·Founders & startups
The small communities behind America’s unicorns
Nearly six in ten privately held US unicorns have an immigrant founder. Some smaller immigrant communities have helped build far more unicorns than their size suggests.
Authored by Vazgen BadalyanThe National Foundation for American Policy’s 2026 report counted 455 of 775 companies and listed their founders’ countries of origin. Counting companies is a start. Compare those totals with the number of people from each country living in the US, then with the population back home, and a different picture appears. Australia, Denmark, Israel, Romania, and the UK stand out in ways the raw leaderboard misses.
Australia’s rate is 3.4 times Canada’s.
Australia’s 14 companies work out to 12.5 per 100,000 Australia-born US residents, compared with Canada’s 3.6. Israel stands apart: 60 founder-linked US unicorns, including Gong, VAST Data, and Fireblocks, work out to one for every 2,560 Israel-born US residents.
Turn the calculation around and there are 8,003 US immigrants per Australia-linked company, versus 27,461 for Canada. Shorter bars mean more companies relative to population.
How many immigrants does it take to create 1 unicorn?
Countries with 10 or more linked unicorns · Select a bar to meet the companies
Australia’s links include Hadrian, PsiQuantum, Physical Intelligence, and Baseten—companies building factories, quantum computers, robots, and AI infrastructure. Select a bar to see the founders behind it.
We recounted the report’s appendix for these charts. Its founder-origin labels do not always match birthplace.
Denmark stands out on a smaller base.
Five US unicorns have founder links to Denmark. Against roughly 25,000 Denmark-born US residents, that is one company per 5,036 people. Singapore has four linked companies; Latvia has two.
These are small company lists: one addition changes Denmark’s rate by 20% and Latvia’s by 50%. The chart shows the 20 lowest ratios among 31 eligible origins with two to nine companies, with the count beside each bar.
Smaller lists, striking ratios
Countries with 2–9 linked unicorns · Select a bar to meet the companies
Now look at the raw counts.
The UK has 48 linked companies, Israel 60, and Australia 14. Divide by US immigrant population and Australia moves ahead of the UK, while Israel stands apart. The UK ranks fourth among countries with at least ten linked unicorns, at 7.0 per 100,000 UK-born US residents.
US unicorns, by founder origin
Select a bar to meet the companies
The UK list includes Anthropic through cofounder Jack Clark, Suno through Keenan Freyberg, Supabase through Ant Wilson, and Calm through Alex Tew and Michael Acton Smith. Select a bar for the full list.
Home-country population gives a different view.
A small US immigrant population can make a country’s rate look striking. Comparing the same founder links with the population back home asks whether its US unicorn footprint still stands out against the country’s overall size. Israel has the highest rate on this chart: 60 US unicorns per 10 million people in Israel.
US unicorns relative to population back home
Countries with 10 or more linked unicorns · Select a bar to meet the companies
The UK is third here, behind Israel and Canada, at 6.9 US unicorns per ten million UK residents.
What the report’s country labels leave out.
The report gives founder-origin labels, not a consistent record of birthplace or family heritage. In our selective check, we found evidence for 173 birthplaces; seven of 74 comparable cases differed from the report label. Deel cofounder Alex Bouaziz, for example, appears under Israel but was born in Paris. This check does not create a new country ranking.
Family heritage tells another story. We documented Armenian heritage among founders connected to six US billion-dollar companies: Ascend Elements, Generate Biomedicines, Lila Sciences, Moderna, Reddit, and ServiceTitan. Its cofounders Vahe Kuzoyan and Ara Mahdessian have Armenian heritage.
Why no Armenia bar? The charts use the report’s founder-origin labels, not family heritage. Its private-company appendix lists one under Armenia: Picsart. Ascend Elements, Generate Biomedicines, and Lila Sciences appear under other origins. Moderna, Reddit, and ServiceTitan had gone public, so they fall outside the report’s private-company list. You can find Armenia in the full table; the charts above show countries with at least two companies.
Look past the biggest bars.
Australia and Denmark are easy to miss in a list sorted by unicorn count. Against the size of their US communities, both stand out. Israel and the UK combine strong rates with longer company lists. Big companies do not always come from big communities.
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Explore the companies behind each country.
Click a country in the table to see its companies and founders. The bars above open the same details.
