Even with the recent additions to the unicorn club by Germany and France, the UK still has the most billion-dollar start-ups in Europe. 47 companies have passed this magic mark according to data from CB Insights. As our chart shows, the rest of Europe doesn't even come close to double digits.
While countries like Norway, Spain or the Netherlands have added to their unicorn portfolio in 2022, it will still be hard to close the gap to Germany, the UK and France, the latter of which added eight unicorns in the year to date. When looking at the overall market valuation, it still comes down to only two countries though: six and three of the top 10 highest valuated unicorns in Europe are from the United Kingdom and Germany, respectively, with British fintech Checkout.com in the clear number one spot with an estimated worth of $40 billion.
Investing in especially fintech startups isn't exactly new, but it has only become a trend as recently as 2021. As CB Insights data shows, this year alone saw 457 new members gaining entry to the unicorn club, which encompasses 917 corporations overall. To put that number into perspective: In 2020, only 109 start-ups made the one-billion-dollar jump. The majority, or 70 percent, of highly valuated start-ups is situated in the US and China.
