Unicorn startups in India are the new moonshot among the generation. With their intuitive idea and efforts, every growing startup wishes to hit the valuation of 1 billion dollars to label itself as a unicorn. What’s the time? It’s time to become Atmanirbhar. The startup is like that new ride of adventure in the fair with most of the crowd.
Throughout the years, India has become the home of revolutionary startups in today’s world of tech and development.
Many Indian startups registered themselves as unicorn startups and remarkably shook the industry. Counting the numbers, we know India reached the milestone of 105 unicorn startups in July 2022. These startups are changing the way we live, work and socialise. From food delivery to ride-sharing, these companies are making a great impact in making life easier for everyone involved.
List Of The Top 50 Unicorn startups in India
With the growing age and time, not only did the number of startups grow but the positive elevation can also be seen in their valuation.
Listing the Unicorns that transfigured the market as well as people worldwide.
Flipkart
Indian giant e-commerce and the most valuable startup in India, Flipkart, made itself the 10th largest e-commerce company in the world. By Introducing the genius idea of cash on delivery to Indian customers, Flipkart opened the gates of hospitality to online shopping.
| Founders | Binny Bansal, Sachin Bansal |
| Founded | 2007 |
| valuation | $37.6 billion (July 2021) |
| Industry | Ecommerce, Marketplace |
| tagline | “Naye India ke saath” |
Makemy Trip
Checking out Indians from long queues and introducing them to online booking of not only railways or airways but getaway hotels, beach houses and all kinds of staycations, Makemy trip made its way into the hearts of Indians, and its rise got it registered into Indian startup unicorns.
| Founders | Deep Kalra |
| Founded | 2000 |
| valuation | $2.52 billion |
| Industry | Online travel |
| tagline | “Dil Toh Roaming Hai” |
Inmobi
Providing a platform to both publishers and advertisers that helps in optimising the ranks of the advertisements offered on mobile phones. The mobile advertising app offers great deals on products through convincing advertisements.
| Founders | Abhay Singhal, Amit Gupta, Mohit Saxena, Naveen Tewari, Piyush Shah |
| Founded | 2007 |
| valuation | $12 billion (April 2021) |
| Industry | Advertising, digital media |
| tagline | “Where entrepreneurs work.” |
Paytm
The established unicorn startup Paytm offered users to sign up for merchandise without having bank accounts. Paytm wallets captured the interests of many users making online payments easier and accessible.
| Founders | Vijay Shekhar Sharma |
| Founded | 2010 |
| valuation | $16 billion |
| Industry | E-commerce Finance |
| tagline | “Paytm karo” |
OLA
The early 2010s marked the success of India’s largest mobility platform and the world’s largest ride-hailing company, OLA. Creating partnerships with cab drivers and owners led to its business worldwide.
| Founders | Bhavish Agarwal, Ankit bhati |
| Founded | 2010 |
| valuation | $7.3 billion |
| Industry | transportation |
| tagline | “Chalo niklo” |
Zomato
The food delivery app masters the industry with its mind-blowing marketing strategies. Whether with creative taglines on flex boards or hyping itself with different trends and tweets, Zomato never fails to advertise itself, thus justifying its place in the top 50 unicorns of India.
| Founders | Deepinder Goyal, Pankaj Chaddah |
| Founded | July 2008 |
| valuation | $ 5.4 billion |
| Industry | Online food ordering and Retail |
| tagline | “Every meal matters” |
Udaan
The business model credited its success to a strong set of founders and the magnificent approach of providing this platform to small buyers and sellers. The logistics furnished the startup and made it a unicorn startup.
| Founders | Sujeet Kumar, Amod Malviya, and Vaibhav Gupta |
| Founded | 2016 |
| valuation | $3.1 billion (Jan 2021) |
| Industry | E-commerce, Supply chain management, B2B |
| tagline | “Kholo munafe ka shutter” |
Lenskart
“Lenskart is a brand with a vision”. Offering services in both online and offline modes and using the latest edge-cutting technologies, the company grounded its roots in great depth.
| Founders | Peyush Bansal, Amit Chaudhary, Sumeet Kapahi |
| Founded | 2010 |
| valuation | $4.32 billion (April 2022) |
| Industry | Eyewear |
| tagline | “How do i look.” |
Swiggy
Swiggy enrolled their value chain highly into customer-required ways. Offering great deals on day-to-day orders and channelising door-to-door quick deliveries made it a success.
