Noubar Afeyan among Immigrant founders of Billion Dollar Startups

Armenia is also presented in the list of countries of origin for the immigrant founders of billion dollar companies: with the help of American-Armenian venture capitalist, scientist and benefactor Noubar Afeyan.

American-Armenian entrepreneur with his Flagship Ventures company is one of the co-founders of Moderna Therapeutics and 37 other companies.

According to study published by National Foundation for American Policy, there are 14 entrepreneurs on the list, India was the leading country of origin for the immigrant founders of billion dollar companies, followed by Canada and the United Kingdom with 8 each, Israel (7), Germany (4), China (3), France (2), Ireland (2) and 12 other countries with one.
Stuart Anderson, author of the study shows that more than half of the USD 1 billion US startups (44 from 87) were established by immigrants.



The number of immigrants in 62 companies from 87 is 70% in product management and development teams.

Immigrant founders of Billion dollar startups in U.S created an average of 760 jobs.

The collective value of the 44 immigrant-founded companies is $168 billion, which is close to half the value of the stock markets of Russia or Mexico. 44 of 87 companies (51%) had at least 1 immigrant co-founder.

The research found 62 of the 87 companies, or 71 percent, had at least one immigrant helping the company grow and innovate by filling a key management or product development position. Chief technology officer, CEO and vice president of engineering are the most common positions held by immigrants in these billion dollar startup companies.

The leading companies for having immigrant co-founders are SpaceX (4,000 employees), Mu Sigma (3,500 employees) and Palantir Technologies (2,000 employees).




The study mentions Uber, SpaceX and other successful companies examples.
“Companies with immigrant founders have created many useful products and services for the benefit of American consumers, American companies are making more productive”.

20 of the 87 billion dollar U.S. startup companies – and almost half of the companies with an immigrant founder – had a founder who first came to America as an international student.


According to the report, California was the headquarters of 32 of the 44 immigrant-founded companies, followed by New York (6), Massachusetts (4) and Illinois (2).

The report also talks about the opportunity of creating startup visa implementation.

“Despite the achievements of these immigrants founders and their companies, a startup visa to enable foreign nationals who start companies and create jobs would be an important addition to the U.S. immigration system, since currently it can be difficult for foreign-born entrepreneurs to stay and grow their business due to the absence of a reliable immigration category.

“The Startup Act,” could create 500,000 to 1.6 million jobs over the next 10 years if it becomes law.

In conclusion, the author of the report shows that immigrant entrepreneurs’ achievements are impressive.

“Jobs that were created by immigrants’ companies have helped tens of thousands of Americans, and the products are consumed by millions of Americans. Research has shown that immigrants are a great help to the United States, and their success proves that the United States is still the land of opportunity”, the report concludes.

Narine Daneghyan
Tatev Hovhannisyan