For the second consecutive year, Senegalese fintech, Wave, was the only African company featured in Y Combinator’s top 50 highest-earning startups of 2024.
The list includes the likes of:
- AirBnB
- Stripe
- Coinbase
- InstaCart
- Scribd
- Zapier
- Optimizely
- RazorPay
- Scale AI
among others.
According to Garry Tan, the CEO of Y Combinator:
“Revenue is the clearest indicator of a startup’s success, and we’re excited to see so many different types of companies represented.”
The featured companies all generated above a certain threshold of revenue in 2023, Tan added.
Stats About the 2024 Top Companies List
- The total revenue generated by these companies in 2023 is $57.2B
- The companies on this list are collectively valued at $458B
- Sectors represented:
- B2B software and services (52%)
- Consumer (23%)
- Financial technology and services (19%)
- Healthcare (2%)
- Bio and industrials (2%)
- Real estate and construction (2%)
- 13 companies (27%) on the list have had an exit, 11 are publicly traded
- Together, these companies employ over 80K people
- Over 50% are headquartered in the Bay Area
- The vast majority of these companies (over 90%) were founded by 2 or more co-founders
- Reddit (YC S05) is the oldest company on the list
- Zepto (YC W21) is the youngest company on the list
- The S12 batch is the best represented, with 5 companies on the list:
* Benchling
* Coinbase
* Instacart
* SmartAsset
* Zapier
- The companies that are new to the Top Revenue list this year:
-
- Clipboard Health – Connects healthcare facilities with nurses nearby
- HoneyLove – Innovative shapewear
- Meesho – Democratizing internet commerce in India
- Odeko – Operations software for running and growing your cafe
- RazorPay – India’s full-stack financial solution for businesses
- Zepto – 10-minute grocery delivery in India
Wave, founded by Drew Durbin and Lincoln Quirk, previously of Sendwave, launched its mobile money product in Senegal in 2018 as a challenger to telcos like Orange and Free Senegal which control 77% of the telco market combined.
During that period, telecommunications companies were imposing transaction fees ranging from 5% to 10%. However, with Wave’s entry into the market, these rates plummeted by up to 70%, accompanied by the introduction of complimentary deposit and withdrawal services through its mobile application.
Wave also brought a flat transaction fee of 1% for peer-to-peer money transfers which was a new standard in the industry. Subsequently, its competitors responded by slashing their prices by up to 80%, and some even restricted their customers from buying airtime through Wave’s mobile app in an attempt to rival Wave’s market dominance.
By 2023, Wave had a user base of 6 million individuals, representing approximately 75% of the adult population in Senegal alone. Its reach extended further across:
- Senegal
- Côte d’Ivoire
- Burkina Faso
- Mali
- Uganda, and
- Gambia
accumulating a total of 10 million users.
Notably, in 2022, it processed 12 billion transactions within Senegal alone.
YCombinator boasts 92 African startups in its portfolio, with 3 having joined the latest batch (W24).
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE | AI Startups Dominate ‘Most Selective Cohort [W24] in YC History’ with Just 3 Startups from Africa
"With an acceptance rate under 1%, this was one of the most selective cohorts in YC history.
Many of the companies in this batch – at least 50% – are… pic.twitter.com/MBu0oSZltB
— BitKE (@BitcoinKE) April 15, 2024
A total of 260 companies joined the batch from over 27,000 applications, at least 50% building around AI in one form or another.
Follow us on Twitter for the latest posts and updates
Join and interact with our Telegram community
_________________________________________
_________________________________________
