How many total Artificial Intelligence companies are there?

As of May 2026, there are 29,611 active companies in Artificial Intelligence sector.

Which countries have the most Artificial Intelligence companies?

United States (10,429) has the highest number of Artificial Intelligence companies, followed by China (2,026) and United Kingdom (2,022).

How many Artificial Intelligence companies are funded?

As of May 2026, 8,126 companies in this sector have received funding.

Which company has raised the most funding in Artificial Intelligence sector?

As of May 2026, OpenAI has secured $180B in funding, making it the highest-funded company in the Artificial Intelligence sector.

Which country has attracted the most investment in Artificial Intelligence companies?

With $579B in total funding, United States has attracted the most investment among Artificial Intelligence companies.

Who are the top investors in Artificial Intelligence companies?

The top investors in Artificial Intelligence companies by number of investments are Y Combinator, Europa and Techstars

How much venture capital has Artificial Intelligence sector attracted?

In the last 10 years, venture capital firms have invested $418B in this sector.

How many unicorns has Artificial Intelligence sector produced?

Globally, there are 231 unicorns in Artificial Intelligence sector, to date.

Artificial Intelligence - 2026 Market & Investments Trends

There are 32.5K companies in the Artificial Intelligence sector across the world, with 8.13K funded companies having collectively raised $715B in venture capital money and private equity. Overall 3.48K of these are Series A+ funded and the sector has seen the creation of 231 Unicorns.

Artificial Intelligence sector has seen 875 acquisitions and 230 IPOs.

This sector includes companies whose core products or offerings are (a) built around AI, making it essential for their operation, and (b) incorporate proprietary AI or machine learning technology.

Companies included in Artificial Intelligence sector

Includes companies that develop core AI infrastructure, platforms for deploying and managing AI systems, and AI development tools. It also encompasses companies creating core AI-powered applications for consumers, enterprises, and a wide range of industry sectors. Companies are included only if AI is central to their products or services, rather than serving as a secondary feature

Companies excluded in Artificial Intelligence sector

Exclude those companies whose primary business domain or revenue generation is not fundamentally dependent on AI. It also excludes businesses where AI functions merely as one of several features or components within a broader product or service. Additionally, companies that primarily provide AI services, consulting, or AI-enabled solutions built upon third-party or non-proprietary technologies, rather than developing native AI systems in-house, are not considered AI-native.

Key Metrics

Total Companies

32.5K

Top Companies

OpenAI, Meitu & more

Total Funding

Funded Companies

Series A+ Companies

Series C+ Companies

Unicorns Created

IPOs

Acquisitions

View complete details of this sector

The market map of Artificial Intelligence gives a visual overview of the sector, showing key business models, their interactions in the value chain, and industry evolution.

Recent BlueBox/Industry Definition image of Artificial Intelligence

There are more than 32.5K companies in Artificial Intelligence. OpenAI is the top Artificial Intelligence company globally, ranked using Tracxn Score (what's this?).

Here are 5 of the top Artificial Intelligence companies globally:

Company	Description	Location	Founded	Current Stage	Private Funding Raised
OpenAI	Developer of artificial intelligence models tools and research-driven platforms	San Francisco (United States)	2015	Series G	$180B
Meitu	Developer of image, video, and design creation software and applications	Xiamen (China)	2008	Public	$525M
Perplexity	AI-powered search and answer generation	San Francisco (United States)	2022	Series E	$1.72B
Nvidia	Developer of hardware and software solutions for artificial intelligence computing	Santa Clara (United States)	1993	Public	-
Mistral AI	Developer of frontier AI models, assistants, agents, and related services	Paris (France)	2023	Series C	$3.05B

Get a longer list of companies

Companies founded year-on-year in the Artificial Intelligence sector

9 new startups have been founded so far in 2026 in the Artificial Intelligence sector. 4,160 Artificial Intelligence startups were founded in 2023 - this is the most number of startups founded in any year in the last 10 years.

Total Number of Companies

Year	No. of companies
2026	9
2025	2,916
2024	3,692
2023	4,160
2022	2,076
2021	1,984
2020	2,009
2019	1,725
2018	1,492
2017	1,450

Companies founded across countries in the Artificial Intelligence sector

United States has 10,429 Artificial Intelligence startups, the most by any country, followed by China which has 2,026 startups and United Kingdom which has 2,022.

Total Number of Companies

Country	No. of companies
United States	10,429
China	2,026
United Kingdom	2,022
India	1,980
Germany	1,160
Canada	1,042
France	642
Australia	608
Singapore	569
Israel	470

Stage-wise distribution of the Artificial Intelligence sector

Out of the total 32,515 Artificial Intelligence companies, 8,126 have secured funding. Among them, 3,478 have reached Series A or higher, and 2,166 to Series B or beyond.

Founded - 32,515

Funded - 8,126

Series A+ - 3,478

Series B+ - 2,166

Series C+ - 1,579

Company Stage	No. of companies
Founded	32,515
Funded	8,126
Series A+	3,478
Series B+	2,166
Series C+	1,579

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32.5K+ Total Companies
$715B+ Total Funding
8.1K+ Funded Companies
225+ IPOs
870+ Acquisitions

Total funding year-on-year in the Artificial Intelligence sector

The Artificial Intelligence sector saw a total funding of more than $702B in the last 10 years. The most amount of funding has been in 2026 at more than $260B till date.

