Neetish Sarda Smartworks tipped to be Unicorn of Tomorrow – Hurun India Future Unicorn List 2021

Hurun India DEBUTS the Hurun India Future Unicorn List. The objective of the list is to highlight India’s fast growing start-up ecosystem to investors, governments, family offices, aspiring entrepreneurs and the international community. Hurun Research Institute has classified these start-ups as Unicorns (start-ups founded after the year 2000 with a valuation of US$1bn), Gazelles (start-ups that are most likely to go Unicorn in the next 2 years) and Cheetahs (could go Unicorn in the next 4 years). The evaluation is based on regulatory filings, feedback from other entrepreneurs and some of the active India-focused VC funds and angel investors.

India is home to 51 Unicorns, up by 25 in 2021, and 32 Gazelles and 54 Cheetahs.

Record breaking Stats: India added circa 3 Unicorns every month over the last year.

India’s future Unicorns are worth US$36bn, equivalent to one third of Delhi’s GDP at current prices.

The top investors in the Gazelles and Cheetahs in the Hurun India Future Unicorn List 2021 are Sequoia, followed by Tiger Global with 37 and 18 investments respectively.

11 co-founders are under the age of 30 and 15 above the age of 50

Online retail store Zilingo is the most valuable Gazelle and online furniture platform Pepperfry is the most valuable Cheetah.

Double Boost: 5 start-ups that were identified as Cheetahs at the beginning of the year, “skipped” the Gazelle stage and directly entered the Unicorn club this year.

E-commerce, FinTech and SaaS comprise 49 per cent of the Hurun India Future Unicorn List 2021

With 31 start-ups, Bengaluru is the start-up capital of India followed by Delhi NCR (18) and Mumbai (13).

India’s Unicorns are now worth US$168bn, more than the GDP of Telangana at current prices.

RateGain, MobiKwik, MedPlus, Fino Paytech and ixigo are preparing for IPO to raise INR 6,840 crore by the end of this year.

E-commerce start-up Spinny’s revenues grew 92 times yoy.

At 25 years of age, the founders of gaming start-up Zupee, Dilsher Singh & Siddhant Saurabh are the youngest in the list.

CoinSwitch Kuber is the only crypto start-up in the list.

Where did they study? Most of the founders of the start-ups featured in Hurun Future Unicorn List graduated/ post-graduated from either IIT Delhi or IIM Ahmedabad.

The average age of founders in the list was 39 years.

Hurun Research Institute today released the Hurun India Future Unicorn List 2021

(02 September 2021, Mumbai, India) The Hurun Research Institute today released the Hurun India Future Unicorn List 2021, a ranking of India’s start-ups founded in the 2000s, worth at least US$200mn, not yet listed on a public exchange and most likely to ‘go unicorn’ within 2 years (Gazelles) or 4 years (Cheetahs). The cut-off date was 31 August 2021.

Hurun India Future Unicorn List 2021 is a snapshot of India’s start-up ecosystem. This is a list of the most valuable private equity or venture capital-funded companies in India founded after 2000, ranked according to their latest funding round valuation.

To enter the Hurun India Future Unicorn List 2021, the start-up is required to have a value of US$200mn (INR 1,500 crore).

Anas Rahman Junaid MD and Chief Researcher, Hurun India said, “Preparing the Hurun India Future Unicorn List 2021 has been one of the most daunting tasks, primarily due to the positive hyperactivity in Indian start-up ecosystems. For instance, 5 start-ups that we had as Cheetahs at the beginning of our research, jumped straight to Unicorn valuations. The list has inputs from India’s start-up investor ecosystem including some of the top VC funds and hence could serve as a good source for investors and family offices to understand more some of the most exciting start-ups in the country.”

“2021 also registered start-up IPOs, starting with Nazaara Tech, followed by Zomato and others who have filed including Paytm, Freshworks, Nykaa and so on. IPOs present exit opportunities for investors and encourage more Indian High Networth Individuals to allocate a meaningful portion of their investment into start-ups.”

“India is home to more than 600 million internet users and is expected to have 900 million users by 2025. The adoption of internet in rural areas will further compliment the rise of technology start-ups. Fintech companies operating in mobile payments, insurance, blockchain, stock trading and digital lending will grow further to capitalize the internet penetration.”

“India is the third largest Unicorn ecosystem in the world and the number of Gazelles and Cheetahs in India is growing at an exponential pace. Over the last year, India added circa 3 Unicorns every month.”

“Although the Indian start-up ecosystem is growing, some of the start-ups, who reach a certain scale migrate from India, in search for better regulatory incentives and risk capital availability. For instance, some of the best Enterprise SaaS companies are born in India but “flipped” to the USA. This is a lost opportunity for India and it is important that these start-ups are incentivised to stay back in the country”

“The list further proves that age is not a barrier for value creation in start-ups. Average age of the founders of Hurun India Future Unicorns 2021 is 39. Youngest is 25 years old and the oldest founder is 60 years old.”

“The list also evidences the ballooning investor interest for Indian start-ups. More than 300 investors that include angel investors, corporates, AIFs, family offices and institutional investors have invested into the Cheetahs and Gazelles. Sequoia is the top investor in these start-ups, followed by Tiger Global”