding is on a steady path, tracking at 2019 levels. 

    The challenge for European markets isn’t chasing bubbles but building durable ecosystems where capital formation is balanced and sustainable. European scale-ups have long scaled under tighter capital constraints than their American counterparts. The result is companies built on sturdier foundations, less vulnerable to the ups and downs of funding markets. But also, a persistent excess demand for capital and, in turn, more reasonably priced assets in the small-to-mid-market.

    Visible cracks

    However, some cracks are starting to show. In 2025 so far, just two deals, Rapyd and FNZ, accounted for nearly half of European fintech funding, leaving much of the rest of the market with less attention. Concentration at the top is not unusual in periods of market caution, but it highlights the growing importance of building a stronger funding base for mid-market companies. By contrast, in the United States the top two fintech deals represented less than 10% of total funding, with capital spread across hundreds of Series A-C rounds. 

    This reflects the greater depth of US capital markets, supported by large institutional pools such as pensions, endowments, and crossover funds. Europe has historically relied more heavily on venture funds and corporate investors. For example, US public pensions and endowments together commit well over $1 trillion to private markets, compared with a far smaller role played by European institutions, where government agencies and corporates are more prominent backers. 

    This means that in quieter years, capital tends to cluster around the largest names. The result is a thinner middle market, not because of a lack of quality companies, but because the supporting financial structures are still developing. Strengthening that layer would help ensure a broader range of companies can scale and eventually reach the public markets.

    The building backlog

    Europe now faces an estimated €300 billion backlog of technology companies waiting to list. A treasure trove for businesses and employees seeking to be unlocked. But the backlog won’t clear overnight. Assuming 15% of this unicorn equity is floated, it would take nearly a decade to clear at the pace of 2024 listings regardless of where they list. And the bar today is set high for IPOs. The sub-$500 million revenue IPO is all but extinct. Mature private capital markets and strategic acquirers with heavy war-chests allow companies to stay private for longer, or forever. 

    However, these same features also allow Europe’s small-to-mid-cap exit market to excel. The continent delivers close to 1,000 technology exits annually of $100 million-$500 million, roughly the same size as the US market and with leaner capital journeys. It benefits from a deep pool of strategic acquirers, and active mid-market PE funds. Private equity buyout accounted for 40% of technology exits in the $100 million-$500 million range in Europe, roughly twice the proportion in the US. Europe’s exit market offers resilience and consistent outcomes for stakeholders, not reliant IPOs.

    Europe does not suffer from a shortage of strong tech companies and not every company needs to raise capital as if it were on the path to €500 million+ revenue (ARR). A €50 million ARR business, given the right capital environment, can be more than good enough for founders, for investors, and for Europe’s competitiveness. But the continent could do more to open up routes for its businesses.

    What the continent can do 

    First, exchanges need to allow companies to list with greater flexibility, so that European firms can list at scale without being forced to seek more favorable terms overseas. Second, the continent needs a vibrant mid-cap investor base, bridging the gap between venture and growth equity. 

    The companies are there, the exit market is vibrant, and the demand for scale-up capital is in excess. Pension funds, sovereign wealth funds, and institutional investors have a role to play in seeding this layer of the market, just as crossover funds have done in the US. For instance, private equity assets account for roughly 14% of US pension fund portfolios, today, European pension fund’s PE allocations are a fraction of this. 

    The next phase of Europe’s technology story should not be defined by bubbles or backlogs, but by building markets that allow its companies to scale sustainably, list locally, and thrive globally.

    The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.

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    Aman Ghei

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  • USA Toyz Announces New 163pk Unicorn Party Supplies Set in Their Exclusive Misty Mountain Unicorn Products Line

    USA Toyz Announces New 163pk Unicorn Party Supplies Set in Their Exclusive Misty Mountain Unicorn Products Line

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    Unicorn party favors, decorations, costume accessories and tableware complete the ultimate Unicorn Party Pack.

    Press Release
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    updated: Apr 9, 2019


    BELLEVUE, Wash., April 9, 2019 (Newswire.com)
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    With unicorn theme parties going beyond magical, USA Toyz, one of the top toy and party supply sellers on Amazon, announced the launch of their new 163 piece Unicorn Party Pack. It’s time to call the unicorn squad because this party pack has everything the birthday girl or boy needs to host ten of their besties. Everything from invitations to unicorn decorations to goodie bags and party favors comes in this complete party pack. Unicorn party decorations are just the start; get unicorn cups, plates, utensils and napkins with your pack of unicorn party supplies. And don’t forget the magic of dress up. Every unicorn party supplies kit includes a beautiful unicorn headband adorned with sparkly ears and flowers for the guest of honor, and 10 paper unicorn crowns for the party guests.

    Believe in the magic of unicorns and your ability to pull off an amazing unicorn party for kids or adults. Yes, the flexible unicorn horn headband fits adults, too. The bright pink and purple party supplies feature rainbows and clouds to pair perfectly with rainbow and unicorn-inspired food served at any unicorn-themed party.

    Need more unicorn party ideas? Use the included 10 unicorn balloons and triangle pennant banner to stage a unicorn backdrop for selfies. Set up a scavenger hunt to find the magic wands and unicorn bracelets found in the mega unicorn party pack. Let guests collect their findings in the matching unicorn party favor bags. Be sure no one leaves the unicorn party without one of the unicorn pocket pinball games and noisemakers.

    The 163pc Unicorn Party Pack is sold on Amazon and USA Toyz.

    Centuries ago, explorers would go out in search of the mythical unicorn. Today birthday girls and boys can celebrate the uniqueness of unicorns with endless unicorn inspiration found at USA Toyz. Want more sparkly unicorn headbands for your unicorn party? Pick up a 6 pack of unicorn headbands for friends, siblings and kids and parents to enjoy together. The shiny metallic gold unicorn horn, glitter ears and soft flowers make the perfect unicorn party hats and unicorn party favors.

    The 6pk of Unicorn Headbands is sold on Amazon and USA Toyz.

    Looking for a quiet space for girls and boys’ playful imagination? The one-of-a-kind unicorn play tent from USA Toyz, with bonus unicorn headband, is a secret hideaway for kids to read, relax or play with friends. Vibrant colors and an exclusive design will sweep kids away to the realm of unicorns! Parents love the tent because it’s easy to assemble, clean and store. Let this adorable tent be the focal point of a girl’s enchanting bedroom decor – or a unicorn party! Here’s a unicorn party tip – set up the unicorn play tent as a unicorn photo booth and use your unicorn headbands, wands and other unicorn party decorations as photo booth props. Your unicorn birthday party is sure to be a blast!

    The Unicorn Play Tent for kids is sold on Amazon and USA Toyz.

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    About USA Toyz:

    USA Toyz is a brand owned by Kaliber Global, a top-tier Amazon seller and the fastest-growing retailer in Washington State (Inc. 500, 2017). They are a locally owned family business based in Bellevue, Washington that specializes in launching fun, innovative products on the Amazon Marketplace since 2012.

    Contact:

    Amber Norell
    Marketing Manager, USA Toyz
    407-432-0522
    amber@kaliberglobal.com

    Source: USA Toyz

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