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A total of 31 companies joined The SA¹ú¼Ê´«Ã½ Unicorn Board in January, the largest count of companies to join in a single month since June 2022. Collectively, those companies added $9.3 billion in funding and $58.5 billion in value to the board.

And underlining the pace at which some startups are now sprinting to billion-dollar-plus valuations, four of the new unicorns are less than a year old.

In exit news, 9-year-old fintech unicorn was acquired by for $5.2 billion. That’s well below its January 2022 valuation of $12.3 billion but still marks a win for earlier investors seeking liquidity.

Of the 31 companies that joined the board, 23 are U.S.-based and two hail from Canada. Germany, France, Belgium, Israel, Japan and India each added one new unicorn to the board last month.

Among sectors, AI and AI infrastructure contributed the most new unicorns, totaling nine from those two areas. The next-leading sectors, with three new unicorns each, were manufacturing and security propelled by AI. AI was also a major contributor to new unicorns in the semiconductor, defense and autonomous driving sectors.

The largest funding last month for a unicorn company was $20 billion to ’s at an . Within a month of that funding, xAI in early February announced a merger with another Musk-led company, rocketmaker .

11 exits

Brex’s acquisition by Capital One was the largest of the four M&A deals for unicorn-valued companies in January.

On the IPO side, seven companies went public, the most high-profile of which were and , both foundation AI model companies based in China.

Here are January’s newly minted unicorns.

AI

• , an AI research lab focused on human collaboration, raised a $480 million seed funding led by and 1. The less than 1-year-old Redwood City, California-based company was valued at $4.5 billion.
• , an AI scientific research lab, raised a $180 million seed round led by , and . The less than 1-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.5 billion.
• AI evaluation platform raised a $150 million Series A led by 2Ìý²¹²Ô»å . The less than 1-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.7 billion.
• Voice AI startup raised a $143 million Series C led by France-based . The 10-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.3 billion. As part of its announcement, Deepgram disclosed the acquisition of , a voice AI startup for restaurants and drive-thru ordering.
• , an infrastructure company for voice AI, raised a $100 million Series C led by . The 5-year-old San Jose, California-based company was valued at $1 billion.

AI infrastructure

• , an AI networking company, raised a $200 million Series A led by , and . The 1-year-old Santa Clara, California-based company was valued at $1 billion.
• GPU marketplace raised a $150 million Series B led by . The 2-year-old Palo Alto, California-based company was valued at $1 billion.
• , for secure AI run locally on devices, raised a Series A extension funding of an undisclosed sum. The 6-year-old Austin-based company was valued at $2.5 billion.
• , which manages a GPU marketplace, raised a Series C led by . The 6-year-old company was founded in Lithuania and is now headquartered in Miami. It was valued at $1 billion.

Manufacturing

• , a builder of factories for defense and the aerospace industry, raised a $131 million private equity funding led by . The 5-year-old Hawthorne, California-based company was valued at $1.6 billion.
• , a developer of no-code applications for manufacturing, raised a $120 million Series D led by . The 11-year-old Somerville, Massachusetts-based company was valued at $1.3 billion.
• ²Ñ´Ç²Ô³Ù°ùé²¹±ô-²ú²¹²õ±ð»å , a manufacturing automation company utilizing modular robotics, raised a $90 million Series D led by . The 9-year-old company was valued at $1.2 billion.

Security

• , provider of security for cloud services in real time to protect from hackers, raised a $250 million Series B led by . The 3-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.5 billion.
• Tel Aviv-based , an AI security platform that integrates with existing security platforms to provide context on incidents, raised a $140 million Series D led by . The 6-year-old company was valued at $1.2 billion.
• Belgium-based , a developer-oriented security platform, raised a $60 million Series B led by . The 3-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.

Semiconductor

• , an AI chip developer to run transformer models, raised a reported $500 million funding led by . The 3-year-old Cupertino, California-based company was valued at $5 billion.
• , an AI chip design company, raised a $300 million Series A led by . The less than 1-year-old Palo Alto, California-based company was valued at $4 billion.

Cryptocurrency

• Stablecoin payments platform raised a $250 million Series C led by . The 4-year-old New York-based company was valued at $2 billion.
• Crypto payments network raised a $75 million Series C led by . The 5-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Healthcare

• Maternity healthcare provider, raised a $92 million Series C led by Stripes. The 4-year-old New York-based company with plans to expand healthcare services to women and children was valued at $1.7 billion.
• , a co-ordination platform for medications across doctors, pharmacies and patients, raised a Series B led by . The 3-year-old New York-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Defense

• Paris-based , an autonomous drone maker, raised a $200 million Series B led by aircraft manufacturer . The 2-year-old company was valued at $1.4 billion.
• , a builder of secure software for the defense industry, raised a $136 million Series B led by . The 4-year-old Colorado-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Fintech

• Tokyo-based brokerage infrastructure provider raised a $150 million Series D led by . The 11-year-old company was valued at $1.2 billion.
• India-based , a payment infrastructure provider, raised a $50 million Series D led by . The 13-year-old company was valued at $1.2 billion.

Fitness

• , an owner of physical fitness brands and the parent of , raised a $785 million private equity financing led by . As part of the transaction it announced a merger with . The San Luis Obispo, California-based company was valued at $7.5 billion.

Autonomous Driving

• Toronto-based , a self-driving technology company, raised a $750 million Series C led by and ,valuing it at $3.8 billion. The 5-year-old company announced a partnership with to support robotaxis.

Social media

• , an AI-powered video generation platform for social media, raised an $80 million Series A extension funding which brings its Series A funding total to $130 million. The 3-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.3 billion.

Education

• Online tutoring platform raised a $150 million Series D led by at a $1.2 billion valuation. The 14-year-old Brookline, Massachusetts-based company was founded by Ukrainians and maintains a team in Ukraine.

Compliance

• ESG compliance software platform raised a $100 million Series C led by , a joint venture between and . The 7-year-old Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany-based company was valued at $1.1 billion.

Energy

• , a developer of a residential energy storage device for electricity and electric vehicles, raised a $163 million funding. The 7-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Related SA¹ú¼Ê´«Ã½ unicorn lists:

• (1,684)
• (596)
• (37)
• (186)
• (115)
• (102)
• (868)
• (494)
• (226)
• (38)
• (470)

Related reading:

• High-Spending Investors Give 2026 An Active Start
• In The Era Of Unicorn Valuation Escalation, A Trillion Dollars Isn’t What It Used To Be
• Global VC Investment Surged In January, With U.S. Dominating Funding, But A Pair Of AI Model IPOs In China
• A Growing Share Of Seed And Series A Funding Is Going To Giant Rounds

Methodology

The SA¹ú¼Ê´«Ã½ Unicorn Board is a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more and is based on SA¹ú¼Ê´«Ã½ data. New companies are 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 .

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. SA¹ú¼Ê´«Ã½ 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 SA¹ú¼Ê´«Ã½ long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

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