| Founders | Nandan Reddy, Sriharsha Majety, and Rahul Jaimini |
| Founded | 2014 |
| valuation | $5.5 billion (July 2021) |
| Industry | Food delivery |
| tagline | Swiggy Karo, Phir Jo Chahe Karo! |
Oyo rooms
CEO Ritesh Agarwal brought the world’s most affordable hotel chain OYO. The predictable and low-cost accommodations with easy booking welcomed a great audience to its premises.
| Founders | Ritesh Agarwal |
| Founded | 2013 |
| valuation | $9 billion (July 2021) |
| Industry | Hospitality |
| tagline | “AurKyaChahiye” |
Postman
Postman emerged as India’s most valuable SaaS startup. An easy-to-use API tool that can be easily installed to perform API testing effortlessly.
| Founders | Abhijit Kane, Abhinav Asthana, Ankit Sobti |
| Founded | 2014 |
| valuation | $5.6 billion (August 2021) |
| Industry | Software, Developer Tools, Developer APIs, |
Nykaa
Setting up a customer base with robust marketing strategies, Nykaa made its name in the most competent brand player in the cosmetic industry.
| Founders | Falguni Nayar |
| Founded | 2012 |
| valuation | $2.3 billion (June 2021) |
| Industry | E-commerce |
| tagline | “Your beauty, our passion.” |
Firstcry
Franchising its presence in online and offline stores, Firstcry established its hybrid business model in the Unicorn startup list of India. The brand solemnly focused on making kids wear a priority and gained fame.
| Founders | Supam Maheshwari, Amitava Saha, Prashant Jadhav, Sanket Hattimattur |
| Founded | 2010 |
| valuation | $2 billion (March 2021) |
| Industry | E-commerce |
| tagline | “Asia’s favourite baby and kid’s shopping platform” |
Razorpay
A fast, affordable and secure platform for making online payments without charging huge sums of translation fees, Razorpay offers great modes of payment to merchants and other small startups.
| Founders | Harshil Mathur, Shashank Kumar |
| Founded | 2014 |
| valuation | $3 billion (April 2021) |
| Industry | Fintech, Financial Services |
| tagline | “PoweringDisruptors” |
Zerodha
The founders’ strong business model with excellent services to the customer made zerodha an acceptable online trading platform. It offers quick trades and proved itself best for active traders.
| Founders | Nithin Kamath and Nikhil Kamath |
| Founded | 2010 |
| valuation | $2 billion (June 2021) |
| Industry | Stockbroker |
| tagline | “The free trade zone” |
Pine labs
An intelligent approach towards capitalising macro market trends made pine labs a user’s favourite. The idea was to focus on the merchant’s needs and provide the best-suited and needed model.
| Founders | Rajul Garg, Tarun Upaday |
| Founded | 1998 |
| valuation | $5+ billion (March 2022) |
| Industry | Fintech, Financial Services, Payments |
| tagline | “We make your business future-positive.” |
Bigbasket
It is a customised model that collaborates with grocery stores, thus becoming India’s largest online grocery store. Fast deliveries and the required concern for customers’ needs made this startup a unicorn.
| Founders | Hari Menon, V.S. Sudhakar, Vipul Parekh, Abhinay Choudhari and V.S. Ramesh |
| Founded | 2011 |
| valuation | $1.85 billion (March 2021) |
| Industry | Retail |
| tagline | “Har Din Sasta.” |
Cars24
The startup not only customised the highly unorganised car industry of the country but also made it diverse. Shifting the sale and purchase of old used cars to an online platform opened the options of diversity to the user.
| Founders | Gajendra Jangid, Mehul Agrawal, Ruchit Agarwal, Vikram Chopra |
| Founded | 2015 |
| valuation | $1.6 billion (July 2021) |
| Industry | B2C, Ecommerce, AI |
| tagline | “Car bechni ho, toh Cars24” |
Physics Wallah
Breaking stereotypes and making skilled talent a ladder, CEO Alakh Pandey grew his Ed-tech to be India’s 101st unicorn startup. Pandey focused on the number of students reached and the quality of content delivered to them, thus making an impact on millions of students.
