A total of 34 companies joined The Crunchbase Unicorn Board in October, adding more than $96 billion in value and $14.8 billion in total funding to the board. The board also reached a new record of 1,900 private companies last month, including an all-time high of more than 1,000 such startups based in the U.S.

Last month’s new unicorn cohort also highlighted how quickly this AI cycle is awarding some companies with billion-dollar-plus valuations: Half of October’s new unicorns are less than 4 years old, and nine companies that joined the board during the month did so via seed or Series A raises.

Leading industries for unicorn formation last month were frontier labs, agentic AI, aerospace and semiconductors. The U.S. accounts for 23 of the companies, while China and Korea each added three. Estonia added two, a record for the nation in a single month. Singapore, Germany and Japan each added one new unicorn.

The most valuable of the newly minted unicorns were electrical infrastructure company Axiom Solutions International, TypeSafe AI  a model developer of Jev, and agentic AI assistant company Manus AI.

Familiar names topped the list of investors backing the latest cohort. Andreessen Horowitz has led rounds across seven portfolio companies over time, Sequoia Capital and General Catalyst in four companies and Eclipse three companies from this batch.

New unicorns in October 2026

Here are October’s new unicorn companies by industry segment.

AI models, assistants and agents

• TypeSafe AI: San Francisco-based AI model developer TypeSafe AI raised an $870 million Series A at a $7.5 billion valuation. Andreessen Horowitz led the round, with participation from DCVC and Sequoia Capital. The 2-year-old company develops an AI model Jev for structured decision-making, helping applications automate tasks such as classification, scoring and routing with confidence estimates.
• Manus AI: Singapore-based AI assistant Manus AI raised $500 million at a $4 billion valuation. Boyu Capital and IDG Capital led the round. The 3-year-old company develops general-purpose AI agents that perform tasks including research, browser automation, content creation and software development. Meta agreed to acquire Manus in December 2025, but Chinese regulators intervened and ordered the transaction reversed.
• Nous Research: Austin-based Nous Research, developer of the Hermes agent, raised a $90 million Series B at a $1.5 billion valuation. Robot Ventures led the financing, with investors including Nvidia, Microsoft’s M12, Menlo Ventures and Union Square Ventures. The 3-year-old company develops open-source AI models, agents and infrastructure for AI development and deployment. Nous Research built the open-source Hermes Agent, which it is deploying for businesses.
• Upstage: South Korea-based Upstage, developer of the open-source Solar model, raised $30 million in Series C funding, reaching $1.5 billion in value. The 6-year-old company develops the Solar language models and document-processing technology that converts unstructured business information into usable data for the future of work.
• Wabi: San Francisco-based personal AI assistant Wabi raised a $55 million Series A at a $1.25 billion valuation. IVP led the financing, joined by investors including Andreessen Horowitz, Forerunner and Amazon’s Alexa Fund. The 1-year-old company develops an AI personal assistant for everyday activities such as planning trips, coordinating meals and organizing tasks.
• Town: San Francisco-based Town, a developer of a workforce AI assistant, raised a $108 million Series B at a $1 billion valuation. Forerunner and Menlo Ventures led the round, with participation from Andreessen Horowitz, First Round Capital and other investors. The 2-year-old company develops personalized AI assistants that connect with workplace tools across teams to manage email, prepare meeting briefings, organize schedules and complete recurring tasks.

Aerospace, defense and space

• Air Space Intelligence: Boston-based Air Space Intelligence, which makes AI software for national security, raised a $325 million Series C at a $3 billion valuation. Spark Capital led the round, with participation from Andreessen Horowitz, Citadel Securities, Craft Ventures, Energy Impact Partners and Meritech Capital Partners. The 8-year-old company develops AI software for managing complex physical operations across aviation, defense, energy and logistics.
• Xona: Burlingame, California-based Xona, which says it’s developing a better satellite navigation system, raised a $250 million Series D at a $2.45 billion valuation. Future Ventures led the round, with participation from Industrious Ventures and Woven Capital. The 7-year-old company says it’s developing a low Earth orbit satellite network to deliver precise positioning, navigation and timing services for applications including defense, transportation and autonomous systems.
• Firehawk Aerospace: Dallas-based munitions manufacturer Firehawk Aerospace raised a $150 million Series D at a $1.4 billion valuation. Advent International and Rochefort led the round, with Nomi Capital also participating. The 7-year-old company uses additive manufacturing to produce rocket motors, engines and propellant for defense applications.
• Warhound: Dallas-based Warhound, which breeds genetically optimized service dogs for the military, raised a $200 million seed round at a $1.2 billion valuation. Sequoia Capital led the financing, joined by investors including 8VC 1, Lux Capital, Breyer Capital and IQT. The less than 1-year-old company was conceived by Anduril Industries founder Palmer Luckey and Colossal Biosciences founder Ben Lamm. Warhound develops genetically optimized dogs by licensing Colossal Biosciences technology and equipping working dogs with Anduril cybernetic technology, for military, law enforcement and emergency response.
• Reliable Robotics: Mountain View, California-based Reliable Robotics, builder of autonomous aircraft systems, raised a $90 million Series D extension that pushed its valuation above $1 billion. The total Series D funding totaled $250 million with a further $25 million term loan. Nimble Partners led the round. The 9-year-old company develops aircraft automation systems for remotely operated and autonomous flight for commercial and defense use cases.

