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A total of 26 companies joined The ¸½½üÉÏÃÅ ¸½½üÉÏÃÅ in September, the largest new monthly cohort in three years, ¸½½üÉÏÃÅ data shows. The surge in new unicorns follows on the heels of a very slow August, when only four companies joined the board.

Collectively, the new September unicorns added $38 billion in value to the board.

Of the 26 companies, 18 new unicorns came from the U.S. Two are U.K.-based, and Finland, Singapore, Hong Kong, Korea, Australia and Mexico each minted one new unicorn last month.

The highest valued among the new entrants were London-based data center provider , valued at $3.2 billion, and Utah-based legal tech startup at $3 billion.

Exits

Unicorn exits also picked up last month, with 11 companies leaving the board. Six of those companies went public, including Sweden-based , Santa Clara, California-based , and San Francisco-based . Five companies were acquired, including by and by .

New unicorns

While healthcare represented the largest cohort among the new unicorns, with five companies from that sector joining the board, new additions last month also hailed from sectors including aerospace, semiconductors and fintech. AI was woven through as a theme in many of the companies.

Here’s a closer look at September’s 26 new unicorns.

Healthcare

• , a kidney care startup that partners with healthcare providers to provide early detection and preventative care for patients, raised a $300 million Series D led by . The 7-year-old Denver-based company was valued at $1.8 billion.
• , a provider of fluorescent imaging for surgery, raised a $188 million private equity round led by ²¹²Ô»åÌý ’s . The 1-year-old Singapore-based company was valued at $1.3 billion.
• , a developer of AI tools for scientific research, raised a $235 million Series A led by and . The company seeks to experiment with AI for  diagnostics, material science, compute and energy. The 3-year-old Cambridge, Massachusetts-based company was valued at $1.2 billion.
• uses AI to analyze the molecules in nature for medicines. It raised a $150 million Series D led by that valued the 6-year-old Boulder, Colorado-based company at $1 billion.
• Cancer care provider , raised a $97 million Series D from strategic and venture investors at a $1 billion valuation. The 5-year-old Nashville, Tennessee-based company partners with health plans and providers to support patients with cancer.

AI

• AI infrastructure provider raised a $150 million Series D led by . The 6-year-old San Francisco-based company, which aims to make AI inference reliable for applications, was valued at $2.2 billion.
• AI data company , a competitor to , raised a $100 million funding led by . The 10-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $2 billion.
• AI consulting firm , which aims to help Fortune 500 companies become AI-native, raised a $175 million Series B led by and . The 3-year-old San Francisco-based company, founded by alumni, was valued at $1.8 billion.
• , a company that supports enterprises looking to adopt AI, raised a $100 million Series C led by . The 5-year-old Palo Alto, California-based company was valued at $1.5 billion.

Fintech

• , a company that supports SMEs with banking, invoicing, loans and payments, among other services, raised $120 million in private equity led by . Tide entered the India market in 2022 and supports and just under that number in the U.K. The 10-year-old London-based company was valued at $1.5 billion.
• Banking-as-a-service provider raised a $70 million Series B led by and at a $1.47 billion valuation for the 4-year-old company. Lead is a chartered bank based in Kansas City, Missouri, and was acquired by in 2022 to provide banking services to fintech companies.
• , a technology-first bank with customers in Mexico, Colombia and the U.S., raised a $100 million Series C led by and. The 5-year-old Mexico City-based bank serves small and medium-sized businesses. It was valued at $1.4 billion.

AI data center

• AI data center provider raised a $1.1 billion Series B led by Norway-based industrial investment company with participation from and . The 2-year-old London-based company was valued at $3.1 billion. Its customers include Nvidia, and . Since the Series B announcement, Nscale has raised a further $433 million SAFE toward a Series C.
• AI data center raised $220 million in private equity led by with participation from Nvidia. An operator of data centers in Singapore and Tasmania, the 6-year-old Tasmania-headquartered company was valued at $1.2 billion.

AI cloud

• , a startup building an AI software computer layer agnostic to the chips they run on, raised a $250 million Series C led by . The 3-year-old Palo Alto, California-based company was valued at $1.6 billion.
• , a company that allows developers to run AI without managing infrastructure, raised an $87 million Series B led by . The 4-year-old New York-based company was valued at $1.1 billion.

Legal tech

• Legal tech startup , a company that unifies case management, communication and billing with AI, raised a $260 million Series E extension led by , and Utah-based The 11-year-old Salt Lake City-based company says it has 6,000 customers using its platform. It was valued at $3 billion.
• , a legal tech startup to support plaintiff law firms, raised a $103 million Series B led by . The 5-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Web3

• , a crypto and stablecoin infrastructure provider, raised a $104 million Series D led by . The 8-year-old Chicago-based company was valued at $1 billion.
• , a stablecoin payments solution provider, raised a $47 million funding led by . The 1-year-old Hong Kong-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Semiconductor

• AI chip startup raised a $250 million Series C led by and . The 5-year-old South Korea-based company was valued at $1.4 billion.

Developer platform

• Developer tooling company , a service that helps engineers with feature releases and tracking impact, raised a $75 million Series E led by . The 5-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.4 billion.

Hardware

• Independent smartphone device-maker raised a $200 million Series C led by . The 5-year-old London-based company aims to reinvent the smartphone with AI intelligence and was valued at $1.3 billion.

Quantum computing

• Quantum computing startup raised a $320 million Series B led by . The 6-year-old Finland-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Material science

• , a startup that plans to build material science applications using AI, launched from stealth to announce a $300 million seed round led by . The less than 1-year-old Menlo Park, California-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Aerospace

• Satellite manufacturer raised a $200 million Series D led by . The 3-year-old Los Angeles-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Related ¸½½üÉÏÃÅ unicorn lists:

• (1,623)
• (118)
• (113)
• (102)
• (811)
• (499)
• (219)
• (38)
• (460)

Related reading:

• The MVPs Of The Startup World Are Still Getting More Valuable
• ¸½½üÉÏÃÅ’s Global Unicorn List Tops $6T In Value In August For The First Time Despite Slowdown
• Here Are Some Of The Newer Investors Entering The AI And Megaround Race
• These Are The Speediest Companies To Go From Series A To Series C

Methodology

The ¸½½üÉÏÃÅ ¸½½üÉÏÃÅ is a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more and is based on ¸½½üÉÏÃÅ 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. ¸½½üÉÏÃÅ 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 ¸½½üÉÏÃÅ long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

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