Female-Founded Unicorns Gain Ground in the US While Europe Sees a Decline

Key Takeaways

• The U.S. hosts around 120 female-founded unicorn startups.
• Meanwhile, 14 can be found in Europe.
• While the U.S. added female-founded unicorns in 2024, the number declined in Europe.

The recent news that Anthropic has raised funding at a $61.5 billion post-money valuation means that a female-founded company has entered the elite ranks of startups worth more than $50 billion.

Anthropic’s bumper funding round aside, a growing number of female-founded unicorns have passed the billion-dollar mark on both sides of the Atlantic.

Female-founded Unicorns in the U.S.

According to data from PitchBook, around 120 American unicorns have at least one female founder.

Among startups worth over $10 billion, Anthropic, Scale AI, Deel and Talkdesk all have female founders.

Anthropic was co-founded by siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei. Lucy Guo started Scale AI with fellow Quora alumni Alexandr Wang. Shuo Wang is a member of Deel’s three-person founding team. And Cristina Fonseca founded Talkdesk alongside Tiago Paiva.

Some of the most valuable startups with only female founders include Guild Education ($4.4 billion), Glossier ($1.8 billion) and Away ($1.4 billion).

Female-founded Unicorns in Europe

Unlike in the U.S., the number of female-founded unicorns in Europe declined in 2024, as a few startups dropped off the list after accepting downrounds.

Europe is currently home to 14 female-founded startups worth more than 1 billion euros ($1.08 billion).

With a valuation of $5 billion each after their most recent funding rounds, Vinted and Relex top the list, followed by Mambu and Blockchain.com.

Johanna Småros (Relex), Milda Mitkutė (Vinted), Sofia Nunes (Blockchain.com) and Mia Hylton (Mambu) each played a different role in their companies’ inception.

Although it is headquartered in Silicon Valley, Talkdesk could also be considered a European startup due to its roots in Portugal. At its last funding round in 2023, the cloud communication company was valued at $10 billion.

Rest of the World

Outside of Europe and the U.S., female founders are behind some of the most valuable startups in the world.

In Australia, Canva’s Melanie Perkins oversees a company worth $49 billion.

Meanwhile, although she is less famed than her fellow Binance founder Changpeng Zhao (CZ), Yi He played an important role in forming the world’s most valuable crypto exchange, where she still serves an executive role.

Former Unicorns With Female Founders

Among former unicorns, i.e., startups that have since gone public, many valuable companies count women among their founders.

Cloudflare has Michelle Zatlyn, Grab has Tan Hooi Ling and Bumble has Whitney Wolfe Herd, for example.

Other well-known former unicorns with female founders include Darktrace, Eventbrite and 23andMe.

Female Entrepreneurs Make Steady Gains

Despite persistent challenges in accessing funding, female founders continue to make inroads in the global startup ecosystem, even at the unicorn level.

On both sides of the Atlantic, startups with at least one female founder accounted for around a quarter of all venture capital deals, up from 20% a decade ago.

A similar pattern can be observed when looking at total funding, with female-founded startups securing roughly 20% of all venture capital investment in 2024 compared to 15% in 2014.

Finally, the emerging roster of software and AI unicorns with female founders reflects a continued push into the traditionally male-dominated tech sector.

All signs suggest that female-founded companies will continue to expand their influence, reshaping the global startup ecosystem and fueling further innovation.