Indian unicorns halved in 2022 vis-a-vis 2021

India had a dream run in 2021 when 44 unicorns were churned out which envied even the likes of the mighty USA, UK, China and others. It was a rare feat in the history of startup ecosystem. The dream run was carried forward into 2022 as well but was reduced only to the first few months and got subdued since May, 2022.

In a rather shocking turn of twists, many Indian unicorns were either entangled in a legal soup, regulatory issues, founder disputes, investor and founder disputes, steep discounts and no clarity on path to profitability. Such issues led to the global investors losing confidence in the Indian startup ecosystem thereby withholding new investments.

Due to all these negative factors the emergence of new unicorns which was expected to double in 2022 as compared to 2021 however less than halved to 21 vis-a-vis 2021 when it created 44.

Although many experts would like to pin down the blame on the Russia Ukraine war for this looming crisis, it has got more to do with the complex Indian market, the price sensitive Indian mentality, the witch hunting by the Government and complex legal requirements, directionlessness of the Indian founders, no path to profitability and most importantly, the poor performance of the recently listed startups at the stock markets like Zomato, Paytm and others.