A total of 28 companies joined The Crunchbase Unicorn Board in April, Crunchbase data shows, with robotics startups and frontier labs leading by number of entrants for the second consecutive month.
Two newly founded AI labs, both based in London and both with researchers from DeepMind, raised large rounds out of the gate and made their Unicorn Board debuts. The two companies, Ineffable Intelligence and Recursive Superintelligence, both raised large initial fundings out of the gate, though take very different approaches to training AI. They were joined by another new unicorn in the foundation AI sector: ModelBest, an open-source model company from China with on-device smaller models.
Six companies working on humanoid robotics — five from China and one from Japan — also received billion-dollar-plus valuations last month. Quite a few of these companies are building models for robotic intelligence using simulated data.
The financial services, defense, developer tools, energy and healthcare sectors each added two or three new unicorns in April.
Of the 28 companies, 12 are U.S.-based and eight are from China. The UK counted two new unicorns last month, while Germany, Spain, Switzerland, India and Japan each added one.
April’s new unicorns
Here are April’s new unicorn companies. Of the 28 companies, 26 are AI-related.
Foundational AI
Ineffable Intelligence, a London-based AI lab using reinforcement learning rather than human-generated data, raised a $1.1 billion seed round led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Sequoia Capital. The less than 1-year-old company was founded by David Silvers of AlphaGo and DeepMind. It was valued at $5.1 billion in its first funding.
London-based Recursive Superintelligence, a new AI intelligence lab with the goal of continuous learning improvement, raised a $500 million Series A led by Google Ventures and Nvidia. Founded by DeepMind researchers and Salesforce’s 1 previous AI lead, the less than 1-year-old company was valued at $4.5 billion.
Beijing-based ModelBest, an on-device foundation model developer, raised funding led by Huichuan Capital and Shenzhen Capital Group. Its open source MiniCPM is deployed in automotives, smartphones, PCs and home devices. The 3-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.
Robotics
Shanghai-based Sudu Technology is a robotics AI company building a foundational model as well as hardware. It uses simulated training to create a model for grasping and spatial awareness. The 1-year-old company raised a Series A round and was valued at $2 billion.
Shanghai-based humanoid robotics company TARS raised a $513 million seed round led by Hillhouse Capital and HSG. The 1-year-old company was valued at $1.9 billion.
Beijing-based GigaAI, a hardware and software developer of models for robotics using simulated data, raised a $220 million Series B. The 3-year-old company was valued at $1.5 billion.
Shenzhen-based EngineAI, a builder of humanoid and quadruped robots, raised a $200 million Series B led by Henan CICC Huirong Fund Management and Luxshare-ICT. The 2-year-old company robots will be deployed for traffic, security and retail. It was valued at $1.5 billion.
Shenzhen-based Pudu Robotics, a commercial robotics company for delivery and commercial cleaning, raised a $146 million funding led by Asia Investment Capital and Longgang Financial Holdings. The 10-year-old company was valued at $1.5 billion.
Tokyo-based Genki Robotics, a humanoid robotics company to address public safety and urban maintenance, raised a Series A led round. The 1-year-old company co-founded by Andy Rubin was valued at $1 billion.
Financial services
Rogo, which automates research for investment banks, raised a $160 million Series D led by Kleiner Perkins. The 4-year-old New York-based company was valued at $2 billion.
Bangalore-based KreditBee, a consumer and small business lending service, raised a $220 million Series E led by Dragon Fund, Hornbill Capital Advisers, and Motilal Oswal Alternates. The 8-year-old company was valued at $1.5 billion.
Slash, a banking and expense management service targeting small businesses and solopreneurs, raised a $100 million Series C led by Goodwater Capital, Khosla Ventures and Ribbit Capital. The 5-year-old San Francisco-based company, founded by college dropouts at the time, was valued at $1.4 billion.
