Goldman Sachs asks what private companies over $10 bn are called…and the answers were quite unexpected

Is it megacorns or is it hectocorns? Or perhaps, it is…popcorns! Goldman Sachs asked its followers in a social media poll what they think a company with over $10 billion valuation is called. 

In the social media poll, Goldman Sachs had four options – megacorns, decacorns, hectocorns and de-unicorned. 

Now we all know about unicorns – considering India has the third-highest number of unicorns, it is a term that one comes by pretty often. For the uninitiated, companies over $10 billion valuation are called decacorns. It borrows the word ‘deca’ meaning 10 in Latin. Meanwhile, unicorn refers to companies with ‘uni’, meaning one billion in valuation.

While some of the LinkedIn users did answer that the correct answer is decacorns, some saw the funnier side of things. 

Besides answering the poll, some took to offering an analysis, for instance, “And those below $ 1 million are called popcorns” and “Popcorns? as they can pop up anytime post IPO?”

Some also said that while the answer is decacorn, it really should have been megacorns as it sounds cooler. “Sorry but megacorns sound just so much cooler,” said a user, while another said, “Megacorns is by far the coolest”.

There were other unexpected answers too such as Capricorn and decepticon. “My horoscope says the honest, direct, hardworking ones are called ‘Capricorns’,” said a user.

As for the poll, at the time of writing this article, 59 per cent had voted for decacorn, while 32 per cent had voted for megacorns, 5 per cent for hectocorns, and 4 per cent for de-unicorned. 

Meanwhile, according to the latest Hurun Global Unicorn Index 2023, India is third only to the US' 666 unicorns and China’s 316, with its own 68 new unicorns. It is an increase of 14 unicorns in one year and 47 per cent since pre-COVID. India also had the third-highest number of gazelles, which is a start-up founded in the 2000s, worth over $500 million, and is most likely to become a unicorn within three years.

Also read: India has 3rd-highest number of unicorns, gazelles: Hurun’s Global Unicorn Index 2023

Also read: BYJU’S, Swiggy & Dream11: Hurun’s Global Unicorn Index 2023 unveils India’s top unicorns