This is an era of startups and it gives me immense joy to know and learn about the young talents that come up with their innovations to infuse their thoughts and talents into building products that set them apart. Amazed by such revolutions, I developed the zeal to acknowledge their efforts and contributions to the global economy. Few such startups that captivated my thoughts and made me freeze in wonder are those which started with almost little money or no money, yet grew out to become famous startups making a huge turnover. I would like to list out those few startups that made billions of dollars becoming the focus.
1. Stripe
Stripe is an American online payment gateway service provider covering over 25 different countries. It was founded in 2010 by Irish entrepreneurs Patrick and John Collison. It allows individuals as well as large enterprises to perform integrated online payment using their credit card or any other major online payment method. Its major focus on providing fraud prevention has given it a $9.2 billion valuation. In 2016, Stripe was ranked number four on the Forbes magazine Cloud 100, a list of companies that engage in cloud computing. In 2017, Stripe was ranked number one on the Forbes Cloud 100.
2. DigitalOcean
The American cloud infrastructure provider, headquartered in New York City, was founded in 2011 by Ben and Moisey Uretsky and has data centers worldwide. Now serving more than 50,000 companies and 700,000 users, DigitalOcean competes with Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure and generates billion dollars revenue annually. DigitalOcean, the cloud of developers, was named to Forbes 2016 Cloud 100 List. It was recognized as one of the World’s Top 100 Private Cloud Companies for a second consecutive year in 2017.
3. Slack
Founded in 2013 by Stewart Butterfield, Slack is a cloud-based set of proprietary team collaboration tools and services. Post its inception, it didn’t take too long for the company to set a new record by becoming the fastest startup ever to achieve a $1 billion valuation. When the company was just two-years-old, is valued at over $1 billion and was already used by more than 30,000 teams. Past 2017 summer, Slack raised a whopping $250 million funding round at a $5 billion valuation.
Former Unicorns in the Billion Dollar Club
4. Braintree Payments
The Chicago-based company and a division of PayPal, Braintree Payments is a payment service provider that specializes in mobile and web payment systems for e-commerce companies. Founded in 2007 by Bryan Johnson, Braintree in the later years came up with advanced fraud protection services that include tools to help businesses detect and prevent fraudulent transactions while approving more orders. Within four years of its inception, Braintree raised $69 million in venture capital later paramount to an $800 million acquisition.
5. Shopify
Shopify is an e-commerce platform headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario. Founded in 2004 by Tobias Lütke, Daniel Weinand, and Scott Lake after attempting to open Snowdevil, an online store for snowboarding equipment was later launched as Shopify in 2006. Within four years, the Canadian e-commerce platform received $7 million and $15 million in a series of venture capital financing generating a huge revenue. They eventually earned billion-dollar valuation from VCs and IPOs with a revenue of $580.9 million as of 2017.
6. Shutterstock
Headquartered in New York City, Shutterstock is an American stock photography, stock footage, stock music, and editing tools provider, founded in 2003. American entrepreneur and computer programmer, Jon Oringer, created his own online marketplace by initially uploading 30,000 of his own stock photos and made them available via subscription. Gradually, acquiring a handful of other companies like Bigstock, WebDAM, Rex Features and PremiumBeat, to name a few, and partnership with Facebook, the company raised a billion-dollar revenue making Oringer a billionaire.