Millie Hanson

CEOs I'm gossiping about this week | Front-row seat on 20+ founder accounts, pre-seed to Series D | Making VC sexy again

[Millie Hanson @ceowhispererr]

December 2018, that was when Juul Labs was last priced.

Even now, it stands as the 18th most valuable VC-backed company globally. The fascinating column on this chart is the one on the far right.

In 2026, 11 out of the 20 companies were repriced, including every company that sits in the top seven - $2.88T worth between them.

The other 9 hold $402B, which is less than half of Anthropic on its own.

$144B of the total was priced before 2025:
- Juul Labs, $38B, December 2018
- https://t.co/qBiJh2tXek, $40B, January 2022
- Shein, $66B, May 2023

https://t.co/qBiJh2tXek and Ripple are both valued at $40B, agreed close to four years apart. In 2022 that number would have put you near the top of a list like this. Today it's 15th and 16th.

Fast forward to February, Stripe was repriced at $159B and Ramp in June at $44B. It is crazy to think that Ramp is ten whole years younger than https://t.co/qBiJh2tXek and has already passed it.

I wrote that headline as a question on purpose. It asks, which VC-backed company is worth the most? But the real answer is that a majority of these are not valuations; it is value over time.

Anthropic's $965B is the most recent number on the board.
Their three month valuation birthday is coming up so soon.

ps, there are already ~100 Waymos testing in London, all still with a safety driver. Having ridden the empty ones in SF, I'm a little impatient.

[Millie Hanson @ceowhispererr]

1/ Women now own 40.6% of US businesses.
All-female founding teams got 1.9% of US venture capital last year.

2/ The scale is not small:15.7M businesses
12.6M employees
$2.8T in revenue

3/ And it's compounding. 2022 to 2025:
Women-owned: +12.1%
Men-owned: +6.3%
Roughly 1.7M businesses added.

(Close to double the growth rate)

4/ None of this was inevitable.
Women couldn't get credit in their own name until 1974.

5/ So the next chapter isn't about convincing more women to start businesses. They did that.

It's whether the capital, customers and networks show up when they try to scale.

[Millie Hanson @ceowhispererr]

40.6% of US businesses are women-owned.

Women-owned firms are growing at twice the rate of men-owned ones.

All-female founding teams got 1% of US venture capital last year.

Guess which number got a press release.

[Millie Hanson @ceowhispererr]

@chloemcormack2 @lessirusso_ a whole £5.99

[Lola @Glitterpoops_]

I do a lot of illegal shit but I draw the line at littering

[Millie Hanson @ceowhispererr]

@chloemcormack2 She’s a 10, but sends you James Morrison songs all day

[Millie Hanson @ceowhispererr]

@chloemcormack2 for you x

[WeRateDogs @dog_rates]

This is Archie. He may be a smol boy, but he’s got legendary hops. 14/10 elevator didn’t stand a chance

[ellie schnitt @holy_schnitt]

y’all ever had a shower wine? it’s where you drink a cute little glass of wine while you shower because u had a long day and deserve a treat. it’s innovative all the hot girls are doing it