It’s been a marvelous year for the SaaS startup ecosystem as it witnessed the transformation of huge numbers of companies achieving a valuation greater than $1 billion, finally accomplishing the tag of Unicorn.

Here is an overview of top SaaS companies that entered the unicorn club in 2021.

SaaS Testing Specifics, Scope, and Success Factors
  1. Mindtickle

Sales Readiness platform, Midtickle is currently valued at $1.2 billion. It has been successful in raising $100 million from Softbank  Vision Fund II during the Series E funding round. It is also backed by other investors such as Norwest Venture Partners, Qualcomm Partners, and NewView Capital.

Mindtickle accelerated double fold as compared to the previous year when it was valued at $500 million. It ranks 8th in the ranking of Indian SaaS unicorn startups.

The platform offers some exclusive features like Sales content management, reading insights, conversation intelligence, and sales coaching. It is globally used by companies like MongoDB, Cipla, Ola, Square, Snowflake, and several others. 

  1. Innovaccer

The California-based health-tech company, Innovaccer, aims to build a resilient healthcare setup supported by data management platforms to integrate information and segregate diagnosis. The company became a unicorn in 2021 with total funding of $200 million. It collected $105 million in the Series D round of funding.

The company is backed by iconic Steadview Capital, OMER Ventures, Sequoia Capital India, and many more. It was rewarded as the “Best Healthcare Big Data Platform” in MedTech Breakthrough Awards,2019.

Innovaccer provides an amazing Intelligent application suite for efficient patient management, referral management, virtual care platform, decentralized clinical trials, and CMS compliance. Its product named Data shop leverages data integration between EHRs, SDoH, pharmacies, labs, and other associated systems.

  1. BrowserStack

Established by Nakul Arora and Ritesh Arora, BrowserStack is one of the celebrated SaaS unicorns along with its competitor Postman. It has total funding of $250 million from Accel, BOND, and Insight Partners. It has a valuation of $4 billion.

It’s a cloud-based mobile application testing platform that eliminates the need for internal labs of virtual machines. The platform envisions becoming the “testing infrastructure of the internet.”

The platform has an audience of 50,000 customers, more than 4 million developers, and some tech giants like Microsoft, Volvo, Walt Disney, National Geographic, Twitter, and others.  

  1. Amplitude

The digital Optimization System, Amplitude, is widely known for its product analytics. The company has been successful in receiving funding of  $186.9 million with a valuation of $1 billion and it went Public in 2021. It was endorsed by Sequoia Capital,  Sorenson Capital, Benchmark, IVP, Battery Ventures, and Lead Edge Capital.

The firm is known for its user behavior tracking applications which help businesses gain better insights about their products in the market. The company serves leading companies like Walmart, Traveloka, G-Loot, Burger King, Postmates.

  1. ChargeBee

Chargebee is a fintech SaaS platform that automates invoicing and revenue management.

The company has gone through 6 rounds of funding, with the last collection of $125 million in Series G and total funding of $200 million.

Chargebee is supported by Steadview Capital, Sapphire Ventures, Accel, Tiger Global Management, and Insight Partners. It witnessed record-breaking growth of three folds in less than six months, reaching a valuation of $1.4 billion.

Headquartered in Chennai, Chargebee offers services in many verticals like e-commerce, Internet Of Things(IoT), online learning. Its customers include the first Indian SaaS Unicorn, Freshworks along with Calendly, and Study.com.

6. Harness

The DevOps platform was developed by Jyoti Singh and Rishi to make coding as reliable as possible. The company sealed its funding round at $85 million, reaching a valuation of $1.7 billion.

Overall, Harness has raised $195 million from investors like Alkeon Capital, Menlo Ventures, Norwest Venture Partners, Thomvest, and Sorenson. The platform has AI/ML-driven workflows that detect cloud anomalies and alerts instantaneously. 

7. Highspot

The sales platform, Highspot is a Seattle’s based SaaS platform that offers personalized information to its users with the help of Natural Language Processing(NLP) AND Artificial Intelligence.

The company entered the unicorn club with a Series E funding of $200 million, achieving a valuation of $2.9 billion. Its total funding is $400 million from investors like Flexe, Ally, Tiger Global, and Zenoti. 

Highspot has revolutionized the marketing sector with its outstanding “sales enablement platform.” Its customer base includes Twitter, Showpad, Weekday, Siemens, and many others. It has been lauded globally for its 900% revenue growth in the last three years.

