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Top 10 Companies in Dubai 2016

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Dubai, an emirate in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), is a major business hub in the Middle East. Home to such iconic skyscrapers as Burj Khalifa and famous for its skyline, Dubai attracts a lot of world attention for its innovative construction projects such as The World Islands and the Palm Jumeirah. A global city offering unique and unmatched living experiences, Dubai has carved a niche for itself. It has several other rapidly growing industries thriving in its heartland – majority of which fall under real estate and financial services sectors. The top companies in Dubai include brands like Emirates NBD, EMAAR Properties, Dubai Islamic Bank, Damac Properties & Emaar Malls Group along with companies like Emirate Integrated Telecommunications, Mashreq Bank, Commercial Bank of Dubai, Dubai Investments and Emirates Islamic Bank. Here is the list of the top 10 companies in Dubai 2016.


10. Emirates Islamic Bank PJSC

Founded on the 4th October 1975, Emirates Islamic Bank is a public bank, listed on the Dubai Financial Market (DFM).


Image: company website

Listed on the DFM since May 2005, it is a subsidiary of the even larger bank Emirates NBD, which holds 99.89% ownership in the Emirates Islamic Bank (EIB). The bank has its headquarters in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE), and operates through its six subsidiaries. The subsidiaries are Emirates Islamic Financial Brokerage Co LLC (100.00%), EIB Sukuk Company Ltd (100.00%), EI Funding Ltd (100.00%), Al Baraka Bank - Syria (10.00%), First Energy Bank (10.00%), Khaleeji Commercial Bank (8.41%). While its commercial banking products and services are provided in the UAE, EIB also functions across Syria, Bahrain and Cayman Islands.

EIB is active in the Retail, Corporate and Investment, and Treasury segments, offering a host of personal and commercial banking products and services. These include deposits (Current and Savings, Fixed, Investment terms), payment cards (Debit, Credit, Prepaid), financing services (Home, Auto, Personal, Commercial property) to name a few. Project financing, takaful banking, wealth management, payroll handling, money exchange services – you name it. It is to be noted that all its products and services are offered through Islamic financing. Even the financial instruments offered by EIB are in conformity with Islamic Sharia. EIB was recently awarded for its innovative product ‘El trade’ for being the world’s first platform to offer Sharia compliant trade finance. Also, as a recognition of its phenomenal growth story in 2015, EIB was recently termed the ‘Fastest Growing Bank’ at the 2016 Banker Middle East Industry Awards. EIB is known both for its cutting-edge innovative products as well as CSR activities.

PARAMETERS:

Market Capitalization [in AED 000's]: 5934937

Income (AED Million): 2,430.00

Total Profit (AED Million): 640.68


9. Dubai Investments

Dubai Investments came into existence on July 16, 1995 with the vision to provide quality products and services in the financial investments sector.


Image: company website

Listed on the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) on the 20th of March, 2000, Dubai Investments (DI) has grown impressively in the past few years. Boasting of a little less than 20000 shareholders and a paid-up capital of over 4 billion Dirhams (AED), DI finds its place among the top 10 companies in Dubai. With active investments in a multitude of businesses across the three core sectors of manufacturing, real estate, and industrial and financial investments, DI has its presence felt across United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the Middle East.

Ever since its incorporation, DI has tried to stay ahead of the times when it comes to interlinking technology with its products. State of the art technology, innovative business models, unparalleled investment strategies and techniques has helped DI in its quest to stay among the top of the tops. Leveraging on the above mentioned, DI has been able to diversify its investment portfolio across sectors and markets from around the world. Exemplarily judicious use of its capital has made it possible for DI to not only acquire rapidly-growing firms and own about 40 subsidiaries, but also identify and obtain lucrative investment opportunities in a wide range of companies. Its sound judgement has enabled it to recognize businesses with promising growth potential, and partner with them by means of a joint venture. While First Energy Bank, Takaful Re Limited, Emirates District Cooling (EMICOOL) are some of its notable strategic investments, Dubai Investment Park, Dubai Investments Industries are some of its well-known subsidiaries. DI’s sound business model and able leadership has helped it stay afloat even in times of economic turbulence.

PARAMETERS:

Market Capitalization [in AED 000's]: 8180073

Income (AED Million): 2,671.66

Total Profit (AED Million): 1,109.84


8. Commercial Bank of Dubai

Commercial Bank of Dubai (CBD) is a publically listed bank in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), offering consumer, corporate banking and financial services.


Image: company website

With a paid-up capital of over 2.8 billion Dirhams (AED), CBD is the 35th largest bank in the Gulf area (as per Gulf Business reports). Founded on the 3rd of July 1969 by the Amiri Decree of the then Emir of UAE, H.H Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum, CBD had started off as a joint venture of three banks – Commercial Bank of Kuwait, Chase Manhattan Bank and Commerzbank. Gradually progressing into a public shareholding firm, CBD had itself listed on the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) on April 1, 2003.

