Hurun China Under30s 2024

Hurun Headquarter

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Hurun China Under30s 2024

131 INDIVIDUALS MADE THE 2024 HURUN CHINA UNDER30S, LOWEST NUMBER IN 7 YEARS.

HANGZHOU THE MOST POPULAR ‘UNDER30S CAPITAL’ IN CHINA FOR THE FIRST TIME IN EIGHT YEARS. SHENZHEN SECOND, OVERTAKING BEIJING FOR THE FIRST TIME

95 OR 73% ARE SELF-MADE

THE AVERAGE VALUE OF START-UPS WAS CNY280MN. 11 ARE WORTH MORE THAN US$100MN

SOFTWARE & SERVICES LED THE WAY WITH 33%, ESPECIALLY AI AND ENERGY DATA SERVICES. EDUCATION & TRAINING AND CONSUMER GOODS SECOND AND THIRD

SERIES A WAS THE MOST POPULAR FINANCING ROUND FOR THESE START-UPS, WITH AN AVERAGE CUMULATIVE FINANCING OF CNY39MN. 19% HAVE RAISED MORE THAN CNY100MN.

FINANCING WAS MAINLY USED FOR R&D (80%), HIRING (73%) AND MARKETING (57%)

AVERAGE NUMBER OF EMPLOYEES 250

ENGINEERING MAJORS SUCH AS COMPUTER SCIENCE AND AI MOST POPULAR COURSES FOR HURUN CHINA U30S

HURUN RESEARCH INSTITUTE RELEASES THE HURUN CHINA UNDER30S 2024 IN ASSOCIATION WITH CHANGSHU KUNCHENG LAKE

(8 May 2025, Changshu) The Hurun Research Institute today released the Changshu Kuncheng Lake · Hurun China Under30s 2024, a list of China’s most successful entrepreneurs aged 30 and under. This is the eighth year of the list.

Changshu Kuncheng Lake is a High-tech Zone located around Kuncheng Lake in the city of Changshu, just outside of Shanghai.

This year, 131 individuals made the list, the lowest number since 2018. The average age was 28, with 79% male and 21% female. They come from 37 cities. 58% offered physical products and 42% software or services. 73% were B2B businesses, and 27% consumer-focused.

95 are self-made entrepreneurs. Software & Services led the way, covering emerging areas such as AI and Energy data services. Education and Consumer Goods ranked second and third respectively. The average age of the self-made businesses was 5.1 years, meaning they set up at the age of 23 and are 28 today. They started out with CNY12mn on average, and their last round was a Series A round, with a cumulative financing of CNY39mn. Today they are worth CNY280mn and have 250 employees, on average. 8% have already listed. 35% of these Under30s have an overseas study background, with the USA, the UK and Australia being their most popular study destinations.

36 are NextGen, with an average age of 29. These NextGen Under30s are mainly in Industrial Equipment, Chemicals and Healthcare. 70% have an overseas study background, led by the USA, Australia and the UK. Economics was their preferred subject.

The Chairman and Chief Researcher of Hurun, Rupert Hoogewerf, said:

“Hurun is all about promoting entrepreneurship through its lists and research. I started out in 1999 by telling the story of the China economy through the stories of its most successful entrepreneurs, the Hurun China Rich List. Next up was the Hurun Unicorn Index, telling the stories of the most exciting start-ups in the world. The Hurun Uth (pronounced ‘Youth’) Series started in 2017 by identifying the most successful young entrepreneurs aged 30 or under, the Hurun China Under30s. Since then, we have expanded to include the Under25s, Under35s and Under40s. The idea is to give these brilliant young entrepreneurs recognition, helping them to get the attention of investors, local governments and strategic partners, and thereby helping them develop faster and go further.”

