Posted by Ben Taylor

For many aspiring entrepreneurs, raising money is the single biggest challenge they’ll face. Sure, they might have the best ideas since the steam engine, the work ethic of Kobe Bryant and the marketing instincts of Steve Jobs, but ask them to close an actual funding round, and they’ll be lucky to secure a $10,000 loan.

It’s this fundraising futility that makes America’s largest funding events all the more astonishing. At FindTheCompany, we partnered with VentureDeal to determine the 25 largest funding events since the turn of the millennium.

In the table below, note the difference between debt (where the company must pay back a loan, with interest) and venture equity (where the investor receives a piece of the company in exchange for putting in money).

The clear fundraiser in chief is Uber Technologies, which closed six of the top 10 funding events since 2000, including the No. 1 spot overall. Founded in March 2009, Uber’s first three years were promising, but its next three were meteoric — a parade of billion-dollar funding events culminating in a $1.6 billion investment from private Goldman Sachs clients.

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