Other than Retail banking, CBD also offers products and services in the wealth management, foreign exchange and insurance sectors. Small and Medium Enterprise financing is another area CBD is venturing into. Needless to say, Islamic Banking and Sharia compliant banking are also the key focus areas of CBD. Under the able leadership of the Chairman, Saeed Ahmed Ghobash and the Chief Executive Officer, Peter Baltussen, CBD has been reporting annual profits to the tunes of billions of Dirhams (AED) for the last two years. Even in terms of Market Capitalization, CBD is third only to Emirates NBD and Dubai Islamic Bank among the companies listed on DFM in the Banks sector. At the back of its sound capitalisation, adequate liquidity, consistent profitability, apt capital adequacy ratio, CBD enjoys a stable outlook in terms of its credit ratings as per the leading credit rating agencies. As of August 2015, both Capital Intelligence and Fitch ratings have rated CBD at A-, testifying its performance and growth prospects.

PARAMETERS:

Market Capitalization [in AED 000's]: 17657224

Income (AED Million): 2,352.24

Total Profit (AED Million): 1,066.23


7. Mashreq Bank

Headquartered in Dubai, Mashreq Bank, formerly known as the Bank of Oman (the name change happened in 1993), boasts of several firsts attributed to its name.


Image: company website

Coming into existence on Jan 1, 1967, Mashreq (Arabic for Oriental Bank) is the oldest privately held bank setup in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). It was the first UAE bank to come up with ATMs, the first to launch consumer loan services, and also the first to initiate payment cards such as credit and debit cards. Its innovative products and extensively technology-led services fetched it the first ever Dubai Quality Award. With 45 domestic branches and 20 branches outside of UAE, which are spread across 9 countries, Mashreq offers its customers products and services in the retail, investment and asset management arenas. Outside of UAE, Mashreq’s presence is strongly felt in Bahrain, Kuwait, Egypt and Qatar.

Mashreq has had a dream run since its inception – with the achievement of a spotless profitable growth story for the last 46 years. It has strived continuously to deliver in its diverse business areas – chiefly, corporate and investment banking, retail banking, treasury and capital markets, international banking, as well as Islamic banking. A paid-up capital of 1.77 billion Dirhams (AED) to boot, Mashreq was listed on the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) on the 1st of April, 2000. In terms of market capitalization, it ranks at 4th, after Emirates NBD, Dubai Islamic Bank and Commercial Bank of Dubai. A four-time winner of ‘Best Regional Retail Bank’, Mashreq also bagged the ‘Best Banking Innovation’ and the ‘Best Real Estate Finance’ awards at the Banker Middle East Industry Awards 2016. With a vision to create a better future for the underprivileged, Mashreq added another feather in its cap with its brainchild online charity account ‘AHSEN’ – a first of its kind in UAE.

PARAMETERS:

Market Capitalization [in AED 000's]: 14557526

Income (AED Million): 5,978.00

Total Profit (AED Million): 2,402.11


6. Emirate Integrated Telecommunications Company

Emirate Integrated Telecommunications Company (EITC) is a telecom operator in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).


Image: company website

While EITC is the legal name, the company was rebranded to Du in February 2007, and established in December 2005, EITC started off operations in 2006. Catering to both people and businesses – small or large, private or Government, EITC offers mobile as well as fixed telephone services, broadband connectivity and IPTV services. For broadcasters, EITC also provides satellite services. Crowned as the Best Mobile Broadband Network in the Middle East and Africa region in 2012 in ARC Chart’s survey, EITC boasts of close to 50% market share in the mobile consumer segment in UAE. EITC’s dedication to providing quality service to its customers, pursuing fair business practices, as well as depicting its commitment to corporate social responsibility are also certified by the various awards and distinctions it has received in the near past. Notably, these include the first place in Standard and Poor’s Hawkamah Pan Arab Environment, Social and Corporate Government Index, Best Investor Relations by CFO for Middle East by the Middle East Investor Relations Society.

Listed on the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) on the April 22nd, 2005, EITC has amassed a paid-up capital of over 4.5 billion Dirhams (AED). Its yearly net profits for the last two years have been to the tunes of 2 billion AED. Attracting talent from over 60 countries, EITC boasts of a rich cultural diversity at workplace, and is often a sought after place to work for. EITC also supports knowledge empowerment by its initiatives such as Masar Sponsorship programmes and du scholarships for Emirati students. Epitomizing its vision “To enhance your life, anytime, anywhere”, EITC is indeed living up to it and revolutionizing the way Emirati citizens are getting connected.

