Can a startup be worth a trillion dollars?

I’ve asked dozens of people this question, and the answer is almost unanimous: “Yes, look at OpenAI’s $500 billion valuation.”

It’s a remarkable case when you consider that as of August 2018, the most valuable startup on the planet was Uber, with a measly $76 billion valuation, and there were exactly no public companies with a trillion-dollar market capitalization. apple He was the first to receive the trillion-dollar ring in August 2018 (on Tuesday, the iPhone maker’s market cap reached $4 trillion), and dead, Nvidia, Microsoft, alphabetand Tesla She has since followed suit.

So, assuming a trillion-dollar privately owned startup is really just a matter of time, there are a number of questions we might need to start asking, including what it means for the exit-based venture capital model and for founders, what it means for regulation and disclosure focused on public companies (particularly in light of efforts to open up retirement plans to private assets), and, of course, what We call these things?

Calling a company of this size a startup is of course somewhat of a misnomer, notes Bessemer partner Talia Goldberg: “Calling a trillion-dollar company a ‘startup’ is an exercise in branding,” she said via email. “It’s a way for founders to maintain the innovation narrative.” Goldberg also adds that the overall valuation of companies on the Bessemer’s Cloud 100 list has increased 10-fold over the past decade. “Soon, the average private valuation will be $112 billion,” she says.

It begs the question: 12 years after Elaine Lee coined the term to describe billion-dollar companies, what does “unicorn” mean anymore? Billion dollar startups are a dime a dozen these days. What we need is a term for the rarest breed, which, if the term sheet readers I spoke to are correct, will soon be measured in thirteen numbers.

Sameer Kumar, general partner of Touring Capital, suggests the name “Triceratops.”

“If you think of a triceratops, you think of an unstoppable, brute force creature,” Kumar said via email. “Kind of like the way trillion-dollar startups would be created. Triceratops are also extinct.”

Costonoa Ventures partner John Coghill is up for “Gigacorn,” while Phyllis founder and managing partner Aydin Sincott likes “Teracaps.”

“Tera versus trillion,” Cincott said. “It’s the next logical leap after unicorn startups and deca-century startups. At that scale, ‘startup’ doesn’t cut it. A startup isn’t really a startup. It’s a sovereign economy with a cap table.”

My personal introduction, for anyone wondering, is the dragon. But perhaps my favorite suggestion:

“For a trillion dollars, we’ll have to call it a kaiju atom!” Antonio Rodriguez, Matrix’s managing partner, said via email. “Because, like mythical monsters from the center of the Earth, they are big and powerful and trampling the rest of the startup ecosystem.”

There is, of course, an exit challenge if we finally see that kaiju atom, which will likely boost incentives to stay private forever.

“If you were investing in a trillion-dollar startup, what exit would you have? How could there be any other way out besides going public?” Wonders of Turing Kumar. “And how many trillion-dollar startups will be able to put up the numbers to justify that valuation in the public markets? None of this is even close to being plausible. Besides going public, perhaps the most realistic path is to stay private (like SpaceX), and do secondary offerings and bids to provide liquidity to founders and early investors. This is another very real path.”

A few hundred words down on this aside, Sunil Dhaliwal, Amplify Partners GP, makes an important point: anything up to this size is anomalous by definition.

“We should give the unicorn metaphor a break,” Dhaliwal said via email. “It has served its purpose, but saying decacorn, centicorn, or kilocorn (is that next?) has become meaningless. I’m not going to try to achieve traction by coming up with a catchy new moniker. I think the bigger point is that while a few companies may reach this level, this is certainly not a category of company any time soon.”

Once again, investor enthusiasm for private companies, especially in the AI ​​space, does not appear to be slowing down.

“The biggest differential we have ever seen now exists between private and public growth,” Cincott said via email. “The best private companies are growing at 400%, while the best public companies are struggling to reach 20%. And the capital will go where there is growth. And right now, that is the private markets.”

Term Paper Podcast… This week’s guest: Oura CEO Tom Hill! Oura has been making headlines for months, most recently with a massive $900 million funding round, valuing the wearables giant at $11 billion. In September, while at Brainstorm Tech, I sat down with Tom Hill, CEO of Oura, to talk about the company’s growth, data privacy, his biggest challenge as CEO, the unexpected places he’s opened the doors to consumer value, and more. Listen and watch here.

see you tomorrow,

Allie Garfinkel
tenth: @agarfinks
Email: alexandra.garfinkle@fortune.com
Send a deal to the term sheet newsletter here.

Joey Abrams coordinated the deals section of today’s newsletter. Subscribe here.

