The Unicorn Board Adds 8 New Companies, With One Newly Minted Entry Valued At $16B

Gené Teare @geneteare

Eight companies joined The Crunchbase Unicorn Board in August, with six based in the U.S., and two hailing from China and India, respectively.

Among them was Huawei Technologies’ smart car subsidiary Yinwang Smart Technology, valued at $16 billion. That dollar amount represents the second-largest value for a newly minted unicorn this year — trailing only xAI, which was valued at $24 billion in May when it joined the board.

The eight new unicorns in August added $25 billion in value to the board. To date in 2024 $152 billion in value was added by 79 new unicorns.

In 2023, 99 companies joined the board, collectively valued at $176 billion as of the most recent valuations. The most highly valued new unicorn from 2023 is currently CoreWeave valued at $19 billion.

Here are the new unicorns in August by sector.

Transportation

Yinwang Smart Technology, a Huawei subsidiary based in Shenzhen, raised $1.6 billion each from electric vehicle brands Seres Group and Avatr. The less than 1-year-old company was valued at $16 billion.
Bangalore-based electric two-wheel vehicle manufacturer Ather Energy raised $71 million at a $1.3 billion valuation led by government-backed NIIF. It competes with Ola Electric, another India-based unicorn which went public in August.

Web3

Story Protocol, a blockchain technology to protect intellectual property rights for content creators, raised an $80 million Series B led by Andreessen Horowitz. The 2-year-old Bellevue, Washington-based company was valued at $2.25 billion.

AI

Mountain View, California-based AI coding platform Codeium raised a $150 million Series C led by General Catalyst. The 3-year-old company was valued at $1.25 billion.

Privacy and security

San Mateo, California-based Kiteworks, a secure content company, raised a $456 million funding led by Insight Partners and Sixth Street. Previously known as Accellion, the 24-year-old company was valued at more than $1 billion.

Agtech

Los Angeles-based Agrovision, a global berry producer using genetics and AI, raised $100 million in funding from private equity firm Aliment Capital. The 11-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.

Sales and marketing

DevRev, which develops AI for customer support and other uses, raised a $101 million series A led by Khosla Ventures, Mayfield Fund 1 and Param Hansa Values. The 3-year-old Palo Alto, California-based company was valued at $1.2 billion.

Real Estate

EliseAI , an AI-powered property management communication platform, raised a $75 million Series D led by Sapphire Ventures. The 7-year-old New York-based company was valued at just over $1 billion.

And one we missed

Fei-Fei Li’s stealth startup World Labs, founded in April this year, raised $100 million from NEA in July at a $1 billion valuation within months of its founding. The company plans to build AI models with spatial awareness. It raised an earlier round from Andreessen Horowitz and Radical Ventures.

Related Crunchbase unicorn queries

The Crunchbase Private Unicorn Company List (1,545)

Methodology

The Crunchbase Unicorn Board is a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more and is based on Crunchbase data. New companies are added to the Unicorn Board as they reach the $1 billion valuation mark as part of a funding round.

The unicorn board does not reflect internal company valuations — such as those set via a 409a process for employee stock options — as these differ from, and are more likely to be lower than, a priced funding round. We also do not adjust valuations based on investor writedowns, which change quarterly, as different investors will not value the same company consistently within the same quarter.

Funding to unicorn companies includes all private financings to companies that are tagged as unicorns, as well as those that have since graduated to The Exited Unicorn Board.

Exits analyzed here only include the first time a company exits.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. Crunchbase converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to Crunchbase long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

Illustration: Dom Guzman