Immigrant and billion dollars startups
- Stuart Anderson
- 21 mars 2016
- 3 min de lecture
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Immigrants play a key role in creating new, fast-growing companies, as evidenced by the prevalence of foreignborn founders and key personnel in the nation’s leading privately-held companies. Immigrants have started more than half (44 of 87) of America’s startup companies valued at $1 billion dollars or more and are key members of management or product development teams in over 70 percent (62 of 87) of these companies.
The research finds that among the billion dollar startup companies, immigrant founders have created an average of approximately 760 jobs per company in the United States. The collective value of the 44 immigrant-founded companies is $168 billion, which is close to half the value of the stock markets of Russia or Mexico. The research involved conducting interviews and gathering information on the 87 U.S. startup companies valued at over $1 billion (as of January 1, 2016) that have yet to become publicly traded on the U.S. stock market and are tracked by The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones VentureSource.
The companies, all privately-held and with the potential to become publicly traded on the stock market, are today each valued at $1 billion or more and have received venture capital (equity) financing. Among the key findings: - The research finds that 51 percent, or 44 out of 87, of the country’s $1 billion startup companies had at least one immigrant founder. This illustrates the increasing importance and contributions of immigrants to the U.S. economy. A 2006 study conducted with the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) identified an immigrant founder in 25 percent of venture-backed companies that became publicly traded between 1990 and 2005, while a 2013 NVCA study found immigrants started 33 percent of U.S. venture-backed companies that became publicly traded between 2006 and 2012. - This study is one of the first to examine the role immigrants play on the management or product development teams in leading private companies in information technology, health, energy, financial services, and other sectors. The research found 62 of the 87 companies, or 71 percent, had at least one immigrant helping the company grow and innovate by filling a key management or product development position. Chief technology officer, CEO and vice president of engineering are the most common positions held by immigrants in these billion dollar startup companies. - The billion dollar startup companies with an immigrant founder excel at job creation.
The leading companies for employment are SpaceX (4,000 employees), Mu Sigma (3,500 employees) and Palantir Technologies (2,000 employees). Uber, co-founded by a Canadian immigrant, directly employs at least 900 people but reports having 162,037 “active drivers” (completed at least four trips) in the United States as of December 2014. - Outstanding immigrant entrepreneurs profiled in the research include Elon Musk, founder of SpaceX; Garrett Camp, co-founder of Uber; Noubar Afeyan, co-founder of Moderna Therapeutics and 37 other companies, primarily through Flagship Ventures, the firm he heads; Jyoti Bansal, who waited 7 years for his employment-based green card to start AppDynamics, which employs 900 people and provides the equivalent of a 24/7 MRI for company websites; Amr Awadallah, co-founder of Cloudera, which allows organizations in various fields to profit from their data; Michelle Zatlyn, co-founder of CloudFlare, which uses the power of its global network to help websites with traffic and security; and other immigrant entrepreneurs. - Companies with immigrant founders have produced a variety of useful products and services to benefit U.S. consumers and make U.S. companies more productive. Uber has transformed travel in American cities, while SpaceX aims to enable Americans to travel to Mars. Gusto makes it easier for employers to administer payroll, while ZocDoc allows patients to find in-network neighborhood doctors and book appointments online. Stripe, started by two Irish immigrant brothers, facilitates online payments for businesses and their customers, while AppDynamics, Cloudera, CloudFlare, Tanium, Actifio, Mu Sigma and others help U.S. companies to maintain strong information technology systems to compete in the global marketplace. Sports fans enjoy playing fantasy sports at FanDuel and gamers relish the offerings of Razer. - Entering the United States as an international student has shown to be a good avenue for starting successful U.S. companies. Nearly one-quarter (20) of the 87 billion dollar U.S. startup companies – and almost half of the companies with an immigrant founder – had a founder who first came to America as an international student. - With 14 entrepreneurs on the list, India was the leading country of origin for the immigrant founders of billion dollar companies, followed by Canada and the United Kingdom with 8 each, Israel (7), Germany (4), China (3), France (2), Ireland (2) and 12 other countries with one. - California was the headquarters of 32 of the 44 immigrant-founded companies, followed by New York (6), Massachusetts (4) and Illinois (2).
Comments