Which colleges produce the most venture-backed startup founders?
Stanford University; University of California, Berkeley; and Harvard University, according to a new report from venture capital data firm Pitchbook, which compiled a list of the 100 top colleges for startup founders.
While elite coastal schools topped the rankings, there was plenty of geographic diversity near the top of the list.
The University of Pennsylvania, University of Texas, University of Illinois, University of Wisconsin and Duke University all cracked the top 20 undergraduate universities for startup founders. Pitchbook's report measured schools based on the number of founders whose companies received a first round of venture funding between Jan. 1, 2012, and Oct. 21, 2022.
At Stanford, the top undergraduate university on Pitchbook's list, 1,427 founders raised funding during that span, cumulatively raising more than $73 billion. While holding a slim lead over No. 2 UC-Berkeley in terms of the number of founders getting checks (1,406), Stanford holds a much stronger lead in dollars raised. UC-Berkeley founders raised just under $46 billion in the last decade.
When it comes to graduate schools, Stanford, Harvard and MIT lead the way. The graduate school top 10 list also includes Columbia University (No. 4), Northwestern University (No. 9) and New York University (No. 10).
Pitchbook also broke down the top schools for female founders, with Stanford and Harvard topping the list for both undergrad and graduate schools.
Here are Pitchbook's top 10 schools in each category. You can read the full list from Pitchbook here.
Top 10 undergraduate universities for startup founders
- Stanford University
- University of California, Berkeley
- Harvard University
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- University of Pennsylvania
- Cornell University
- Tel Aviv University
- University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
- University of Texas at Austin
- Yale University
Top 10 graduate universities for startup founders
- Stanford University
- Harvard University
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- Columbia University
- University of California, Berkeley
- University of Pennsylvania
- University of Cambridge
- University of Oxford
- Northwestern University
- New York University
Top 10 undergraduate universities for female founders
- Stanford University
- Harvard University
- University of California, Berkeley
- University of Pennsylvania
- Cornell University
- New York University
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- Yale University
- Columbia University
- University of California, Los Angeles
Top 10 graduate universities for female founders
- Harvard University
- Stanford University
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- Columbia University
- University of Pennsylvania
- University of California, Berkeley
- New York University
- University of Oxford
- Northwestern University
- University of Cambridge