“The young entrepreneurs on the Hurun China Under30s list are involved in areas with huge potential for future development, such as AI, Healthcare, Robotics, the Low Earth Orbit economy, Cross-border e-commerce and MR. I am delighted to release the Hurun China Under30s 2024 in association with Changshu Kuncheng Lake in Suzhou. We hope that this list will help more people understand what these outstanding young entrepreneurs are up to, and will inspire these pioneers to achieve greater success, and set an example for founders who hope to make the Hurun Under30s in the future.”

“The popularity of AI continues to rise, but now new opportunities have emerged in areas such as AI hardware, large language models and specific intelligence. Compared with previous years, China's U30s on the list this year are more into vertical AI than general AI. They are breaking down AI technology into more subdivided fields, such as retail and chemical industries. Young entrepreneurs are paying more attention about how to use AI to solve bottlenecks in specific industries.”

“Hangzhou led the Hurun Under30s for the first time, in the same year as its 'Six Little Dragons' have garnered global attention, led by DeepSeek, the Black Myth developer Game Science, robotics firms Unitree and DeepRobotics, Neuralink challenger BrainCo, and spatial intelligence firm ManyCore.”

“In the past three years, the proportion of Hurun Under30s with a masters or PhD has doubled to 45% and the number of Tsinghua University alumni has also doubled to 14%.”

“What surprised me was that among this year’s Hurun U30s, 35% studied overseas, of which 26% have bachelor's degrees, 50% master's degrees and 24% PhDs, mainly from the US, and followed by the UK and Australia.”

“Many entrepreneurs have shared with me that starting a business is very difficult, but when it works, it is really worth it. For these U30 entrepreneurs, creating social value and realizing personal dreams are the primary driving forces for setting out on their own. Few people start businesses for the sake of financial freedom. This shows that while personal wealth is important on the road to successful entrepreneurship, there are still more critical factors at play.”

“The rolemodels the Hurun China Under30s look up to is interesting. Overall, it was Elon Musk, the world’s richest person and a serial entrepreneur. Next up was Lei Jun, who has garnered massive respect for how he has grown his Xiaomi brand, especially with the addition of EVs this past year. Jack Ma was back up to third, with Steve Jobs in fourth place. Duan Yongping, a well-known investor and considered to be a driving force behind brands like Oppo, vivo and Pinduoduo, also made the Hurun China Under30s Top 5 rolemodels for the first time.”

“The NextGen have a unique and important position in the economy. Take Lee Shau Kee of Henderson, one of the four major families in Hong Kong, who has just passed away. His two sons and one daughter have inherited US$20bn and now need to manage and use it well. How to help this NextGen succeed has become a topic of great concern.”

“This is the eighth year of the Hurun Under30s. Over the past eight years, the Hurun U30s has unearthed many outstanding young entrepreneurs, including Wang Xingxing of Unitree Robotics (in 2020), Xu Yi of BiliBili (in 2018), Nie Yunchen of Heytea (in 2017), etc... We are very honored to witness the growth and breakthroughs of these young founders. Take Wang Xingxing, for example, he then became a Hurun U35s in 2023 and one of the youngest Hurun U40s in 2024. Over the past eight years, many of these founders have gone on to great things. More than 20 of them have become high-profile Unicorns, including Heytea, Keep, Kr Space, Water Drop, Hello Inc, MEGVII, Infer Vision, HeyGears, Medlinker, etc.”

“This year’s U30 cohort is the smallest on record, from a maximum of over 300 to just over 100 this year. The main reason for the drop is that startups have found it harder to raise funds, especially compared with the high point of 2021. Another reason is that for the Under30s and each of our Uth series, the cohort size tends always to be bigger in the early years since we have to include many of the young founders accumulated over previous years.”

This is a brief summary of the Chinese-language press release. For the full press release in Chinese, please see www.hurun.net.

By Industry

	Industry	Proportion
1	Software & Services	33%
2	Education	9%
3	Consumer Goods	8%
4	Industrial Equipment	7%
5	Healthcare	6%
6	Entertainment & Media	5%
6	Energy	5%
8	Chemicals	4%
8	Semiconductors	4%
10	F&B	3%
10	Aerospace	3%