What is a "unicorn" in the high tech domain ( aka "licorne" in French) ?

The "unicorn" companies have common features:

• specialise on the high tech domain
• exist since at least 10 years
• they are capitalised over 1 billion USD even before to be on the stock market

The term "unicorn" has been used for the first time in the literature by Aileen Lee.
We may say that in average there are four unicorns born every year.


Disruptive Innovation
 Nearly all of the unicorn companies have disrupted the industry they belong to. Uber changed the way people book cabs, Airbnb capitalized on the sharing economy, Snapchat disrupted the social networking sphere, Dropbox by sharing files on the Cloud, DJI with drones,  etc.


First Mover’s Advantage
Disruption and the first mover’s advantage go hand in hand. Unicorns not only capitalize on the first mover’s advantage but maintain their positioning by constantly innovating and improving.


Consumer Focused
Their business models are focused on making the things more easier and affordable for the consumers (B2C).


List of unicorn startup companies