Most startups will never be a huge success. Their vision isn’t big enough.

Let’s take a look at 3 of the most successful startups of the 2020’s. All have reached valuations of over $10 billion.

Each of these founders imagined a radically different world, then went out and made it happen.

Colossal Biosciences — $10.2 billion. Yesterday, I was listening to an interview with the founder, Ben Lamm, on the Joe Rogan podcast. Listen to Ben for 10 minutes and you’ll see how ambitious he is.

Ben plans to bring back the woolly mammoth and other extinct species. If he realizes his vision, the world will be full of animals none of us have ever seen.

Already, they’ve created the woolly mouse and resurrected the dire wolf. And the company is just 3 years old.

Do you see how different this is from the typical startup? A typical startup tries to help you find sales leads a little more easily, something like that. Incremental change.

Ben doesn’t care about incremental change. His vision is radical.

Figure — $39.5 billion. Figure is developing humanoid robots. Founder Brett Adcock plans to make one for every human being in existence.

This is a radically different world. Robots would be doing manufacturing, farm work, even cleaning our houses.

Compare this to a typical startup. Maybe that startup is making meeting notes easier or scheduling a little smoother.

That just doesn’t change things the way Figure could. So it simply cannot grow as large.

Cursor — $10 billion. The other two startups on this list are deep tech. But pure software can be transformative too. Cursor is a great example.

Cursor lets anyone create software, no coding background needed. If you had an idea for a software tool in the past, you had to find a coder to build it for you.

Now, everyone is free to build their own tools that are perfect for them. Imagine the 1,000 businesses that could enable.

Cursor is a powerful, general purpose tool. Software startups like that can become massive.

Wrap-Up

I had a chance to invest in Figure’s seed round in March of 2023. I passed on it, concerned about the valuation and how capital intensive the business would be.

That turned out to be a huge mistake. I’d be sitting on a 100x return in only 2 years if I’d had the brains to put a check into it.

Since then, I’ve been thinking about how to catch the next Figure. My conclusion: I need to look for giant opportunities.

When a company’s ambitions are small, even the best case scenario isn’t that great.

Startups with a giant vision usually bite the dust too. But at least I have a chance of a big success.

And one is all it takes.

More on tech:

Five Things Founders Should Never Pay For

Meet My Latest Investment: Sent.dm

How to Build a Relationship with Investors

Save Money on Stuff I Use:

Fundrise

This platform lets me diversify my real estate investments so I’m not too exposed to any one market. I’ve invested since 2018 with great returns.

More on Fundrise in this post.

If you decide to invest in Fundrise, you can use this link to get $100 in free bonus shares!

Misfits Market

I’ve used Misfits for years, and it never disappoints! Every fruit and vegetable is organic, super fresh, and packed with flavor!

I wrote a detailed review of Misfits here.

Use this link to sign up and you’ll save $15 on your first order.