Project deals

– Unifora business AI platform based in Palo Alto, California, has raised $260 million in Series F funding from Nvidia, AMD, Snowflake, Data brickset al.

– Moneypointa financial platform based in Lagos, Nigeria, has raised $200 million in Series C funding. development Partners He led the tour and joined him jump Investments, Light Rock, Alder tree Investmentset al.

– langshena San Francisco-based agent engineering platform, has raised $125 million in funding. IVP He led the tour and joined him Capital G, Sapphire Projectsand existing investors.

– Senecaa San Francisco-based firefighting technology company, has raised $60 million in funding. Contains caffeine capital and convection capital He led the tour and joined him Firstly Capital round, transmission VC, He advances Take risks Partnerset al.

– UnifyAppsa New York City-based developer of enterprise AI operating systems, has raised $50 million in Series B funding. Westbridge capital He led the tour and joined him ICONIC And others.

– On the edgean AI-powered IT service management platform based in San Francisco, has raised $47 million in Series A funding. Redo point Projects He led the tour and joined him Firstly Capital round, general Catalyst, fund groupet al.

– Hiroa New York City-based developer of conversational AI for healthcare, has raised $45 million in funding. healthier capital He led the tour and joined him Norway, Defines Projectsand existing investors.

– key carda San Francisco-based platform for building and deploying AI agents, has raised $38 million across Seed and Series A funding rounds. Andreessen Horowitz and Boldstart Projects He led the $8 million seed round and Acro capital Led $30M Series A round.

– Nutritional TreatmentsA San Francisco-based biotechnology company developing therapies designed to target tumor metabolism has raised $25 million in funding. S2G Projects He led the tour and joined him Khosla Projects, future Projects, digitalis Projectset al.

– ChipAgentsGoleta, an AI chip design platform based in Goleta, California, has raised $21 million in Series A funding. Bessemer Take risks Partners He led the tour and others joined him.

– estuarya New York City-based traffic and live streaming platform, has raised $17 million in Series A funding. M13 He led the tour and joined him Firstmark and Operator Partners.

– Street rhythma Palo Alto, California-based AI intelligence platform designed for financial professionals and individual investors, has raised $15 million in Series A funding. CDP Take risks capital He led the tour and joined him TTV capital, p. 101, Monty Carlo capital, 3Lineset al.

– ProntoThe Dublin, Ireland-based registry data platform company has raised $14 million in seed funding. close administration He led the tour and joined him Heavybeat and Belief capital.

– Asylaba Brooklyn, New York-based AI platform designed to help architects choose building materials, has raised $13.5 million in Series A funding. Navitas capital He led the tour and joined him JLL spark, DEVCO Westet al.

– big energyan ocean energy storage company based in Milan, Italy, has raised $8 million. stadium worldwide He led the tour.

– anchor Browsera cloud browser developer for AI clients based in Tel Aviv, Israel and New York City, has raised $6 million in seed funding. Bloomberg capital He led the tour and joined him Gradient.

– MythWorxan AI modeling company based in Dallas, Texas, has raised $5 million in seed funding. eagle Take risks finance Fourth and eagle Freedom Fund secondly He led the round and was joined by angel investors.

– lusteran Indianapolis-based AI platform designed to help customer-facing teams prevent errors, has raised $3 million in seed funding. High alpha and Ivy Projects He led the tour and others joined him.

– honeyan AI-powered financial automation platform based in New York City, has raised $2.1 million in seed funding. Grand Ventures led the round and joined it Salah Projects, trust Projects, Samfed Projectsand fabric VC.

Private equity

– machinewhich is a portfolio company new mountain capitalhe took Performance health carea New York City-based healthcare analytics company, is privately held and valued at approximately $670 million.

– Mainsail Partners Invested $54 million Court reservationa developer of reservation, membership management and other racket and paddle sports software based in St. Augustine, Florida.

– Affiliated to High capital acquired a majority stake in Alaaa Naples, Italy-based provider of logistics and distribution services to aerospace and defense manufacturers. Financial terms were not disclosed.

– Cailintsupported Gryphon Investorsacquired Journey10an Amazon Web Services Associate based in South Bend, Indiana. Financial terms were not disclosed.

– industrial He controls Solutionswhich is a portfolio company LDR Partnersacquired Doro Sense Companya Carson, California-based designer and manufacturer of temperature sensors and assemblies. Financial terms were not disclosed.

– one justice Partners acquired a majority stake in digital valuea Rome, Italy-based company that provides data, artificial intelligence, cloud computing and other technology-based solutions. Financial terms were not disclosed.