50 High-Growth Companies for 2025: Post-Money Valuation & Headcount Tracking for Better Investments

A smart investor understands the importance of actionable data before committing to a venture. And if the global investment scenario in 2025 is going to be anything like 2024, staying ahead demands more than just the basics, it demands an extra edge.

Today, I'm helping you gain that edge. I will highlight the top 50 high-growth companies of the past year, assessed through two decision metrics: headcount tracking and post-money valuation, key indicators that every venture capitalist should prioritize. I'll also demonstrate how we used our custom-built app(which you can also build from scratch) to present and access decisive data at scale.

But first, let’s take a step back and peek at the investment landscape of 2024.

Global Investment Scenario in 2024

2024 saw a sharp decline in global investments compared to 2023. A sign of a cautious, less confident approach from investors. By the third quarter, the number of funding rounds decreased by 25% compared to the same period in 2023.

The first quarter was promising with 13,029 funding rounds, the highest of the year. Venture funding in particular reached $66.5 billion by the third quarter. That's no feat, because it's down by 15% compared to the numbers in 2023.

Crunchbase reports start-up funding went down by a whopping 63% from what it was in 2023, while early-stage funding fell over 20% year over year. However, late-stage funding doubled year over year.

AI startups operating across multiple sectors saw a huge push, as it reached a monthly peak of $14 billion in November of 2024.

The U.S. in particular also faced their fair share of challenges, with declining funding round rates experiencing a drop of 28% from what it was last year. More than 3,000 tech companies went out of business despite being backed by private ventures.

The 2025 Outlook

Experts predict a continuation of the downward trend outside of the US. The European Central Bank is likely to cut the deposit rate to 1.5% by the end of the year to lighten the tariff weight.

For the US, things look better. Capital markets are predicted to elevate as Trump's administration takes over. The US economy is expected to grow steadily at 2%, even if things outside the US look down.

As an investor, you might be distraught with what 2024 brought in, going into 2025. It just stresses the need for decisive, actionable data.

How Post Money Valuation and Headcount tracking helps evaluate investment opportunities

Post money valuation gives you tangible insights into how a company utilizes its capital to scale its operations. Consistent growth trends post-funding indicate that the company is able to leverage its new found resources to generate returns and build sustainable momentum.

Pre-money valuations are considered to determine the amount of equity investors need to secure in exchange for any capital injection.

For instance, let's assume a company has a $10 million pre-money valuation. If you put $5 million into the company, it creates a post-money valuation of $15 million. So in a very basic scenario, the investor would then have a 33.33% interest in the company, since $5 million is equal to one-third of the post-money valuation of $15 million. This is assuming the investors and the entrepreneurs agree on the valuations without negotiations. Negotiations on the company's assets, intellectual property, determine the actual value.

Headcount tracking is a method used to analyze the number of employees in an organization over a time period. It gives a glimpse into a company's growth rate, hiring trends, and pinpoint periods of high or low turnover. A positive headcount growth, particularly in strategic roles like sales, marketing, and product development, reflects a proactive approach to scaling and innovation. Expanding the workforce is a green signal in a business's confidence in its business model, demand for its product or service, and readiness to meet market opportunities.

Together, these metrics provide investors with a clearer picture of a company's trajectory and its potential to deliver significant returns.

Now, I am confident you are a competent investor, who knows how to do your research before investing. But try to do that manually, and you are in for a lot of work.

Let's take a look at the top 50 high-growth companies by headcount tracking and post-money valuation in 2024 that I pulled in mere minutes using Proxycurl. I'll even go a step further and segment the employee data geographically and based on their role, and present it in a piechart, using our own homemade employee composition app, which you can also build from scratch.

Top 50 high-growth companies by headcount tracking and post-money valuation

1. Personio

Based in Munich, Germany, Personio is an all-in-one HR software platform designed for small and medium-sized businesses. It offers solutions for recruiting, payroll, employee management, and more, streamlining HR processes to improve efficiency and compliance.

Personio secured a total funding of $724 million over 7 rounds. They subsequently added 688 new employees from 2022 to 2024, the largest headcount growth in the period.

Top employee location percentages:

• Germany 59.5% at 1104

• Ireland 13.4% at 248

• Spain 9.7% at 180

Here's what the workforce distribution by role looks like:

• Sales 31.2% at 577
• Developers 22% with 408
• Operations 21.1% with 391

2. Mews

Mews is a hospitality management software company that automates operations for hotels and hostels. Their cloud-based system handles reservations, check-ins, payments, and guest management.

This company secured a total funding of $442.3 million in over 8 funding rounds. They added 687 new employees from 2022 to 2024.

