Five privately held Israeli-founded companies in California have reached or surpassed a $1 billion valuation in 2021, giving the Golden State 22 Israeli unicorns, according to the United States – Israel Business Alliance (USIBA).
That makes California the leading US destination for large privately-held Israeli start-ups, USIBA said. New York ranks second in the US, with 21 Israeli-founded unicorns.
All of the California unicorns are located in Silicon Valley, except for cybersecurity company Orca Security, which is based in Los Angeles. Eight are headquartered in San Francisco, the most of any US city behind New York.
“California continues to attract many of the best and brightest innovators in the world,” USIBA president Aaron Kaplowitz said. “Silicon Valley lives by the ‘move fast and break things’ mantra. The Israelis, of course, have a word for that: chutzpah.”
Last week, payroll and compliance platform Deel announced the completion of a $156 million funding round, driving its valuation to $1.25b. Deel has raised $206m. total – all in the past 11 months.
Less than a mile away, ironSource, an app monetization and distribution pioneer, recently revealed its plans to go public through a special purpose acquisition company. The agreement with Thoma Bravo Advantage surges pushed up the company’s value to $11.1b., surpassing the $10.4b. SPAC merger between New Jersey-based eToro and FinTech Acquisition Corp.
Trailing San Francisco, Palo Alto now has seven Israeli-founded unicorns, including insurance disrupters Hippo ($5b.) and Next Insurance ($4b.). On March 22, Wiz closed a $130m. round. CEO and co-founder Assaf Rappaport proclaimed that Wiz had become the “fastest-growing security startup ever,” achieving a $1.7b. valuation only three months since emerging from stealth.
Database management innovator Redis Labs ($2b.) also lists its corporate headquarters in Mountain View. On April 7, Redis and San Francisco-based Trax ($2.3b.), a retail analytics leader, raised $950m. combined. Although not yet unicorns, Blue Dot and WhiteSource, both based in Massachusetts, increased the total funding amount to $1.1b., setting a single-day record for Israeli-founded start-ups.
In March, Orca Security closed a $210m. round at a $1.2b. valuation.
“When you unpack these astonishing figures,” Kaplowitz said, “you begin to understand that the investments fund new jobs and boost local economic activity.”
In San Mateo, Tipalti has grown its accounts payable and global remittance automation solutions into an enterprise valued at $2b.
Dremio, a big data curating engine ($1b.) and Innoviz ($1.4b.), a LiDAR manufacturer, maintain headquarters in Santa Clara. They could soon be joined by their neighbor Cloudinary, a provider of cloud-based solutions for image, video, and data asset management. Cloudinary has impressively approached unicorn status without taking a single investment from a venture capital firm.
Last week, USIBA published research findings on the 21 Israeli-founded unicorns based in New York, which trails Tel Aviv as the city with the most Israeli-founded unicorns in the world. Soon after, Outbrain, a unicorn from the list, filed a prospectus with the US Securities and Exchange Commission for plans to IPO. This development came one day after Israeli-founded ad software company DoubleVerify – headquartered in SoHo – closed its first day on the New York Stock Exchange up 33%, enough for a market cap of $5.3b.