AI data, analytics and coding

• Labelbox: San Francisco-based Labelbox, a data learning platform, raised a $100 million Series E at a $1.35 billion valuation including equity and a credit facility. Infinitum Partners led the round, with participation from Andreessen Horowitz, B Capital and Wipro Ventures among others. The 8-year-old company provides data infrastructure and reinforcement-learning data services for AI laboratories and enterprises.
• Hex Technologies: San Francisco-based Hex Technologies, a business intelligence platform, raised a $100 million Series D at a $1.2 billion valuation. The round was led by 137 Ventures and Peak XV Partners, with participation from investors including Andreessen Horowitz, Amplify Partners, Redpoint and Sequoia Capital. The 7-year-old company has rebuilt business intelligence from scratch for the AI era with context and controls in place with code at the center and data in disparate places.
• SignSplit: New York-based SignSplit, a data licensing platform, raised a $400 million seed round at a $1 billion valuation, led by W Group. The 2-year-old company develops infrastructure for collecting, licensing and monetizing human data with consent. Its platform combines identity verification, consent management, attribution and compensation for data used in AI, robotics, research and media.
• Blacksmith: San Francisco-based Blacksmith, a code deployment service, raised a $66 million Series C at a $1 billion valuation. Sequoia Capital led the financing, joined by Google Ventures, Peak XV Partners, Premji Invest and Y Combinator. The 2-year-old company provides an environment to build and test automated code for continuous code integration and deployment to production.
• Daytona: New York-based Daytona, which offers a testing environment for AI agents, raised a $60 million Series B at a $1 billion valuation. FirstMark led the round, with participants including Pace Capital, Upfront Ventures, Qualcomm Ventures and Samsung Next among others. The 3-year-old company provides isolated cloud environments where developers can run AI-generated code, test applications and execute autonomous agent workflows.

Industrial technology and manufacturing

• Re:Build: Framingham, Massachusetts-based Re:Build, a manufacturing startup that says it aims to rebuild America’s  industrial manufacturing, raised $2.1 billion in private equity financing, led by General Catalyst and J.P. Morgan Asset Management. The valuation was not disclosed, though Crunchbase estimates a post-money valuation of approximately $5.8 billion. The 6-year-old company partners with industrial companies from product design phase to large-scale production with 2.4 million square feet of manufacturing capacity.
• Vinci: Palo Alto, California-based Vinci, builder of software for hardware design, raised a $250 million Series B at a $1.5 billion valuation. Advent International, Temasek and Xora Innovation led the round, with participation from AMD Ventures, Eclipse, Khosla Ventures and Madrona. The 3-year-old company develops physics-based AI software that simulates thermal and mechanical behavior in semiconductor and electronics designs.
• Arda: San Francisco-based Arda, which is building software for manufacturing, raised a $160 million Series A at a $1.5 billion valuation. Accel, Altimeter Capital and Khosla Ventures led the round, with participation from 8VC, Felicis 2, SV Angel 3 and XYZ Venture Capital. Arda was founded by Bob McGrew, former chief research officer at OpenAI, and a former product and engineering lead at Palantir Technologies.  The 1-year-old company develops software that turns product design into an assembly line. Arda announced its $72 million seed round the same day as its Series A.
• Tractian: Atlanta-based Tractian applies AI to maintain machinery in production.  It raised a $130 million Series D at a $1.4 billion valuation. Sapphire Ventures led the financing with M&G Catalyst. General Catalyst, Bosch Ventures and Monashees also joined the round. The 7-year-old company combines industrial sensors, AI diagnostics and maintenance software to monitor equipment, detect failures and improve factory performance.

Energy and cloud infrastructure

• Axiom Solutions International: Austin-based Axiom Solutions International, which provides storage and cooling systems for data centers, raised a $2 billion Series A at a $37.5 billion valuation. General Catalyst and Koch Equity Development led the financing. The 5-year-old company, a business division of Flex, develops digital and electrical infrastructure for power applications.
• Atlas Atomics: Austin-based Atlas Atomics, a nuclear-energy startup, raised a $400 million Series A at a $1.9 billion valuation. General Catalyst led the financing, with Andreessen Horowitz also participating. The 1-year-old company, co-founded by Vivek Ramaswamy, is a nuclear-energy startup operating in stealth.
• Skeleton Technologies — Tallinn, Estonia-based Skeleton Technologies, developer of energy storage systems, raised $100 million in corporate funding at a $1 billion valuation from Siemens. The 17-year-old company develops ultracapacitors and high-power energy-storage systems using its curved-graphene technology, serving data centers, industrial, automotive and other applications.

