Europe makes unicorns at virtually twice the speed of the US, report finds

Europe lastly has all of the items in place to problem the US because the world’s main tech hub, in line with an evaluation from enterprise capital agency Creandum and Dealroom, launched as we speak. 

Europe’s whole variety of unicorns has grown 88% in comparison with the US’ 56% since 2014. Furthermore, its share of world VC funding has quadrupled within the final 20 years — the continent now takes greater than a 3rd of worldwide investments at early-stage.

In keeping with the report, Europe has the best density of tech unicorn cities globally — with 514 corporations valued at $1bn or extra unfold throughout 65 cities in 25 international locations. These embrace fintechs like Adyen, Revolut, Klarna, Pleo and iZettle; digital well being startups like Kry and Doctolib; and enterprise software program startups like Factorial, Personio, and UiPath.

“In simply 20 years, Europe has gone from being an outsider to a world challenger,” mentioned Staffan Helgesson, common companion at Creandum — the primary VC to spend money on European success story Spotify. 

Whereas Europe is clearly doing job at producing world-leading corporations, its largest energy lies in rising sectors like fintech, quantum computing, and local weather tech, says the report. It already accounts for round a 3rd of worldwide funding in these key rising industries, whereas the continent is dwelling to half of the world’s high science clusters centered on these sectors. 

Local weather tech particularly has remained a key development space regardless of the enterprise downturn, with 22% of whole European funding going into local weather tech in 2023 versus 7% for the US. On condition that the local weather transition is poised to rework industries, Europe’s energy on this sector alone presents a “enormous alternative” within the years to come back, says the report. 

“We’re assured that within the subsequent 20 years, Europe can take the lead in rising tech sectors, together with digital well being, local weather tech, fintech, and AI, which are crucial to our economies and lives,” mentioned Helgesson.