Defense
Space defense company True Anomaly raised a $600 million Series D led by Eclipse and Riot Ventures. The company has built software for space operations and an autonomous orbital vehicle called Jackal. The 4-year-old, Colorado-based company was valued at $2.2 billion.
Defense aviation company Hermeus raised a $200 million Series C led by Khosla Ventures. The 7-year-old El Segundo, California-based builder of autonomous aircraft was valued at $1 billion.
Developer tools
Parallel, a web search provider for AI agents used by Harvey and Notion, raised a $100 million Series B led by Sequoia Capital. The 2-year-old Palo Alto, California-based company was valued at $2 billion.
Factory, an agentic software coding tool for enterprises, raised a $150 million Series C led by Khosla Ventures. The 3-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.5 billion.
Energy
Valar Atomics, developer of small nuclear reactors to provide direct power for AI data centers, raised a $340 million Series B funding. The 2-year-old El Segundo, California-based company was valued at $2 billion.
CMBlu Energy AG, a long duration energy storage battery provider, raised a $58 million Series C led by Samsung Ventures. The 12-year-old Bayern, Germany-based company that supports energy needs for grids, data centers and industry, was valued at $1.2 billion.
Health care
Shanghai-based SenseTime, a developer of a model for healthcare that includes computer vision and large language models, raised a $73 million Series A round. The 12-year-old company has built an assistant for doctors for screening, diagnosis and patient care, and was valued at $1 billion.
Switzerland-based vVardis, a developer of a peptide product to address enamel repair without needing surgery, raised a private equity funding led by Apollo. The 6-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.
Data platform
Omni has built a semantic layer between data and agents necessary to interpret data and provide guardrails for AI. The 4-year-old San Francisco-based company raised a $120 million Series C led by ICONIQ Growth and was valued at $1.5 billion.
Manufacturing
Shanghai-based Black Lake Technologies, a collaboration tool to make factories more efficient, raised a $146 million Series D funding. The 10-year-old Shanghai-based company was valued at $1.3 billion.
Agentic AI
Applied Compute, which builds agents trained on company data, raised a $80 million funding led by Kleiner Perkins. The 1-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.3 billion.
Aerospace
Madrid-based Xoople, which is building data from satellites tracking changes in the earth for various commercial needs, raised a $130 million Series B led by Nazca Capital. The 6-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.
Marketing & sales
Avoca, a provider of booking and customer service for the services industry using AI, has raised a Series B funding led by General Catalyst and Meritech Capital Partners. The 4-year-old New York-based company was valued at $1 billion. The company has raised $125 million in funding from seed through its Series B.
Biotechnology
Alloy Therapeutics, an AI biotechnology infrastructure platform speeding up drug discovery, raised a $40 million Series E. The 8-year-old Waltham, Massachusetts-based company was valued at $1 billion.
Waste management
Divert converts unused food products into energy. It raised a Series C funding led by strategic partner Mitsubishi Corporation. The 19-year-old Concord, Massachusetts-based company was valued at $1 billion.
Related Crunchbase unicorn lists:
The Crunchbase Private Unicorn Company List (1,756)
Exited unicorns (611)
New unicorns in 2026 (128)
New unicorns in 2025 (187)
New unicorns in 2024 (118)
New unicorns in 2023 (102)
Unicorns in the U.S. (896)
Unicorns in Asia (516)
European unicorns (239)
Unicorns from LatAm (38)
Emerging unicorn leaderboard (477)
Related reading:
March Mints 11 New Unicorns, As $200B Is Added Through Up Rounds And Board Posts Strong Exits
Billion-Dollar AI Rounds Push April To Third-Highest Startup Funding Month In A Year
This Is A Momentous Year For Early-Stage Unicorns
The Rising Investors Behind The New Unicorn Class
While OpenAI Shattered Records, Robotics and Semiconductor Startups Quietly Added The Most New Unicorns In February
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
Salesforce Ventures is an investor in Crunchbase. They have no say in our editorial process. For more, head here.↩