There are two ways to get rich. A, you work hard to get money and B, make your money to work hard for you. The second one sounds simplistic, but requires a fair share of calculations, systematic approach adopted and practiced over time, an effective sense of impulse and luck working in favour. However, there is no magic formula involved in being one of the most successful investors. They all work on rather simple philosophies and investment formulas that have proven to be effective over a significant period of time. We have looked into the profiles of most successful investors of our time, and here are the top 10.
Andreessen Horowitz
Number of $1B+ companies – 17
Andreessen Horowitz is a Silicon Valley based venture capital firm operating since 2009. They specializes in investing in seed, startups, early, mid, growth and last stage. They have invested in companies like Skype, Twitter, Facebook, Airbnb, Groupon, Zynga and Coinbase to name a few. Their investments over the years span across mobile, gaming, social media, e-commerce, education and enterprise IT industries.
Sequoia Capital
Number of $1B+ companies – 16
Sequoia Capital, an American venture capital firm, started doing business in 1972 and currently headquartered in California. They are primarily focused on technology, energy, financial, healthcare, internet and mobile industries. Sequoia specializes in incubation, seed, startup, early and growth stage investments. They have invested in over 250 companies since their inception, including Apple, Oracle, Google, PayPal, YouTube, Instagram and Whatsapp.
Fidelity Investments
Number of $1B+ companies – 16
Founded in 1946, Fidelity Investments is an American multinational financial services corporation and one of the largest mutual fund and financial services groups in the world. Fidelity is a strategic investor focused on telecom, managed services and data centre industries.
Rowe Price
Number of $1B+ companies – 14
Rowe Price is a publicly owned investment management firm doing business from Maryland since 1937. They are primarily dedicated to funding technology startups.
Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers
Number of $1B+ companies – 14
KPCB is a Silicon Valley based venture capital firm and termed as one of the ‘largest and most established’ in the business by Wall Street Journal. They specializes in incubation and early stage companies. Since their establishment in 1972, they have invested in over 500 ventures including Amazon.com, Google, Intuit, WedMD, Zynga, Nebula, and Compaq. Their investments are primarily focused on digital, clean tech and life sciences industries.
Wellington Management
Number of $1B+ companies – 14
Wellington Management is one of the most successful investors in the world, focused on investment management. They specialize in early and late stage ventures.
Tiger Global Management
Number of $1B+ companies – 13
Established in 2001, Tiger Global Management is an impact investing firm based in New York. So far they have invested in startups like hike, Glassdoor, TVF Play, NestAway, ShopClues.com and Grofers, to name a few.
CapitalG
Number of $1B+ companies – 12
Based in California, CapitalG is a venture capital firm investing in large, growth stage technology companies since 2013. They are currently partnering with companies in USA, China and India. They have invested in 25 companies so far, including Zipline, Stripe, Airbnb, Practo, Oscar and FanDuel. They are interested in big data, fintech, security and e-learning sectors.
GV
Number of $1B+ companies – 12
GV is a Silicon Valley based venture capital firm doing business since 2009. They specializes in seed, venture and growth stage funding to technology focused startups. They have invested in companies like Acalvio Technologies, Lemonade, Amino Apps, Carbon, Luma, Gametime and CoreOS.
Institutional Venture Partners
Number of $1B+ companies – 11
Institutional Venture Partners is an American late-stage venture capital firm investing in technology and media companies since 1980. They have invested in over 300 companies, including AppDynamics, Business Insider, GitHub, Netflix, MySQL, Snapchat, Twitter, Zenefits and Klarna.