Semiconductors

• MHX Technology: Shanghai-based MHX Technology, a chip subsidiary of Li Auto, raised a $243 million Series A funding at a $2.5 billion value. BlueRun Ventures, Huaye Tiancheng Capital, Li Auto and Matrix Partners China led the round. The less than 1-year-old company develops AI chips and associated software, including inference hardware for automotive and edge-computing applications.
• Isabers: Beijing-based Isabers recorded a venture round at $1.1 billion. Investors included Advanced Micro-Fabrication Equipment, CCB Investments, Cowin Capital, Inno-Chip and others; the funding amount was not specified. The 6-year-old company develops semiconductor integration and advanced packaging technologies to improve chip performance, manufacturing yields and costs.
• FuriosaAI: Seoul-based chip developer FuriosaAI raised $610 million in Series D funding at a $2.9 billion value anchored by South Korea’s state-backed National Growth Fund. Investors included Cisco Investments, Korea Development Bank, Korea Investment Partners, Naver Ventures and other firms. The 9-year-old company develops energy-efficient AI chips and data center accelerators for advanced AI models and applications.

Robotics and drones

• Eka Robotics: Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Eka Robotics raised a $150 million Series A at a $1.45 billion valuation. Andreessen Horowitz and F-Prime led the round. The 2-year-old company develops robotics systems that combine computer vision, physics reasoning and tactile force feedback to automate physical tasks in manufacturing, logistics and other environments. Eka is co-founded by Pulkit Agrawal, an associate professor at MIT.
• RobCo: Munich-based RobCo raised a venture and secondary transaction at a $1 billion valuation. Investors included Lightspeed Venture Partners, Sequoia Capital, Lingotto, Cherry Ventures and other firms; funding amounts were not specified. The 6-year-old company develops modular industrial robots, AI software and no-code tools to automate manufacturing tasks such as machine loading, palletizing and materials handling.
• Zero Zero Robotics: Beijing-based Zero Zero Robotics recorded a Series D at a $1 billion valuation. Investors included Ant Group, Boyu Capital, Delian Capital and Xianghe Capital; the round amount was not specified. The 12-year-old company develops intelligent flying cameras and consumer drones.

Cybersecurity

• Armadin Security: Palo Alto, California-based Armadin raised a $255 million Series B at a $2.5 billion valuation. Accel and Andreessen Horowitz led the round, with investors including Google Ventures, Kleiner Perkins, Menlo Ventures and Ballistic Ventures. The 1-year-old company uses autonomous AI agents and human red-team expertise to test enterprise defenses, validate attack paths and identify exploitable security weaknesses.
• BlackWall: Tallinn, Estonia-based BlackWall raised a $100 million Series C at a $2.2 billion valuation. AVP led the financing, with participation from Dawn Capital, MMC Ventures and Tera Ventures. The 7-year-old company protects websites, hosting providers, cloud platforms and enterprise networks against bots and other automated threats across their entire customer base.

Financial services and insurance

• Valon: New York-based Valon raised a $150 million Series D at a $2.3 billion valuation with participation from Andreessen Horowitz and Ribbit Capital. The 7-year-old company develops software infrastructure for mortgage servicing, combining loan data, payments, escrow management, compliance and AI-assisted workflows in its ValonOS platform. The company services some of the largest mortgage institutions.
• Stand: San Francisco-based Stand, an insurance provider for homes, raised a $70 million Series C at a $1 billion valuation. Saga Ventures led the round, with investors including Eclipse, Equal Ventures, Inspired Capital Partners, Lowercarbon Capital and Neotribe Ventures. The 3-year-old company provides homeowners insurance and property-risk management, using property data and physical simulations to assess natural hazards and recommend mitigation measures.

Automotive and electric mobility

• Mitsubishi Electric Mobility: Tokyo-based Mitsubishi Electric Mobility raised $728 million in secondary financing at $1.5 billion value from Lin Yin International Investment.  The 2-year-old company develops vehicle electrification systems, advanced driver-assistance technology, powertrain equipment and in-vehicle infotainment.

Related Crunchbase unicorn lists:

Methodology

The Crunchbase Unicorn Board is a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more and is based on Crunchbase data. New companies are added to the Unicorn Board as they reach the $1 billion valuation mark as part of a funding round.

The unicorn board does not reflect internal company valuations — such as those set via a 409a process for employee stock options — as these differ from, and are more likely to be lower than, a priced funding round. We also do not adjust valuations based on investor writedowns, which change quarterly, as different investors will not value the same company consistently within the same quarter.

Funding to unicorn companies includes all private financings to companies that are tagged as unicorns, as well as those that have since graduated to The Exited Unicorn Board.

Exits analyzed here only include the first time a company exits.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. Crunchbase converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to Crunchbase long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

Illustration: Dom Guzman