8. Lucid

Louisiana’s first unicorn company, Lucid, is one of a kind startup that accomplished triple unicorn status. It is currently valued at 3 billion with fundraisings of more than $500 million.

The Intelligent diagram application and whiteboards platform is the only visual collaboration suite in the SaaS market. It caters to almost 99% of fortune 500 companies, including Google, Amazon, Asana, and NBC.

9. OwnBackup

OwnBackup is a SaaS and PaaS data protection agency with headquarters in New Jersey. The company has raised $267.5 million to date from investors like Salesforce Ventures, Insight Partners, Sapphire Ventures, Innovation Endeavors, Vertex Ventures, and Oryzn Capital. It has a valuation of $1.4 billion.

Salesforce companies form its biggest customer base that has a count of 3000 with names of organizations like Zoom, Aston Martin, Medtronic, Harvard University, and Guidewire Software.

10. Quantum Metric 

A continuous product design platform, Quantum Metric deals with the ideation of a product, its design, and collaboration needed between engineers, data scientists, and other members. It entered the unicorn club following Series B funding of $200 million with total funding of $250 million. It has reached a valuation of $1.2 billion. This is a 9.2% hike in growth for the company.

It is significant to emphasize the fact that Quantum Metric achieved this milestone with backing from only three lead investors, namely Hangar 51, Insight Partners, and Bain. Other investing firms backing the platform are Endeavor Catalyst and Uncorrelated Ventures.

11. Zapier

An online automation tool, Zaiper effortlessly syncs applications, APIs, and online web services to reduce reputation and empower automation. It became a unicorn following total funding of $1,362,469 and reached a valuation of $4 billion in the very first month of 2021.

The SaaS platform offers more than 3000 integrations with 9909% uptime along with supreme data protection. The most important advantage of Zapier is that it’s a code-free solution to app integration, thus eradicating the need for a developer to make users self-reliant. 

12. Calendly

Calendly is an e-scheduling platform that witnessed enormous growth in turbulent pandemic times. The platform began its unicorn innings following a $350 million funding from OpenView Venture Partners and Iconiq Capital.

The platform is subscribed by more than 10 million people across the globe, leading to revenue growth of $70 billion. The company is currently valued at $3 billion.

Calendly can collaborate with video platforms like zoom. It also enables embeds on websites and team pools during meetings. It is used by top companies like L’oreal, Dropbox, VISA, and eBay.

13. Papaya Global

AI-based payroll automation platform, Papaya Global, generated $190 million and reached a valuation of more than $1 billion. It is endorsed by IVP Ventures, GreenOaks Capital Partners, Alkeon Capital, Insight Venture Partners, Bessemer Ventures,  Scale Ventures, Dynamic Loop, and Group 11.

It caters to Cyberark, Rubrik, Fiver, Circle, Microsoft, and many other tech giants.

Table of Contents

Conclusion

2021 has seen unicorns raining into the global startup ecosystem. The increase in digitization and influx of investors from various leading firms has accelerated the process of conversion of a startup to a unicorn. May we witness more unicorns, decacorns, and hectacorns!

References

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  2. https://www.mindtickle.com/
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  4. https://innovaccer.com/
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  7. https://yourstory.com/companies/chargebee/amp
  8. https://panoramacrypto.com/ftx-reaches-us-3-5-billion-market-value-and-becomes-a-unicorn-company/
  9. https://siliconangle.com/2021/01/14/harness-becomes-1-7b-unicorn-raising-85m-software-delivery-platform/
  10. https://harness.io/company/about-us/
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  14. https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/quantum-metric/company_financials
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  19. https://getdivvy.com/#
  20. https://www.geektime.com/a-unicorn-gets-its-horn-papaya-global-raised-100m-at-1b-valuation/
  21. https://papayaglobal.com/
  22. https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/funding/slice-turns-unicorn-after-raising-220-million-from-tiger-global-insight-partners/articleshow/87968881.cms
  23. https://yourstory.com/companies/slice/amp
  24. https://yourstory.com/companies/coindcx/amp
  25. https://pointclickcare.com/press-releases/
Author

Snigdha Biswas is a seasoned professional with 12 years of experience in Content Development, Content Marketing and SEO across SaaS, Tech, Media, Entertainment, and News categories. She crafts impactful campaigns, adapts to market trends, develops content strategies, optimizes websites, and leverages data analytics. With a track record of driving organic growth and brand visibility, Snigdha's passion for storytelling and analytical mindset drive conversions and build brand loyalty. She is a trusted advisor, helping businesses achieve growth objectives through strategic thinking and collaboration in the competitive digital landscape.