Top employee location percentages:

• Czech Republic 24.3% at 252

• United Kingdom 19.5% at 202

• Spain 12.7% at 132

Here's what the workforce distribution by role looks like at Mews:

• Operations 29.9% at 310
• Developers 28.9% at 299
• Sales 13% at 135

One interesting find was the position of "Canine Executive Officer" at Mews.

3. Apollo.io

Apollo.io is a sales engagement platform that helps businesses streamline their sales processes by offering prospecting tools, analytics, and automation. It enables companies to connect with potential customers more effectively and optimize their sales pipelines.

Over 6 rounds of funding, Apollo.io raised $251.3 million. Their new funds allowed them to add 420 new employees from 2022 to 2024.

Top employee location percentage:

• United States 52.3% at 304

• India 19.8% at 115

• Colombia 5.2% at 30

Workforce distribution by role at Apollo:

• Developer 31.8% at 184
• Sales 22.3% at 129
• Operations 16.1% at 93

4. Vanta

Based in California, Vanta specializes in automating security and compliance processes, making it easier for businesses to obtain certifications like SOC 2, ISO 27001, and GDPR. By simplifying the complex requirements of cybersecurity audits, Vanta helps companies build trust with customers.

Vanta secured $353 million of total funding over 6 funding rounds. This allowed them to recruit 345 new employees from 2022 to 2024.

Top employee location percentages:

• United States at 83.8% with 451

• Ireland 7.6% at 41

• Australia 3.2% at 17

Here's what Vanta's workfroce distribution looks like:

• Sales 30.1% at 161
• Developers 27.5% at 147
• Operations 17.6% at 94

5. Drata

Similar to Vanta, Drata is a continuous security and compliance automation platform that helps companies achieve and maintain regulatory standards such as SOC 2, GDPR, and ISO 27001.

With over 4 funding rounds, Datra raised over $328.2 million. From 2022 to 2024, they were able to add 342 new employees.

Top employee location percentages:

• United States 78.6% at 392

• Mexico 10% at 50

• United Kingdom 4.6% at 23

Workforce distribution by role at Datra:

• Developer 30.8% at 153
• Sales 24.2% at 120
• Operations 20.4% at 101

6. Pigment

A business planning and forecasting platform, Pigment empowers organizations to analyze data, model scenarios, and make informed decisions.

Pigment raised $396 million in total, over 6 funding rounds, financing 300 new employees from 2022 to 2024.

Top employee location percentages:

• France 44.8% at 173

• United States 25.1% at 97

• United Kingdom 18.4% at 71

Here's what the workforce distribution looks like at Pigment:

• Sales 25.5% at 97
• Developers 22% at 84
• Operations 18.6% at 71

7. Multiplier

Multiplier offers global employment solutions, allowing businesses to hire and manage international teams with ease. The platform handles payroll, compliance, and employee benefits across multiple countries, enabling seamless cross-border workforce management.

Multiplier secured a total funding of $77.2 million in over 4 funding rounds. From 2022 to 2024, they added 280 new employees.

Top employee location percentages:

• India 53.1% at 189

• United States 11% at 39

• Singapore 7.6% at 27

Workforce distribution by role at Multiplier:

• Operations 29.5% at 103
• Developers 18.6% at 65
• Sales 17.2% at 60

8. Factorial

Factorial is an HR management platform catering to small and medium-sized businesses. It simplifies HR tasks such as time tracking, performance reviews, and payroll, helping companies optimize their HR processes and improve employee satisfaction.

In over 6 funding rounds, Factorial secured $299.9 million, most recently in April of 2024 for $76.8M. They subsequently added 263 new employees from 2022 to 2024.

Top employee location percentages:

• Spain 77.1% at 541
• Brazil 5.4% at 38
• Mexico 5.3% 37

Workforce distribution by role at Factorial:

• Sales 42.8% at 298
• HR 19.3% at 134
• Marketing 11.8% at82

9. ZipHQ

A procurement management software, ZipHQ helps businesses optimize their purchasing processes. By automating workflows, managing vendor relationships, and improving spend visibility, ZipHQ enables organizations to save time and reduce costs.

With over 6 funding rounds, ZipHQ secured a total funding amount of $371.3 million. The company added 233 new employees from 2022 to 2024.

Top employee location percentages:

• United States 83.2% at 247

• Canda at 12.8% at 38

• United Kingdom 2.69% at 8

Have to give props to ZipHQ for having an employee in Antartica. Must be a brag!

Here's what ZipHQ's workforce breakdown looks like:

• Developers 37.6% at 111
• Sales 25.1% at 74
• Operations 12.5% at 37

10. Dataiku

Dataiku is a data science and machine learning platform that enables businesses to analyze large datasets, build predictive models, and operationalize AI solutions. It caters to data teams by offering collaborative tools that support the entire data lifecycle.

Dataiku secured a total funding of $846.8 million, over 11 funding rounds. From 2022 to 2024, they added over 196 new employees.

