According to the US Department of Health & Human Services, about 10.2 million people are covered through the Health Insurance Marketplace under the Affordable Care Act. The Affordable Care Act has led to the mushrooming of several startups using technology in sectors related to healthcare. Oscar is one such startup that has made it to the Billion Dollar Unicorn Club. >>>
According to a Zinnov research report, India’s mobile commerce market is estimated to grow to $19 billion by the year 2019 from $2 billion in 2015. The growth is being driven by smartphone sales supported by a wave of low-cost handsets. Cisco’s reports estimate that the number of smartphone users in India will grow nearly five times to 651 million by 2019 compared with 140 million by the end of 2014. Billion Dollar Unicorn club member One97 Communications is counting on this rapid explosion to sustain its valuation.
There aren’t many success stories out of Africa. But things appear to be changing now. According to a McKinsey research report, a third of the African population currently has Internet access. It estimates that Internet penetration will increase to 50% and that the country will see 360 million smartphone owners by the end of 2025. Africa Internet Group (AIG) is the first Billion Dollar Unicorn out of the continent and it is already making big news.
Software has increasingly become pervasive in all kinds of businesses driven by the use of open source. It allows businesses to get high-quality programs while saving on licensing fees and programming costs. It has led to several disruptive companies that have gone on to become billion dollar businesses. GitHub is a Billion Dollar Unicorn that has risen due to the open source movement. >>>
According to a Gartner report published earlier this year, the global cloud application services, including SaaS offerings, is expected to grow 20% this year to $37.7 billion. The market was estimated to have grown 16% in 2015 to $31.4 billion. Gartner attributes this growth to the shift in the models of software vendors who are transitioning from on-premises licensed software to public cloud-based offerings. SaaS based enterprise application services provider Workday (NYSE: WDAY) is already seeing the benefits of this growth. >>>
According to a ResearchandMarkets report, the global protein therapeutics market is expected to reach $208 billion by the end of 2020. Moderna Therapeutics is a startup in the field that has captured the imagination of VCs and waltzed into the Billion Dollar Unicorn Club. >>>
According to Gartner, the worldwide cyber security market was estimated to grow 4.7% to $75.4 billion in 2015. Growth in cloud computing, mobile computing, and the Internet of Things as well as advanced cyber attacks have spurred interest in security technologies. Another report by MarketsAndMarkets expects the global cyber security to grow 9.8% annually over the next five years to be worth $170.2 billion by 2020. >>>
According to market research firm eMarketer, global e-commerce sales will be worth $3.5 trillion by the year 2019. By 2019, e-commerce is estimated to account for 12.4% of total retail sales compared with 7.3% share in 2014. Australian company BigCommerce is helping turn this growth forecast into reality.
About 80% US consumers are expected to be using the sharing economy by 2017 and about 40% people are expected to be freelancers by 2020. These factors coupled with the surge in VC funding for sharing economy startups are driving up the value of shared-office company WeWork, which is among the top ten Billion Dollar Unicorns. >>>
According to a PayPal report, the e-commerce market in the Middle East was expected to be worth $15 billion in 2015, with about 10% of the transactions occurring on mobile devices. Another report from Payfort put the value of the e-commerce sector in the Middle East at $7 billion in 2015 and projected that the industry would be worth up to $10 billion in the UAE and Saudi Arabia by 2020. Souq.com is a leading e-commerce company in the Middle East that has recently joined the Billion Dollar Unicorn Club. >>>