| Founders | Alakh Pandey |
| Founded | 2016 |
| valuation | $1.1 billion+ (June 2022) |
| Industry | Edtech, Elearning |
| tagline | “Padhai ko manage mat karo …. life ko manage karo” |
Unacademy
Multiple offerings and taking advantage of the shift of learning platforms to online, Unacademy made itself the platform to be there for students for all kinds of entrance exams whether graduate or postgraduate.
| Founders | Gaurav Munjal, Hemesh Singh, Roman Saini, Sachin Gupta |
| Founded | 2015 |
| valuation | $3.44 billion (August 2021) |
| Industry | Edtech, E-learning |
| tagline | ” Invaluable Treasure of Incredible India” |
Myglamm
The startup aims to reach many customers by collaborating with salons and spas across India. The unique business model got its fair share of success rapidly.
| Founders | Darpan Sanghvi, Priyanka Gill |
| Founded | 2015 |
| valuation | $1.2+ billion (November 2021) |
| Industry | Cosmetics, Beauty, Marketplace |
| tagline | “Have you had your first Fruitgasm?” |
Pharmeasy
With the Digitization of healthcare items and reaching vast corners of the country, pharmeasy emerged as India’s No.1 healthcare aggregator. Doorstep delivery of healthcare objects is easy and swift.
| Founders | Mikhil Innani, Dharmil Sheth and Dhaval Shah |
| Founded | 2015 |
| valuation | $5.6 billion (October 2021) |
| Industry | Healthcare and Online Pharmacy |
| tagline | “Take it easy PharmEasy’ |
Digit insurance
Trusted by over 2 cr customers for health, motor and travel insurance within just 4 years, digit insurance made its way into the unicorn list.
| Founders | $4 billion (May 2022) |
| Founded | 2017 |
| valuation | $4 billion (May 2022) |
| Industry | Insurance |
Cred
The startup focuses on customer experience and incorporating consumer needs into one app that pays bills, offers loans and tracks credit scores with time.
| Founders | Kunal Shah |
| Founded | 2018 |
| valuation | $2.2 billion (April 2021) |
| Industry | Financial Technology |
| tagline | ‘Suraksha Aur Bharosa Dono’ |
Coin DCX
A trading platform that promises users reliable, secure and fast trading. The across-the-board ecosystem provides all kinds of trading options to the users.
| Founders | Neeraj Khandelwal, Sumit Gupta |
| Founded | 2018 |
| valuation | $2+ billion (April 2022) |
| Industry | Cryptocurrency, Blockchain, Fintech |
| tagline | “Your Gateway to Crypto.” |
Curefit
The unicorn startup stands on digital efficiency and massive customer engagement. Successful enrollment of over 11 million customers and high effective deals made it a unicorn.
| Founders | Ankit Nagori, Mukesh Bansal |
| Founded | 2016 |
| valuation | $1.5 billion (November 2021) |
| Industry | Healthcare, wellness |
Blackbuck
The blackbuck company revolutionarily brought offline trucking services online. The contract truck services promise to track their shipment throughout.
| Founders | Chanakya Hridaya, Rajesh Yabaji, Ramasubramaniam B |
| Founded | 2015 |
| valuation | $1.02 billion (August 2021) |
| Industry | Logistics, Transportation |
Droom
With a valuation of 1.2 billion dollars the company became a unicorn startup providing end to end services for both buyers and sellers.
| Founders | Sandeep Aggarwal |
| Founded | 2014 |
| valuation | $1.2 billion(August 2021) |
| Industry | Automotives, B2B, Marketplace |
| tagline | “Miley feeling nai wali” |
Innovaccer
The startup aims to service the Medicaid population of the country. Successful clinical drives and enrollment of over 24 million people digitally helped its way out to be a unicorn startup.
| Founders | Sandeep Gupta |
| Founded | 2014 |
| valuation | $1.3 billion (February 2021) |
| Industry | Healthcare |
| tagline | “Accelerate Your Digital Transformation with the Innovaccer Health Cloud” |
Coinswitch kuber
Allowing traders to withdraw their earnings instantly and making itself a popular choice by adding features like no lock-in period. Easy and secure liquidity made it a successful unicorn.