Top employee location percentages:

• United States 36.9% at 427

• France 31.5% at 364

• United Kingdom 10% at 116

Workforce breakdown by role in Dataiku:

• Developers 27.6% at 314
• Sales 26.8% at 305
• Operations 19.7% at 224

How to source data for Post money valuation and headcount tracking?

You can manually search for each company and click on hundreds of job portals and industry publications, hoping you'll find everything you need (Good luck doing this btw!)

Or,

You can rely on a trusted data provider, like Proxycurl.

Proxycurl is actually the source of all the data you see here. With Company Profile Endpoint and Employee Listing Endpoint, I extracted all the data I needed for headcount tracking, post money valuation, total funding amounts, and revenue metrics.

Let me show you how I did it.

First, start with creating a free account with Proxycurl. You get 10 free credits, so don't worry about pulling your credit card right now. Go to your dashboard and scroll down to the Company Profile Endpoint.

Using this endpoint, I pulled out all the companys' total funding, post money valuation, employee headcount from 2022 to 2024 and the estimated revenue.

Let's Take a look at this sample API call for Personio:

python
import requests

api_key = 'YOUR_API_KEY'

headers = {'Authorization': 'Bearer ' + api_key}

api_endpoint = 'https://nubela.co/proxycurl/api/linkedin/company'

params = {'url': 'https://www.linkedin.com/company/personio/', 'funding_data': 'include'}

response = requests.get(api_endpoint, params=params, headers=headers)

if response.status_code == 200:

    data = response.json()

    print(f"Company: {data.get('name', 'Unknown')}")

    print(f"Employee Count 2022: {data.get('employee_count', {}).get('2022', 'N/A')}")

    print(f"Employee Count 2024: {data.get('employee_count', {}).get('2024', 'N/A')}")

    print(f"Total Funding: ${data.get('funding', 'N/A')}")

    print(f"Estimated Revenue: ${data.get('estimated_revenue', 'N/A')}")

else:

    print(f"Error: {response.status_code} - {response.content.decode('utf-8')}")

This is what you get in response.\
{

    "name": "Personio",

    "employee_count": {

        "2022": 1202,

        "2024": 1890

    },

    "funding": $724.3M

    "estimated_revenue": $210.1M

}

Employee Listing Endpoint comes to the frey for granular details on each employee, including their roles and locations. In this case, I used the endpoint to get the geographical distribution of all the employees. Here's a sample API call for Personio:

python
import requests

api_key = 'YOUR_API_KEY'  # Replace with your actual API key

headers = {'Authorization': 'Bearer ' + api_key}

api_endpoint = 'https://nubela.co/proxycurl/api/linkedin/company/employees/'

params = {

    'url': 'https://www.linkedin.com/company/personio',

    'coy_name_match': 'include',

    'use_cache': 'if-present',

    'country': 'us',

    'enrich_profiles': 'enrich',

    'role_search': '(co)?-?founder',  # Confirm API supports regex-style queries

    'page_size': '10',

    'employment_status': 'current',

    'sort_by': 'recently-joined',

    'resolve_numeric_id': 'false',

}

response = requests.get(api_endpoint, params=params, headers=headers)

if response.status_code == 200:

    try:

        employees = response.json()

        for employee in employees.get('results', []):

            full_name = employee.get('full_name', 'N/A')

            role = employee.get('role', 'N/A')

            location = employee.get('location', 'N/A')

            print(f"Name: {full_name}, Role: {role}, Location: {location}")

    except Exception as e:

        print(f"Error processing data: {e}")

else:

    print(f"Error fetching data. Status code: {response.status_code}")

    if response.content:

        print(f"Error details: {response.content.decode('utf-8')}")

This is what it returns:\
[

    {"name": "Jorge Muller", "role": "Software Engineer", "location": "Stuttgart, Germany"},

    {"name": "Karla Hoffman", "role": "Communications Specialist", "location": "Munich, Germany"}

]

By combining data from these endpoints, I was able to construct the top 50 list, and a profile on the top 10 companies. Imagine the horror if I had to do all this manually!

Proxycurl's selection of endpoints made the process efficient, so much so that I could pull this off alone.

Make Data-Driven Investment Decisions with Proxycurl

As 2025 dawns, you need to go the extra mile to make sound investments. Secure your funds, and power your data driven decisions with Proxycurl. Scouting high-growth companies using metrics like headcount growth and post money valuation is just skimming the surface of what Proxycurl can do.

With Proxycurl every data on company and individual profiles are on your finger tips. The data is sourced from trusted sources like LinkedIn and Crunchbase, and topped off with a data freshness guarantee. Pair that with the employee composition app, and what you have is a prospector, that helps you glance opportunities based on headcount tracking.

Identifying investment opportunities has never been easier. Get started with Proxycurl today!

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