PARAMETERS:

Market Capitalization [in AED 000's]: 23314288

Income (AED Million): 12,340.00

Total Profit (AED Million): 1,941.35


5. Emaar Malls Group

A subsidiary of EMAAR Properties, Emaar Malls Group is a major shopping malls and retail centres development and management firm based out of Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE).


Image: company website

Established on December 28th, 2005, Emaar Malls Group is second only to its own parent company EMAAR Properties with respect to Market capitalization among all the companies operating in the Real Estate and Construction Sector and listed on the Dubai Financial Market (DFM). Listed on the DFM on October 2nd 2014, Emaar Malls Group has a massive paid-up capital of over 13 billion Dirhams (AED). The company has majority of its operations in four segments of shopping malls and retail centre construction and management - Regional Malls, Super-Regional Malls, Specialty Retail, and Community Integrated Retail.

The front runner of Emaar Malls Group’s construction business is the world famous Dubai Mall. The Dubai Mall is not only the world’s largest shopping mall by area (1,124,000 sq. mts.), it is also the world’s most visited shopping, entertainment and leisure destination by footfall. The company also has several other impressive names to its credit – notably the Souk Al Bahar, which is a dining and entertainment place designed in Arabesque style; the Dubai Marina Mall, which caters to the lifestyle shoppers in the Dubai Marina community; and also the Gold and Diamond Park, which caters solely to the gold and jewellery enthusiasts. Understandably, Emaar Malls Group boasts of an impressive 5.8 million sq. ft. of leasable area. Achieving a staggering 96% occupancy rate in its shopping malls and retail centres, Emaar Malls Group also has several awards in its kitty - Best Hotel Chain the Middle East’, ‘Best Individual Hotel in the World’ for The Address in Downtown Dubai to name a few, as a recognition for its operational standards and excellence.

PARAMETERS:

Market Capitalization [in AED 000's]: 35919468

Income (AED Million): 2,992.00

Total Profit (AED Million): 1,656.30


4. Damac Properties Dubai Co.

Damac Properties Dubai Co. is a Dubai based firm into property development with its operations majorly in the luxury real estate segment.


Image: fcprop

Damac Properties was founded in 2002 and has since been on its mission to provide unparalleled living experience. While starting off majorly in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE), Damac Properties now has its projects in the GCC counties, the Middle East, and even in the United Kingdom. Ranging from high rise luxury apartments to mammoth golf course communities to operating and managing five star hotels and serviced apartments, Damac Properties has several credible and incredible projects to its name.

Listed on the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) on January 12 2015, Damac Properties is next only to EMAAR Properties and Emaar Malls Group in terms of Market Capitalization in the Real Estate and Construction Sector on the DFM. With a paid-up capital of over 6 billion Dirhams (AED), Damac Properties has delivered over 15800 units, and has another 44000 units in progress. The company also has the distinction of being the first real estate company from Dubai to be listed on the London Stock Exchange, when it did so on the 4th of November 2013. For its limited edition and world class luxury apartments, the company has partnerships with various global brands. For its exclusive limited edition villas in Akoya Oxygen, its flagship construction project, the company is partnering with Bugatti, and the interiors of its Aykon Nine Elms in London has been done by Versace Home. While it roped in Tiger Woods for designing the Trump World Golf Club at Akoya Oxygen, it also signed up with the fashion brand Fendi for projects in Saudi Arabia and Dubai.

PARAMETERS:

Market Capitalization [in AED 000's]: 14036000

Income (AED Million): 8,536.06

Total Profit (AED Million): 4,514.83


3. Dubai Islamic Bank

Dubai Islamic Bank came into existence on 12th March 1975 and is one of the leading companies in UAE.


Image: company website

It is a public joint stock company that offers banking and insurance products and is based in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE). Dubai Islamic Bank (DIB) is an Islamic Bank, which means that all its banking activities follow the Sharia (Islamic laws), that is to say, it follows Sharia compliant finance. DIB in fact holds the distinction of being the first bank in UAE to start practicing all Islam principles and laws in its banking operations. With more than 60 branches in UAE itself, DIB currently holds the first position when it comes to being the largest Islamic bank in UAE. In terms of Market Capitalization, DIB is second only to Emirates NBD when comparing among all the banking sector companies listed on the Dubai Financial Market (DFM). DIB was listed on the DFM on March 26, 2000.

Owing to its success in UAE, DIB has also established its branches and partnerships internationally. Its wholly owned subsidiary DIB Pakistan Limited (DIBPL) started its operations in Pakistan in 2006. DIB Pakistan, like its parent company is into Islamic Banking, and has grown to 175 branches in over 60 cities in Pakistan. With offices in Turkey as well as clinching a banking license in Jordan, DIB has been expanding its network like never before. DIB currently has a paid-up capital of 3.9 billion Dirhams (AED). With its customer-centric approach in doing business, DIB is not foreign to awards and recognition. It has received the Best Retail Bank, Best Corporate Bank, Best Commercial Bank, Best Islamic Bank, Best Sukuk Arranger, and Best Car Finance among a flurry of other awards.

