The US-originated practice of buying startups primarily to recruit their teams, now reshaping AI-era M&A globally as hyperscalers spend billions of US dollars on talent.
A US-originated route for companies to list shares publicly without underwriters or new share issuance, used by Spotify, Coinbase, and others to bypass traditional IPO fees and lockups.
A down round is when a startup raises capital at a lower valuation than its last round, diluting founders and employees while triggering investor anti-dilution protections globally.
Committed but undeployed private capital held by VC and PE funds worldwide, now near US$3.7 trillion in PE alone, concentrated in mega-managers as smaller funds struggle to raise.
Recurring governance clashes between startup founders and venture-backed boards over control, strategy, and succession, a defining fault line of the global venture-capital industry.
The US venture capital firm managing approximately US$25 billion from Menlo Park, California, whose early bets on Snap and Affirm made it one of Silicon Valley's most consequential early-stage investors.
Platforms where founders, employees, and early investors in private companies sell shares before IPO, unlocking liquidity in a US$4 trillion global private-equity universe.
The first two rounds of US-origin institutional venture capital, now the global standard for startup financing, channeling billions annually from VC firms into early-growth companies worldwide.
Private investment in commercial space globally hit a record US$55.3 billion in 2025, driven by launch-cost collapse, defence demand, and US-China competition for orbital infrastructure.
US-originated blank-check shell companies that raise public capital before merging with a private target, offering a faster but sponsor-skewed alternative to a traditional IPO.
The dissolution of venture-backed companies, concentrated in the United States, has surged since 2022 as higher interest rates crushed valuations and zero-rate-era capital ran out.
The global market for technology companies going public, a cyclical barometer of risk appetite that drove US$47bn in US proceeds alone in 2025 and now awaits OpenAI and SpaceX.
Private companies valued at US$1 billion or more; the US and China host three-quarters of the world's 1,600 unicorns as of 2026, making valuations a bellwether for global risk appetite.
The US startup accelerator that pioneered the modern seed-funding model, backing 200 companies a year from San Francisco and producing more unicorns than any peer.