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Incubators are a special type of enterprise dedicated to supporting the growth of start-up and scaling businesses in high-potential sectors. There’s no doubt that there is a major shortage of capital for new ventures, so incubators are playing an important role in providing needed support for companies that otherwise might never grow.
Top 10 Incubators Worldwide
1. Venture Kick
Venture Kick, a private philanthropic initiative, provides as much 150,000 Swiss francs in pre-seed funding to Swiss startups and offers structured, entrepreneurial training to build robust, winning businesses. Entrepreneurs pitch for finance as many as three times, as they compete for increasing amounts of funding at each stage. Founders gain direct feedback from the expert juries and access to an international network of successful entrepreneurs and investors.
Venture Kick has supported 600 Swiss startup projects with 24.9 million francs to date. Supported projects have incorporated as 454 active companies, creating 6,033 jobs, and attracting 2.49 billion francs worth of subsequent investment. Companies founded by Venture Kick alums represented 55 percent of the TOP 100 Swiss Startup Award 2018.
In 2019 Venture Kick will support idea-stage startup projects with 4.35 million francs, to bring Swiss science to global markets.
Website: www.venturekick.ch
Founded: 2007
Top Industries active in: Health Care, Software and Information Technology.
Number of Investments: 1,274
Exits: 47
Venture Kick's most notable exits include Versantis, Ava, and Bicycle Therapeutics.
2. Innovation Works
For more than 20 years, Innovation Works has played a vital role in Southwestern PA's technology economy, investing capital, business expertise, and other resources into high-potential companies with the greatest likelihood for regional economic impact. IW is the single largest investor in seed-stage companies in the region. They also providere sources for manufacturers to adopt new technologies.
Website: www.innovationworks.org
Founded: 1999
Top Industries active in: Software, Health Care and Information Technology.
Number of Investments: 562
Exits: 42
Innovation Works's most notable exits include Cognition Therapeutics, Nowait, and Wombat Security Technologies.
3. JAFCO
JAFCO operates a series of funds to channel risk capital to start-ups in Japan, US, China, Taiwan, Korea, India, and Singapore. Targeting high-potential companies with innovative and creative management strategies, JAFCO provides support for enhancing corporate value and expanding business through deep involvement in management.
JAFCO currently manages total capital commitments of approximately 460 billion yen.
Website: www.jafco.co.jp
Founded: 1973
Top Industries active in: Software, Information Technology and Internet.
Number of Investments: 275
Exits: 73
JAFCO's most notable exits include Sesen Bio, double jump. tokyo, and RedSeal.
4. AGORANOV
Agoranov is a public Science & Tech incubator that provides mentorship, office space, funding, and consultancy services to startups. The company is based in Paris.
Agoranov has supported more than 380 startups that have already created more than 7,000 direct jobs and raised €700 million from private funds. Among them Criteo (NASDAQ: CRTO),Anevia, Biophytis, Gensight and Pixium listed on Alternext, or Aldebaran, Dataiku, Doctolib, Point Vision and Ynsect. Agoranov, founded by the Universities Pierre and Marie Curie and Paris-Dauphine, Ecole Normale Supérieure, ParisTech, and INRIA, is supported by the Ministry of Research and Higher Education, the Ile de France Region, the City of Paris and the European Social Fund. Agoranov provides its 60 incubated with personalized support, a state-of-the-art acceleration program, quality accommodation in the center of Paris and a rich community of several hundred entrepreneurs.
Website: www.agoranov.com
Founded: 2000
Top Industries active in: Software, Health Care and Biotechnology.
Number of Investments: 359
Exits: 45
AGORANOV's most notable exits include Cryptosense, PayPlug, and GenSight Biologics.
5. Venture Catalysts
Venture Catalysts is an integrated incubator that offers funding, mentorship, and network. It provides investment of $500K to $2MN per startup with incubation support for 18-24 months. It was established in year 2016 and in a short span, it boasts of successful in cubatees like BharatPe, Fynd, Beardo, PeeSafe, Innov8, vPhrase, SuprDaily, DSYH,IGP.com etc., which are today category leaders.
It is one of the largest early stage players in India with 4500+ angel investors spread across 36 cities in 6 countries - India, Hong Kong, Singapore, UAE, Saudi Arabia & USA. Globally, marquee investors such as YCombinator, Greenoaks, Axis Capital, Alpha Capital, Rocketship, FJ Labs (investors of Airbnb, Uber, Facebook) have co-invested with Venture Catalysts.
With its focus on developing startup ecosystem in Tier II, III cities in India, Venture Catalysts has launched its incubation program in cities like Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Raipur, Surat and Nagpur besides metros like Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Kolkata. These centres not only offer incubation support to startups but also organise regular investor education sessions for potential angel investors viz. HNIs & industrialists.