Total Funding

Year	Total Funding
2026	$260B
2025	$173B
2024	$85.8B
2023	$40.6B
2022	$29.6B
2021	$45.6B
2020	$21.5B
2019	$17.6B
2018	$19.8B
2017	$8.1B

Total funding across countries in the Artificial Intelligence sector

In the last 10 years, Artificial Intelligence startups in United States have recieved the highest funding among all countries - $579B. China follows with $36.3B and United Kingdom with $20.6B.

Total Funding

Country	Total Funding
United States	$579B
China	$36.3B
United Kingdom	$20.6B
Australia	$12.6B
Canada	$10.8B
Israel	$7.98B
France	$7.32B
India	$5.89B
Germany	$4.71B
South Korea	$2.67B

Total funding amount raised by stage in the Artificial Intelligence sector

Over the last 10 years, the Artificial Intelligence sector have seen $17.8B into Seed Stage funding rounds, $126B into Early Stage funding rounds and $484B go into Late Stage funding rounds.

Funding Stage	Total Funding
Late Stage	$484B
Early Stage	$126B
Debt	$57.6B
Seed Stage	$17.8B
Post IPO	$12.1B
Grant	$1.24B
PE	$1.17B
Other-Equity	$528M
ICO	$379M

Recent Funding Rounds in Artificial Intelligence

In the year 2026, till May 2026, Artificial Intelligence companies have raised $242B in equity funding across 428 rounds. In the same period last year (i.e. till May 2025), Artificial Intelligence companies had raised $62.6B across 746 rounds. So, 2026 has seen a 286.2% rise in funding in Artificial Intelligence companies as compared to 2025.

Here are some recent, important funding rounds in Artificial Intelligence:

Company	Round Raised	Amount Raised	Funding Date	Investors
OPENHEART	Seed	6856	May 15, 2026	Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Venture Capital ... and 4 more
Anomaly	Series B	7010	May 15, 2026	RRE Ventures and 4 more
CyberSwarm	Series A	1780	May 15, 2026	-
Graphon AI	Seed	1778	May 14, 2026	Perplexity Fund and 6 more
Anduril	Series H	3185	May 13, 2026	Thrive Capital and 1 more

See a more detailed list of funding rounds

Y Combinator is the top investor in Artificial Intelligence companies based on number of companies invested.

Here are some top investors in Artificial Intelligence:

Investor	Location	Top Portfolio Companies
Y Combinator	Mountain View (United States)	Scale AI, Replit, Cruise and SingleStore
Europa	Belgium	Nvidia, Snyk, Verbit and AlphaSense
Techstars	New York City (United States)	Outreach, Rasa, DataRobot and Certa
Andreessen Horowitz	New York City (United States)	OpenAI, Mistral AI, Dialpad and Waymo
Plug and Play Tech Center	Sunnyvale (United States)	Dialpad, Glean, Einride and Decagon

See a more detailed list of investors

In the year 2026, till May 2026, 77 acquisitions happened in Artificial Intelligence sector. Last year, in 2025, a total of 191 acquisitions happened in Artificial Intelligence sector.

Here are some recent, important acquisitions in Artificial Intelligence:

Company	Acquisition Type	Acquisition Date	Acquirers
Rossum	Business Acquisition	May 13, 2026	Coupa
restb.ai	Business Acquisition	May 12, 2026	Clear Capital
Midship	Business Acquisition	May 06, 2026	Optro
Vogent	Business Acquisition	May 06, 2026	Aircall
Graceview	Business Acquisition	May 06, 2026	Legora

See a more detailed list of acquisitions

Acquisition trends in Artificial Intelligence

Here are the acquisition trends in Artificial Intelligence:

Total Number of Acquisitions

Year	No. of companies
2026	77
2025	191
2024	115
2023	85
2022	96
2021	90
2020	47
2019	50
2018	42
2017	27

In the year 2026, till May 2026, 10 IPOs happened in Artificial Intelligence sector.

Here are some recent, important IPOs in Artificial Intelligence:

Company	IPO Date	Exchange Symbol
Cerebras	May 14, 2026	National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations (NASDAQ)
SalesCloser AI	Apr 09, 2026	Toronto Stock Exchange - Venture Exchange (TSX-V)
Extreme Vision	Mar 30, 2026	Hong Kong Exchanges (HKG)
Generate Biomedicines	Feb 27, 2026	National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations (NASDAQ)
Rank One Computing	Feb 20, 2026	National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations (NASDAQ)

See a more detailed list of IPOs

Companies founded by alumni from top colleges in the Artificial Intelligence sector

Most number of Artificial Intelligence startups have been founded by alumni from Stanford University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University.

College	No. of companies
Stanford University	484
Massachusetts Institute of Technology	319
Harvard University	255
University of California (Berkeley)	248
Carnegie Mellon University	207
University of Cambridge	171
University of Oxford	156
Tel Aviv University	154
Cornell University	142
University of Pennsylvania	131

Total funding in companies founded by alumni from top colleges in the the Artificial Intelligence sector

In the last 10 years, Harvard University graduates' Artificial Intelligence companies have raised the most funding among top colleges. Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni are second, and University of Toronto alumni are third.

College	Total Funding
Harvard University	$341B
Massachusetts Institute of Technology	$314B
University of Toronto	$259B
Carnegie Mellon University	$217B
New York University	$190B
Stanford University	$116B
Columbia University	$95.4B
Stanford Business School	$82.9B
Princeton University	$76.3B
University of California (Berkeley)	$18.8B