| Founders | Ashish Singhal, Govind Soni, Vimal Sagar Tiwari |
| Founded | 2017 |
| valuation | $1.9 Billion (October 2021) |
| Industry | Cryptocurrencies, Financial Services |
| tagline | “Buy, Sell, Trade.” |
Mamaearth
Dedication and commitment toward the customers made this wide range of brand customers’ favourite. The innovative marketing strategies and use of only natural ingredients brought it success in no time.
| Founders | Varun and Ghazal Alagh |
| Founded | 2016 |
| valuation | $1.1 billion+ (December 2021) |
| Industry | Ecommerce, Health and Wellness |
| tagline | ‘Goodness Inside’ |
Mpl
MPL’s intuitive business model that incorporates in -app purchases and making revenue through advertisements helped it make a place in the startup industry.
| Founders | Sai Srinivas Kiran G, Shubh Malhotra, Shubham Malhotra |
| Founded | 2018 |
| valuation | $2.3 Billion (September 2021) |
| Industry | Gaming, ESports |
| tagline | ‘Game Khelo Hero Bano’ |
Phonepe
Online payment made reliable and shifted from cumbersome cash to instant scan. Easy transfer of money and many more features enrolled made, the app a choice of 125 million active users every month.
| Founders | Burzin Engineer, Rahul Chari, Sameer Nigam |
| Founded | 2015 |
| valuation | $5.5 billion (December 2020) |
| Industry | Fintech, Mobile Payments |
| tagline | “Karte Ja. Badhte Ja,” |
Upstox
Online share trading was made easy and understandable by the startup through its cost-effective brokerage plans.
| Founders | Raghu Kumar, Ravi Kumar, Shrinivas Viswanath |
| Founded | 2010 |
| valuation | $1 billion+ (November 2021) |
| Industry | Fintech, Financial services, Trading platform |
| tagline | “Start Karke Dekho.” |
Vedantu
One of India’s leading online tutoring apps made its way out by localising students from all over the country to one screen.
| Founders | Vamsi Krishna, Pulkit Jain, Saurabh Saxena, and Anand Prakash |
| Founded | 2011 |
| valuation | $1 Billion+ (September 2021) |
| Industry | Edtech |
| tagline | ‘Zindagi Ka Syllabus’ |
Meesho
This unicorn startup offers a zero investment business model to small businesses across the country and thus making it easy for in-shop sellers to sell their products online on meesho. The cost-effective and relatively affordable products gathered the attention of Indian customers.
| Founders | Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal |
| Founded | 2015 |
| valuation | $4.9 billion (September 2021) |
| Industry | E-commerce |
| tagline | ‘Not just a homemaker, a Meesho Entrepreneur’ |
CarDekho
Car Dekho is India’s largest online Auto Portal. The company welcomes a massive lead of 15 million visitors every month.
| Founders | Amit Jain, Anurag Jain |
| Founded | 2007 |
| valuation | $1.2 billion (October 2021) |
| Industry | Automotive, Ecommerce |
| tagline | “Bharosa Kar Ke Dekho” |
Bharatpe
The OR code scanning payment app takes care of its customers by providing discreet payment methods. The user-friendly transaction app provides merchant credits at a cheaper rate thus making itself a favourable choice.
| Founders | Ashneer Grover, Bhavik Koladiya, Shashvat Nakrani |
| Founded | 2018 |
| valuation | $2.85 billion (February 2022) |
| Industry | Payments platform, Fintech, Financial Services |
| tagline | ‘Ab se Dukandar is king’ |
Apna
The firm aims at making it easier for people to seek job opportunities and does a good job in linking companies with white-collar workers.
| Founders | Nirmit Parikh |
| Founded | 2019 |
| valuation | $1.1 Billion (September 2021) |
| Industry | Employment, Recruiting, Human Resources |
| tagline | “Get a Job. FASTER.” |
Urban company
The preeminent startup made it highly accessible to avail easy services of spas and saloons at the door. The home accessed services made it a choice in 11.5 million orders.
| Founders | Abhiraj Bhal, Varun Khaitan and Raghav Chandra |
| Founded | 2014 |
| valuation | $2.8 billion (June 2021) |
| Industry | Home Services |
upGrad
The start-up’s ultimate kingpin is a mentorship rather than putting a course online. The interactive effort by the team registered it as a unicorn.
