The venture capital funding of big data companies was a hot topic in 2013, and many market research organizations such as Forbes, Crunch Base, Wikibon, and Big Data Startups came up with their lists of the top 10 most-funded big data companies.
Each list is somewhat unique and showcases top listers, some of which overlap. But retaining the top nine from Forbes list (as shown in the table below-updated March 31 2014), as a standard reference, you will notice some difference in the info-graphic provided below, which was compiled by Big Data Startups.
| Big data startup | Received VC Funds | Primary business |
| Cloudera | $1040 million | Hadoop services & training |
| Palantir | $650 million | Analytics application |
| Domo | $250 million | Business intelligence |
| Mongo DB | $231 million | Document-oriented DB |
| MuSigma | $208 million | Data Science-as a Service |
| Hortonworks | $198 million | Hadoop services & training |
| Opera Solutions | $114 million | Data Science-as a Service |
| Talend | $102 million | Application & process integration platform |
| Guavus | $89 million | Big Data analytics platform |
In 2013, venture capital funding of big data startups touched $3.6 billion. Big Data Startup’s infographic showcases 10 data startups that according to them, have grabbed the most funding to date. You will notice that the top five fund recipients appear to be similar in both Forbes list and the infographic, except for one. The infographic features the top five fund raisers in 2013:
- Palantir reported to have raised $100 million with a $9 billion valuation;
- MongoDB received $150 million in funding around October last year;
- Mu Sigma raised $108 million over the course of two years ago;
- Cloudera received $65 million last December, and is now leading the list of most-invested big data start-ups;
- Opera Solutions, which raised $64 million in 2011.
The infographic also showcases the venture capital firms with the largest investments, which includes Lightspeed Venture Partners as the top investor. Other prominent investors include Khosla Ventures, Sequoia Capital, and New Enterprise Associates.
The infographic lists KPMG Capital and Accel Partners as high investors with three, $100 million big data funds posting in the same calendar year. What else in included in the graphic? Well, the infographic carries information about acquisitions in the big data startups industry!
Though this trend of capital funding of big data startups will continuein 2014 and 2015, you may notice the funding spree toning down. The next big move after funding big data startups will be a data scientists hiring binge. So if you happen to be a data professional, look forward to the bright future ahead.
