A study conducted by Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business professor Ilya Strebulaev found that graduates from Israeli universities have the highest chance of founding a startup company in the United States valued at over a billion dollars, also known as a “unicorn”. The study looked at non-US universities whose graduates have founded at least 10 unicorns, with a total of 17 institutions making the list, five of which are Israeli.
Leading the list in terms of likelihood of founding a “unicorn startup” are graduates from the Technion in Haifa, followed by Reichmann University (formerly Herzliya Interdisciplinary Center). Ben-Gurion University, Tel Aviv University, and Hebrew University also ranked highly in the study, coming in fifth, sixth, and seventh place, respectively.
When looking at the absolute number of unicorn startup founders in the United States, Tel Aviv University stood out with 42 such startups. The Technion followed with 31 “unicorns”, while Hebrew University had 27. Ben-Gurion and Reichman universities had 17 and 14 alumni who founded “unicorns” in the United States. The list of 17 universities also includes representatives from India, Canada, the UK, France, and China.
