If You Want A Billion-Dollar Startup Idea, Take A Look At This Chart

Alyson Shontell

Dec 13, 2014, 20:14 IST

Pinterest is the new Craigslist. That's what Kevin Ryan, a serial entrepreneur believes.

Ryan co-founded multiple startups, including Gilt Groupe, wedding site Zola, MongoDB and Business Insider.

He's eying new companies to start and turning to Pinterest for ideas. Ryan's statement that Pinterest is the new Craigslist comes from a chart that was made four years ago by by Spark Capital investor Andrew Parker.

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The chart is a screengrab of Craigslist's homepage and it includes valuable startups that attack specific functionalities within Craigslist. For example, job site Indeed was acquired for about $1 billion and it is competitive with Craigslist's Jobs section. Etsy is a $1 billion-plus company that competes with Craigslist's For Sale category.

"Some of [the startups] have IPO'd," Parker says. "Others are out of business. If you could have made investments in all of these companies back in 2010, you'd have a portfolio of 34 companies with roughly 6-8 billion dollar outcomes, which would likely be one of the best venture funds of the decade."

Here's the Craigslist chart:

David Haber

And here's some opportunities Pinterest is presenting. Mobile, photo-heavy companies in the following categories could soon explode, particularly if they're tied to e-commerce.