Country comparison table · select a country
| Report origin | Companies | US immigrants | Per 100,000 immigrants | Immigrants per company | Per 10m home residents |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 117,128 | 0.9 | 117,128 | 4.2 | |
| 1 | Unavailable | Unavailable | Unavailable | 0.3 | |
| 6 | 210,909 | 2.8 | 35,152 | 1.3 | |
| 1 | 113,871 | 0.9 | 113,871 | 3.3 | |
| 14 | 112,037 | 12.5 | 8,003 | 5.1 | |
| 1 | 37,622 | 2.7 | 37,622 | 1.1 | |
| 1 | 33,476 | 3.0 | 33,476 | 1.0 | |
| 1 | 353,701 | 0.3 | 353,701 | <0.1 | |
| 1 | 48,573 | 2.1 | 48,573 | 35.4 | |
| 5 | 72,513 | 6.9 | 14,503 | 5.5 | |
| 1 | 38,468 | 2.6 | 38,468 | 0.8 | |
| 1 | 108,665 | 0.9 | 108,665 | 3.2 | |
| 9 | 725,419 | 1.2 | 80,602 | 0.4 | |
| 5 | 70,116 | 7.1 | 14,023 | 7.8 | |
| 30 | 823,843 | 3.6 | 27,461 | 7.3 | |
| 2 | 137,579 | 1.5 | 68,790 | 1.0 | |
| 41 | 2,380,223 | 1.7 | 58,054 | 0.3 | |
| 2 | 1,153,648 | 0.2 | 576,824 | 0.4 | |
| 1 | 1,688,798 | <0.1 | 1,688,798 | 0.9 | |
| B05006 combines Czech Republic and Slovakia as Czechoslovakia; no exact denominator is used. | 2 | Unavailable | Unavailable | Unavailable | 1.8 |
| 5 | 25,182 | 19.9 | 5,036 | 8.4 | |
| 1 | 1,299,961 | <0.1 | 1,299,961 | 0.9 | |
| 1 | 621,915 | 0.2 | 621,915 | 0.6 | |
| 2 | 225,321 | 0.9 | 112,661 | 0.2 | |
| 1 | Unavailable | Unavailable | Unavailable | 7.3 | |
| 4 | Unavailable | Unavailable | Unavailable | 7.1 | |
| 21 | 179,804 | 11.7 | 8,562 | 3.1 | |
| 1 | 35,886 | 2.8 | 35,886 | 2.6 | |
| 18 | 519,159 | 3.5 | 28,842 | 2.2 | |
| 1 | 222,781 | 0.4 | 222,781 | 0.3 | |
| 4 | 117,468 | 3.4 | 29,367 | 3.8 | |
| 1 | 1,365,684 | <0.1 | 1,365,684 | 0.5 | |
| 96 | 3,162,885 | 3.0 | 32,947 | 0.7 | |
| 9 | 420,227 | 2.1 | 46,692 | 1.0 | |
| 1 | 224,492 | 0.4 | 224,492 | 0.2 | |
| 4 | 116,641 | 3.4 | 29,160 | 7.4 | |
| 60 | 153,622 | 39.1 | 2,560 | 60.0 | |
| 7 | 284,510 | 2.5 | 40,644 | 1.2 | |
| 2 | 342,968 | 0.6 | 171,484 | 0.2 | |
| 3 | 91,008 | 3.3 | 30,336 | 2.6 | |
| 1 | 47,270 | 2.1 | 47,270 | 0.5 | |
| 2 | 181,766 | 1.1 | 90,883 | 0.4 | |
| 2 | 20,381 | 9.8 | 10,191 | 10.7 | |
| 9 | 138,062 | 6.5 | 15,340 | 15.5 | |
| 1 | 36,300 | 2.8 | 36,300 | 3.5 | |
| 1 | Unavailable | Unavailable | Unavailable | 17.6 | |
| 4 | 11,143,711 | <0.1 | 2,785,928 | 0.3 | |
| 1 | 97,640 | 1.0 | 97,640 | 0.3 | |
| 1 | Unavailable | Unavailable | Unavailable | 3.3 | |
| 1 | 208,406 | 0.5 | 208,406 | 0.3 | |
| 1 | 74,774 | 1.3 | 74,774 | 0.6 | |
| 1 | Unavailable | Unavailable | Unavailable | 34.2 | |
| 7 | Unavailable | Unavailable | Unavailable | 13.2 | |
| 7 | 532,602 | 1.3 | 76,086 | 0.3 | |
| 1 | 19,842 | 5.0 | 19,842 | 1.8 | |
| 10 | 418,535 | 2.4 | 41,854 | 0.4 | |
| 3 | 2,157,523 | 0.1 | 719,174 | 0.3 | |
| 8 | 390,226 | 2.1 | 48,778 | 2.2 | |
| 4 | 150,049 | 2.7 | 37,512 | 3.7 | |
| 1 | Unavailable | Unavailable | Unavailable | 3.5 | |
| 10 | 156,722 | 6.4 | 15,672 | 5.2 | |
| 23 | 424,059 | 5.4 | 18,437 | 1.6 | |
| 1 | 59,727 | 1.7 | 59,727 | 0.3 | |
| 2 | 35,585 | 5.6 | 17,793 | 3.0 | |
| 4 | 39,527 | 10.1 | 9,882 | 6.6 | |
| 1 | Unavailable | Unavailable | Unavailable | 4.7 | |
| 4 | 156,094 | 2.6 | 39,024 | 0.6 | |
| B05006 publishes Korea together; do not substitute it for South Korea. | 5 | Unavailable | Unavailable | Unavailable | 1.0 |
| 5 | 136,202 | 3.7 | 27,240 | 1.0 | |
| 1 | 62,305 | 1.6 | 62,305 | 0.2 | |
| 4 | 45,280 | 8.8 | 11,320 | 3.8 | |
| 3 | 38,004 | 7.9 | 12,668 | 3.3 | |
| 1 | 121,907 | 0.8 | 121,907 | 0.4 | |
