In the last few years, India has become the hub for innovation and startups. In fact, the 21st Century has seen India become the fastest growing startup ecosystem in the world.
Every budding entrepreneur dreams of spearheading a ‘Unicorn Startup’. This term was coined by Aileen Lee, an American venture capitalist, seed investor and the founder of Cowboy Ventures. Once a startup crosses the $1 billion valuation mark, it becomes a Unicorn. Presently, India is home to 107 unicorns.
Achieving such a mammoth feat requires a lot of hardwork, persistence, patience and a little bit of luck. Here are 5 unique Indian unicorns that have etched their name into history:
1) Inmobi
Valuation: $12-15 billion (provided they meet their plans to raise $1 billion at that valuation this year)
Inmobi’s rise to the top made it the first ever Indian Unicorn Startup in 2011. This was a key milestone in the Indian startup industry which kickstarted a revolution to reach the prestigious unicorn status. Founded in 2007 by Naveen Tewari, Mohit Saxena, Amit Gupta and Abhay Singhal under a different name of mKhoj, it helped companies advertise and engage audiences through mobile advertising.
2) Verse Innovation
Valuation: $5B
Verse Innovation, based in Bengaluru is the parent company behind Dailyhunt, the ultimate news aggregator in the Indian space. Founded in 2007 by Virendra Gupta and Shailendra Sharma, it also owns the popular application Josh. These two ventures together have a combined audience over 300 million.
3) Meesho
Valuation: $4.90B
Another company out of Bengaluru, Meesho was founded by Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal. Meesho is highly regarded because it helps individuals to establish their online stores while also assisting small and medium-scale businesses. It basically helps entrepreneurs to start their ventures without investing money.
4) Razorpay
Valuation:$7.50B
Founded in 2013 by IIT-Roorkee graduates Harshil Mathur and Kuma, Razorpay is a one-stop payment gateway for all forms of online transactions such as cards, UPI, EMI, wallets and many more. A pioneer in the industry, it aims at elevating the user experience and is fairly easy to integrate into online stores.
5) MakeMyTrip
Valuation: $3.14 billion
Deep Kumar launched MMT in 2000 and transformed it into the most popular travel booking platform in India. Headquartered in Gurgaon, the company is synonymous with all forms of bookings from domestic flights, hotels and trains to international itineraries. It is currently present in 14 countries in the world with 7 million monthly active users and 33.5 million cumulative users.
Written by Gagan Dhawan
