Rama Krishna Sangem
This seems to be best time for startups in India. As many as 46 Indian startups have the potential to become unicorns—founded after 2000 and with a valuation of $1 billion—in the next three years, a report released on Thursday said. It added that another 106 startups may join the club in the next five years. This shows the resilience of Indian economy and domestic market growth.
The ASK Private Wealth Hurun India Future Unicorn Index 2024 said that India is home to 67 unicorns, 46 gazelles, and 106 cheetahs. Gazelles and cheetahs could become unicorns in three and five years respectively.
It added that in the last one year, two gazelles and one cheetah have transitioned into unicorns. Zepto, the Indian quick delivery startup, gained unicorn status in August 2023. Another former gazelle, InCred Finance became a unicorn in December 2023.
Homegrown logistics platform Porter was a cheetah earlier and achieved unicorn status recently, surpassing a valuation of $1 billion. The report also said that ten companies were promoted from cheetahs to gazelles this year. These were Atlan, Fibe, Saas Labs, InsureDekho, Pocket FM, Pixis, Freshtohome, Bounce, Carbon Clean Solutions, and K12 Techno Services.
Funding may fall short
However, the findings of the report highlighted the impact of the funding winter. The years 2023 and 2024 witnessed the emergence of three future unicorns being promoted to unicorn status. In 2022, this number was 24.
Notably, this year witnessed an increase in drop-offs from the Future Unicorn list, with a total of 25 startups falling under the category. Around five gazelles and 20 cheetahs dropped out of the list this year.
As compared to 12 startups moving from the status of cheetah to gazelle in 2022, only nine could do this in 2023 and ten in 2024.
In 2022, seven startups were promoted from the status of cheetahs to unicorns. In 2023 and 2024, only one startup could do it each year. Moreover, as compared to 17 startups turning unicorns from gazelles in 2022, only two each did so in 2023 and 2024. Overall, entrepreneurship appears to be picking up among Indian youth.