| 6 | 400,369 | 1.5 | 66,728 | Unavailable | |
| 7 | 184,010 | 3.8 | 26,287 | 0.8 | |
| 1 | 33,913 | 2.9 | 33,913 | 0.9 | |
| 1 | 43,611 | 2.3 | 43,611 | 0.2 | |
| 16 | 510,016 | 3.1 | 31,876 | 4.2 | |
| ACS includes Crown Dependencies; the UK company category and World Bank population do not explicitly match that scope. | 48 | 682,714 | 7.0 | 14,223 | 6.9 |
| 2 | 81,552 | 2.5 | 40,776 | 0.6 | |
| 1 | 987,647 | 0.1 | 987,647 | 0.4 | |
| 1 | 1,395,775 | <0.1 | 1,395,775 | <0.1 |
Explore more comparisons
US unicorns per 100,000 immigrants
Countries with 10 or more linked unicorns · Select a bar to meet the companies
Sources & how we counted
The starting point is NFAP’s 2026 Immigrants and U.S. Billion-Dollar Companies report, revision 5, covering US privately held, venture-backed companies valued at $1 billion or more, largely as of April 2026. Of 775 companies, 455 had at least one immigrant founder or cofounder. Children of immigrants are considered separately. Public listings form a separate, selected list.
The charts use the report’s founder-origin labels with 2024 US Census birthplace populations and World Bank home-country populations. These labels do not always match birthplace. The ratios compare groups; they do not measure an individual’s likelihood of founding a unicorn.
Counting notes and limitations
- Companies: We counted 455 distinct companies in the report’s appendix, once per reported origin. Because a company can have founders from several places, this produces 584 country attributions. The appendix has 85 origin labels, including regions and historical places; the report summary names 76 countries.
- Appendix versus summary: The appendix gives the UK 48 companies, Poland 8, and New Zealand 7. The report summary says 47, 7, and 6. All charts use our recount of the appendix.
- Rankings: The opening charts show 12 countries with at least ten companies. The UK ranks fourth by US immigrant population and third by home-country population in that group. Include smaller origin groups with available data, and it ranks tenth and fourteenth. The ten-company cutoff helps readers compare larger lists; it is not a confidence threshold.
- Population and rates: US immigrant populations come from the 2024 American Community Survey; home-country populations come from the World Bank’s 2024 data. We divide companies by population to get companies per 100,000 US immigrants or per ten million home-country residents. “Immigrants per company” reverses that division.
- Country labels: A reported founder origin does not always match birthplace. The UK Census group includes Crown Dependencies; China’s excludes Hong Kong and Taiwan. We leave a rate blank when no matching population group exists. Population estimates and founder records also have gaps.
- Timing and meaning: The company list is a 2026 snapshot; the population data is from 2024. These comparisons do not measure an individual’s chance of founding a unicorn or the effect of immigration policy. The data download includes company lists, source links, and population margins of error. Founder evidence was reviewed through September 30, 2026.
- Birthplace check: We found evidence for 173 birthplaces among 1,155 candidate people. The report label differed in 7 of 74 comparable cases (9.5%). This was a selective check, so it is not an estimate of the report’s overall error rate. ServiceTitan is outside the report’s private-company cohort.
