THE NEXT SPANISH UNICORNS
Spain has few unicorns (startups valued at more than US$1 billion) in proportion to the number of startups, the total investment made by Spanish venture capital funds, or considering the ranking of Barcelona and Madrid in the list of the most important European and global startup hubs.
The first spanish unicorn was eDreams, a company led by Javier Perez and Mauricio Prieto, amongst others. The next unicorn was Letgo which although not legally being a Spanish company, has most of its personnel in Barcelona, and many of the founders and principal executives are from Spain. The most famous current Spanish unicorn is Cabify, whose valuation of the last round was more than US$1 billion.
To create these lists I counted on the opinion of several directors from venture capital funds such as Atomico, Seaya, Kibo, JME, Nekko, Axon, The Venture City, Bonsai, Samaipata, KFund, Inveready, Bankinter, Sabadell, Encomenda, All Iron, BigSur, Seedrocket, Faraday and the principal business angels from Spain. I only consider technological startups, excluding startups from the BioTech industry as it is a market which I am not familiar with. Although some do not consider them as technological startups, I include Holaluz and MasMovil in these lists as they were born as disruptive startups, and I do consider them as technological startups.
There are many startups that could get the label of being a unicorn startup within the next few months and could be sold for more than US$1 billion, despite the fact that in some cases they still have several years of growth left before reaching this point. The main list could be made up of:
· Letgo
· Cabify
· Glovo
· Holaluz
· MasMovil
· Flywire (Peertransfer)
· Travelperk
· Spotahome
· Logitravel
The following companies could have an exit of +300M:
· Tradeinn
· Fintonic
· JobandTalent
· Typeform
· Ontruck
· 21 Buttons
· Fever
· Devo (Logtrust)
· Vilynx
· Lingokids
· Wallapop
· Destinia
· Atrapalo
The third list would be companies that have been in the market for more than 5 years and can have a +100M sale:
· RedPoints
· Carto
· Kantox
· Tiendeo
· Marfeel
· Scytl
· World Sensing
· Exoticca
· Glampinghub
· Adsmurai
· Force Manager
· ABA English
· Playgiga
· Buguroo
· Signaturit
The last list is made up of younger companies created in the last 4 years and which look very promising to many of the investors that I have consulted. I think there are startups in this group that will surpass the previous group, however, as they are much younger it is still early to know although I think they could have an exit above 100M:
· Paack
· MrJeff
· CornerJob
· Housfy
· Holded
· Colvin
· Bnext
· Badi
· Civiciti
· Nextail
· Odilo
· Sequra
· Citibox
Most likely you might have thought of some more startups to include in the listings above, however, I have only included those that at least 2–3 investors have mentioned in their lists. If you think that I have clearly forgotten one, do not hesitate to contact me and send the information / justification to include it.
Obviously all those companies that have already been sold (Privalia, Idealista, Social Point, etc…) are not included in the listings of startups that can be sold for more than US$1 billion.
P.D: As Jesus Encinar reminded me, we had another «unicorn» listed in the MAB, which is Gowex😜
P.D: My investments from the lists are Glovo, Kantox, Cornerjob, Holded, Housfy and Citibox.