Top Founder-Led Companies That Can Be Safer Long-Term Bets

An updated edition of the September 16, 2025, article.

Founders possess a rare ability to shape and nurture their companies from inception, much like a parent raising a child. With a clear vision and unwavering commitment, they guide their ventures through uncertainty, often taking risks and pursuing unconventional ideas that traditional managers might avoid. Founder-led businesses typically reflect the personal values, ideals, and long-term aspirations of their creators, serving as enduring manifestations of their ambition and innovation. These leaders not only establish the foundation of their enterprises but also embed a sense of purpose and identity that drives sustainable growth.

Despite accounting for less than 5% of the S&P 500 index, founder-run companies exert an outsized influence on the global economy. Visionary entrepreneurs such as Elon Musk, Warren Buffett, Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates have reshaped entire industries and created trillion-dollar corporations that continue to thrive long after their early days. Today, companies like NVIDIA Corporation NVDA, Berkshire Hathaway BRK.B, Amazon, Meta, Tesla, Alphabet and Netflix exemplify the strength of founder-led organizations. Collectively, these companies contribute nearly 15% of the S&P 500’s total market capitalization, with technology firms leading the charge.

Many of these companies originated from groundbreaking ideas and are deeply rooted in technological innovation. Often built from the ground up, they are designed for resilience and long-term sustainability. In their formative years, founders typically face skepticism from investors who may not immediately recognize the potential of their vision, forcing them to rely on personal savings or bootstrap operations. Over time, as their ventures gain traction, external investors step in, though the founder usually continues to bear the greatest risk and hold the largest stake.

However, the same passion that fuels founders can sometimes pose challenges. Reluctant to delegate, many founder-owners assume multiple senior roles out of concern that others may lack their level of commitment or understanding. This hesitation can limit the inflow of professional expertise, potentially hindering scalability or agility. Still, evidence suggests that founder-led companies consistently outperform their peers. A Harvard Business Review study found that such firms achieved a market-adjusted return of 12% over three years, compared with a negative 26% return for companies led by non-founder CEOs—underscoring the long-term advantage of founder-driven leadership.  

Our Founder-Run Companies Screen makes it easy to identify high-potential stocks. Currently, stocks like NVIDIA, Berkshire Hathaway, Palantir Technologies PLTR and Capital One Financial COF look appealing. 

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4 Founder-Run Companies to Add to Your Portfolio

NVIDIA Corporation, with a market cap of $4 trillion, is a worldwide leader in visual computing technologies and the inventor of the graphic processing unit (GPU). Over the years, the company’s focus has evolved from PC graphics to artificial intelligence (AI)- based solutions that now support high-performance computing (HPC), gaming and virtual reality (VR) platforms.

Jensen Huang, CEO and founder, believes accelerated computing and generative AI are transforming the computer industry and every other industry worldwide. NVIDIA has already applied AI to build several multi-billion-dollar verticals in gaming, healthcare, automotive and robotics. Its Hopper 200 and upcoming Blackwell GPUs are designed for training and inference of large language models, recommendation engines and generative AI applications. 

Datacenter presents a solid growth opportunity for the company. As more and more businesses are shifting toward the cloud, the need for datacenters is increasing. To cater to this huge demand, datacenter operators like Amazon, Microsoft and Alphabet are expanding their operations across the world, which is driving demand for GPUs. NVDA currently carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

Berkshire Hathaway, with a market capitalization of $1.1 trillion, is one of the largest property and casualty insurance companies with diverse business activities. Warren Buffett, the Oracle of Omaha, still serves as the chairman and CEO of this conglomerate. 

The company’s insurance operations serve as the cornerstone of its business model and remain a key growth engine. Continued insurance business growth fuels an increase in float, which effectively serves as an interest-free source of capital that can be invested elsewhere. 

Beyond insurance, Berkshire’s diverse portfolio generates steady cash flows and supports resilience against sector-specific volatility. Under the leadership of Warren Buffett, the company adheres to a disciplined, value-oriented investment philosophy focused on acquiring undervalued assets with durable long-term potential. 

This Zacks Rank #2 company has also been actively reshaping its equity portfolio, emphasizing management’s focus on stable, cash-generating assets that support future share buybacks and reinvestment.

Nonetheless, the attention now turns to the company’s future as Greg Abel prepares to step in as CEO on Jan. 1, 2026, with Buffett continuing as executive chairman.

Palantir Technologies, with a market capitalization of $406.2 billion, builds and deploys software platforms for the intelligence community to help in counterterrorism investigations and operations. Alex Karp co-founded Palantir with Peter Thiel, Stephen Cohen and Joe Lonsdale in 2003 and is the executive chairman of the company.

Palantir’s comprehensive AI strategy combines its proprietary Foundry and Gotham platforms with a solid plan to promote AI adoption across both government and commercial sectors. PLTR’s performance stands out in an increasingly crowded AI space, where many companies are still experimenting with pilot deployments. Palantir’s strategy of making AI immediately useful — through production-ready agents and scalable platforms — has created a distinct moat around its commercial and government businesses.

As Palantir aligns its AI strategy with U.S. defense priorities, it is strengthening its position as a key player in the defense sector. Also, PLTR’s modular sales approach allows clients to purchase specific product components instead of committing to the full platform upfront.  This, in turn, has expanded its U.S. commercial customer base.

As AI continues to transform the software landscape, Palantir is one of the few players capitalizing not just on the hype but on the tangible utility of AI, delivering operationalized solutions that clients are eager to adopt. The company raised its full-year 2025 revenue guidance, the midpoint of which, at $4.398 billion, indicates 53% year-over-year growth. It carries a Zacks Rank #2.

Capital One Financial, with a market capitalization of $137.9 billion, is a diversified financial services holding company with banking and non-banking subsidiaries. It has evolved to be one of the largest banks in the United States.  Richard Fairbank co-founded Capital One with Nigel Morris in 1994 and is the executive chairman of the company. It carries a Zacks Rank #1.

The company continues to benefit from its portfolio of attractive businesses, technology transformation, and pipeline of growth opportunities. Its credit-card business remains its core strength.  

Opportunistic buyouts over the years have been driving Capital One's revenues. The acquisition of Discover in May 2025 reshaped the landscape of the credit card space, leading to the formation of a behemoth. Now, the company is well-positioned to capture a bigger share of spending on cards.

Technological innovation has remained the backbone. The company’s investment in data analytics and digital infrastructure has allowed it to drive efficiency. It is now in the thirteenth year of tech transformation. The company noted that as it climbs up the tech stack, the benefits of the transformation are accelerating. The company seems well-positioned in terms of its liquidity profile and earnings strength.

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