| Founders | Mayank Kumar, Phalgun Kompalli, Ravijot Chugh, Ronnie Screwvala |
| Founded | 2015 |
| valuation | $1.2 bn (August 2021) |
| Industry | Edtech, E-learning |
| tagline | “A journey as dynamic as us.” |
Sharechat
The major approach of the app was simple as it gave the user a platform to create content and post it in their local language. Today the share chat app has active users of 250 million.
| Founders | Ankush Sachdeva, Bhanu Pratap Singh, and Faris Ahsan |
| Founded | 2015 |
| valuation | $3.7 Billion (December 2021) |
| Industry | Internet, Mobile Apps, Social Media, Social Network |
| tagline | “best of India by best of India” |
Blinkit
The company’s belief in doling out excellent experiences to its customers bought it fame and admiration.
| Founders | Albinder Dhindsa, Saurabh Kumar |
| Founded | 2013 |
| valuation | $1 billion(June 30, 2021) |
| Industry | Ecommerce, Grocery, Delivery |
| tagline | “Lets blink it” |
BoAt
The leading company sells one of the finest ranges of affordable audio ear wears. The startup started from scratch and built a unicorn trusted by over 2 million customers.
| Founders | Aman gupta, sameer mehta |
| Founded | 2016 |
| valuation | $1.5-2 billion |
| Industry | Consumer electronics |
| tagline | “Plug Into Nirvana” |
Mohalla tech
A software company known for its share chat and moj apps. The company works in providing designs and develops social media platforms for sharing high-quality quotes, videos, images, news concrete etc.
| Founders | Ankush Sachdeva, Farid Ahsan and Bhanu Singh |
| Founded | 2015 |
| valuation | $3.7 billion (December 2021) |
| Industry | Software |
BYJU’s
India’s effective online learning educational program that provides innovative services of teaching has boosted ed-tech remarkably.
| Founders | Byju Raveendran & Divya Gokulnath |
| Founded | 2011 |
| valuation | $16.5 Billion (July 2021) |
| Industry | Edtech, Distance education, M-learning |
| tagline | Fall in love with learning |
Globalbees
The fast-growing e-commerce is picking up pace in India as investing in a wide range has profited their market a lot.
| Founders | Nitin Aggarwal , Supam Maheshwari |
| Founded | 2021 |
| valuation | $1.1 billion |
| Industry | Investment |
Ofbusiness
The raw material procurement aims at the manufacturing of the industries.
| Founders | Asish Mohapatra, Bhuvan Gupta, Chandranshu Sinha, Nitin Jain, Ruchi Kalra, Srinath Ramakkrushnan, Vasant Sridhar |
| Founded | 2015 |
| valuation | $5+ billion (December 2021) |
| Industry | Building Materials, FinTech |
| tagline | “The more unsexy a business, the more profitable it” |
Policybazaar
The largest insurance company in the country has also spread its roots in the UAE. The platform provides insurance in an easy and accessible way.
| Founders | Yashish Dahiya, Alok Bansal and Avaneesh Nirja |
| Founded | 2008 |
| valuation | $2.4 billion (July 2021) |
| Industry | Insurance Company |
| tagline | ‘Har Family Hogi Insured’ |
Dream11
The fantasy platform that offers a variety of sports gathers the fascination of public interest not only in cricket but also basketball, hockey, football etc worldwide.
| Founders | Bhavit Sheth, Harsh Jain |
| Founded | 2008 |
| valuation | $8 billion (November 2021) |
| Industry | Fantasy Sports, IT |
| tagline | “Jab Dream bada ho, toh koi akela nahi hota. Dream Big, Dream11” |
Licious
The one-stop meat shop for easy and fresh meat and seafood is the first meat brand in India to be FSSC 22000 certified. Thus enormous popularity and fresh deliveries made their way to becoming unicorn startups.
| Founders | Abhay hanjura,Vivek gupta |
| Founded | 2015 |
| valuation | $1 billion+ |
| Industry | E-commerce, Meat products |
| tagline | “For the love of meat” |
Conclusion
Experts’ stats reveal that we all should be ready to welcome many more brilliant unicorns by 2025. Collectively, Indian startups have renowned the country by making it the 3rd largest startup ecosystem and ranking it 19th in the top 100 countries producing the most successful startups. It can be said that despite the economic crisis due to the pandemic amid covid 19, these unicorns supported the backbone of the Indian economy successfully.