Meet the 2015 CNBC Disruptor 50 companies

In the third annual Disruptor 50 list, CNBC features private companies in 16 industries—from aerospace to financial services to cybersecurity to retail—whose innovations are revolutionizing the business landscape. These forward-thinking upstarts have identified unexploited niches in the marketplace that have the potential to become billion-dollar businesses, and they rushed to fill them. In the process, they are creating new ecosystems for their products and services. Unseating corporate giants is no easy feat. (Tweet this.) But we ranked those venture capital–backed companies doing the best job. Already it's hard to think of the world without them. Read more about the list ranking and the methodology.

1 Moderna Therapeutics Reprogramming cells to fight disease.
2 SpaceX Elon Musk's mission to Mars.
3 Bloom Energy Live off the grid; keep the lights on.
4 Uber A $50 billion on-demand rid/e.
5 Airbnb The newest idea in room service: Renting one.
6 Dropbox Saving a billion files every day.
7 Palantir Tech Helped find Bin Laden. Don't like to talk about it.
8 TransferWise Getting bankers out of the forex biz.
9 Slack Giving "slacker" a whole new meaning.
10 Warby Parker Taking on the Luxottica eyewear machine.
11 Houzz If you rebuild it ...
12 LISNR Using sound to make waves in the app world.
13 DocuSign Read their lips: No new faxes.
14 SurveyMonkey Questions for everyone.
15 Quirky Crowdsourcing an idea for basement tinkerers.
16 Pure Storage Predicting a flash flood of data.
17 Oscar Health insurance for the Obamacare era.
18 Personal Capital A 360-degree view of your finances.
19 Blippar An augmented reality check for your smartphone.
20 GitHub Cracking the code on collaboration.
21 Synack The white-hat army.
22 GENBAND Disrupting telecom by helping the disrupted.
23 Motif Investing Building theme-based portfolios online.
24 Hampton Creek The egg comes first; no chicken necessary.
25 SoFi Trying to ease the student-debt crisis.
26 ZenPayroll Changing the way we get paid/.
27 MongoDB Solving humongous data problems.
28 Rent the Runway Nice dress. Can I borrow it?
29 Intarcia Therapeutics A better way to treat diabetes.
30 HackerRank Helping nerds get hired.
31 Coinbase The closest thing bitcoin has to a central bank.
32 SugarCRM Building a better Salesforce.
33 Klarna No cart left behind.
34 Wealthfront Silicon Valley's plan to oust wealth managers.
35 Pinterest The world's bulletin board.
36 Betterment Robo-advising for the masses.
37 Dollar Shave Club Disrupting the cutting edge.
38 Optoro On a mission to turn trash into treasure.
39 Hearsay Social Teaching Wall Street to tweet.
40 Square Saying good-bye to "cash only."
41 Twilio A stealth giant tapping into telecom's mobile moment.
42 Impossible Foods Introducing the meatless cheeseless cheeseburger."
43 Birchbox Free samples for a price."
44 Nutanix Breaking companies out of their IT handcuffs.
45 DraftKings Fantasy sports without the real-life commitment.
46 Narrative Science Here come the robo-writers.
47 Spotify The most controversial act in music.
48 Qubole Big-data turnkey service with a smile.
49 Nextdoor A social network for neighborhoods.
50 Snapchat The app for selfie photo lovers.

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