GUANGZHOU, April 9 (Xinhua) -- China added 56 new unicorn enterprises in 2023, which means the country added more than one each week during the period, according to the Hurun Global Unicorn Index 2024 released on Tuesday.

The Global Unicorn Index 2024 is a ranking of the world's start-ups founded after 2000 that are worth at least 1 billion U.S. dollars and not yet listed on a public exchange.

There are a total of 1,453 unicorn enterprises in the world, with a total market value of 4.6 trillion U.S. dollars. China alone has 340 unicorn enterprises, ranking second worldwide, while the United States takes first place, with a total of 703. China's unicorn enterprises are mainly in the sectors of artificial intelligence, semiconductors and new energy, said the report.

The report also highlighted Hefei, capital of east China's Anhui Province, as the fastest-growing city in terms of the number of unicorn enterprises in China, followed by other major cities including Guangzhou, Hangzhou and Suzhou.

TikTok's parent company ByteDance retained the title of the world's most valuable unicorn last year, worth some 1.56 trillion yuan (about 220 billion U.S. dollars). Meanwhile, the Shanghai-based Chinese games giant miHoYo shot up 91 places to the world's 12th, with an estimated market value of some 160 billion yuan, according to the report.

（Editor:Fu Bo）