Besides raising seed stage and Series A investments for startups, Venture Catalysts is known for its startup building capability, strategic guidance, generating business leads, leveraging its network across the globe through its partners and providing phenomenal returns to its investors. It is evident from the fact that more than 10 incubatee companies of Venture Catalysts have raised Series A investment in the last two years especially when the market had not been very upbeat.
Today, Venture Catalysts has taken the leadership position in startup investments and incubation and has been rated as India's top Early stage Investor by leading national media.
Website: www.venturecatalysts.in
Founded: 2016
Top Industries active in: E-Commerce, Internet and Artificial Intelligence.
Number of Investments: 265
Exits: 11
Venture Catalysts's most notable exits include Beardo.in, Supr Daily, and ANS Commerce.
6. DMZ
The DMZ at Ryerson University is a business incubator for tech startups in Canada. It helps startups build businesses by connecting it with customers, capital, experts, and a community of entrepreneurs and influencers. This means creating an environment where people can focus on scaling businesses.
The DMZ at Ryerson University was founded on 2010and is headquartered in Toronto, Canada.
Website: www.dmz.ryerson.ca
Top Industries active in: Software, Information Technology and Health Care.
Number of Investments: 252
Exits: 30
DMZ's most notable exits include Fiix Software, 500px, and Zensurance.
7. AngelPad
AngelPad is a seed-stage accelerator program that finds product market fit, defining a target market to get first validation for a company.
AngelPad is a startup Accelerator & MicroVC Fund, founded by Thomas Korte & Carine Magescas in 2010. AngelPad is consistently ranked #1 U.S. Accelerator by MIT/Rice University's Accelerator Rankings Project.
Website: www.angelpad.com
Founded: 2010
Top Industries active in: Software, Mobile and SaaS.
Number of Investments: 179
Exits: 37
AngelPad's most notable exits include AllTrails, Postmates, and Fieldwire.
8. Samurai Incubate
In 2008, we launched Samurai Incubate Inc. to support early-stage start-ups in the areas of management, marketing, sales, human resources, and finances. Our company invests in start-up ventures, and we also hold advisory posts and serve as external directors of some venture companies.
Background: Social and Economic Legislation
Where as venture capital investment is at about 30 billion dollars in U.S. and 24 billion dollars in Europe, Japan was only at about 0.86 billion dollars (2005), and the Japanese investment ratio is only about 30 / 1. On the other hand, by the legal deregulation progresses as seen in new business laws, increasingly in the future Japanese funding is expected to expand.
Samurai Incubate Inc. was established to help companies to develop vision and strength and to realize their greater revenue potential. We support practical expertise in marketing and sales management personnel as well as clear financial strategies to monetize our start-ups.
Website: www.samurai-incubate.asia
Founded: 2008
Top Industries active in: Internet, Software and Information Technology.
Number of Investments: 150
Exits: 8
Samurai Incubate's most notable exits include PORT, Mentalhealth Technologies, and ONDiGO.
9. EvoNexus
EvoNexus is a technology incubator for Southern California's startup and entrepreneurial community with locations in San Diego and Irvine. EvoNexus empowers motivated entrepreneurs to turn their transformative ideas into fundable, commercially viable companies and leverages community resources to provide what entrepreneurs need to be successful.
Website: www.evonexus.org
Founded: 1998
Top Industries active in: Software, Health Care and Information Technology
Number of Investments: 229
Exits: 31
EvoNexus's most notable exits include ecoATM, Aira, and Citadel Defense Company.
10. Velocity
The Velocity Fund is a grant program for startups that offers $390,000 in equity-free funding each year to local startups through its Velocity Fund $25K and Velocity Fund $5K programs at the University of Waterloo.
The Velocity Garage incubator is home base to 75+ early-stage startups building technology-based businesses in the heart of Water loo Region.
Velocity Start is workspace on-campus at the University of Waterloo for people who want to learn about entrepreneurship and collaborate with like-minded people. Resources include lounge and workspace, booking space, weekly workshops, and startup coaching.
Velocity Science is a partnership between Velocity and the University of Waterloo Faculty of Science, providing students interested in building a science startup with the right tools and resources to initiate and develop world-class science companies.
The Velocity Residence provides aspiring entrepreneurs living in Waterloo Residences with the opportunity to collaborate and work on projects they are passionate about.
Website: www.velocity.uwaterloo.ca
Founded: 2008
Top Industries active in: Health Care, Software and Information Technology.
Number of Investments: 256
Exits: 21
Velocity's most notable exits include North, Pebble, and Embark Trucks.