PARAMETERS:

Market Capitalization [in AED 000's]: 24434181

Income (AED Million): 7,546.00

Total Profit (AED Million): 3,839.00


2. EMAAR Properties

Founded on 23rd July, 1997, EMAAR Properties needs no introduction in the world of real estate.


Image: Wikimedia

It is undoubtedly among the leaders in the real estate and construction sector companies in United Arab Emirates (UAE). The fact that EMAAR Properties is among the leaders is exemplified by its flagship construction – the mighty Burj Khalifa, which is the tallest building in the world. Headquartered in Dubai, EMAAR Properties is a public joint stock firm, and was listed on the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) on March 26th 2000. It was actually the first real estate company in UAE to offer its shares to overseas citizens. It has a paid-up capital of over 7 billion Dirhams (AED), and also ranks first in terms of Market Capitalization among all the real estate companies listed on the DFM. Its subsidiary EMAAR Malls Group is also a leading real estate company, specializing in shopping malls and retail centres development and management.

Other than the iconic Burj Khalifa, EMAAR properties also has diversified interests in other real estate segments such as commercial and residential property construction, and also shopping malls and hospitality. The company has expanded its operations internationally, and with its premier construction and management services, has its presence felt in 36 markets across Middle East, Europe, North Africa, Asia and North America. Among its notable construction projects outside UAE is Hyderabad International Convention Centre (HICC) in Hyderabad, India and the development of 2010 Commonwealth Games Village in Delhi, India, which was constructed by its joint venture with MGF India. On an expedition to beat its own record, EMAAR Properties now wants to construct a building taller than its own Burj Khalifa, and plans to complete it by 2020.

PARAMETERS:

Market Capitalization [in AED 000's]: 40738915

Income (AED Million): 13661

Total Profit (AED Million): 4,082.17


1. Emirates NBD

Coming into existence on the 16th of October, 2007, Emirates NBD was formed as a result of the merger between two strong players in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) banking sector.


Image: company website

To leverage on their core competencies and competitive advantages, the merger of National Bank of Dubai (NBD) and Emirates Bank International (EBI), which were the then fourth and the second largest banks in UAE, gave rise to what is today known as Emirates NBD. The merger has since then become a benchmark. It led to the formation of an industry leader – one specializing in retail, corporate, private, Islamic and investment banking across the geography. Listed on the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) on the 16th of October, 2007, Emirates NBD is currently one of the largest banks in the Middle East in terms of the assets it possesses. It also tops the charts when it comes to rankings based on Market Capitalization in the banks sector, or in fact even across the sectors among the companies listed on the DFM. It has a paid-up capital of over 5.5 billion Dirhams (AED).

Apart from UAE and Middle East (Egypt and Saudi Arabia), the company also operates in UK and Singapore, and has opened its representative offices in India, Indonesia and China to help entities from these countries get access to Dubai’s financial markets. While Emirates NBD’s performance, customer satisfaction and business growth need no certification, it has received a horde of awards testifying its position – Euromoney awards for Excellence, Best Mobile Payment of the year (by Asian Bankers) and also grabbing most of the awards at Banker Middle East Industry 2016. Emirates NBD has also tried to give back to the society with its CSR activities in areas of education, charity, sports and art, proving its dedication to the economic and social welfare of the society.

PARAMETERS:

Market Capitalization [in AED 000's]: 41127535

Income (AED Million): 15,228.00

Total Profit (AED Million): 7,123.03

 

Ranking Methodology:

The top 15 companies in Dubai were selected and three parameters were chosen. Market Cap was given 0.4, Income was given 0.25 and Profit was given 0.35 weightages. Based on this a final score was calculated and the rank wise list was formed


Top 10 Telecom Companies in USA 2016

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Telecom companies have revolutionized the world and ever since the penetration of smartphones, the impact of telecom companies have increased manifold. In US, telecom services provide calling, data plans, broadband and much more to customers. The top telecom companies in USA include brands like AT&T, Verizon Communications, Comcast, T- Mobile & Sprint, along with companies like DirecTV, Time Warner Cable, DISH Network, Cox Communications and CenturyLink. Here is the list of the top 10 telecom companies in USA 2016.


10. Charter Communications

This American cable telecommunications company was founded in 1993 and is headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut, United States.


Image: company website

The company is the 2nd largest cable operator in terms of number of subscribers in the United States and 10th largest telephone provider on the basis of residential subscriber lines. The company has its key markets in South, Midwest, Southwest and west, and the company serves 19 million broadband customers. It also serves 17 million video subscribers, for it provides a full range of services to both business and residential subscribers including high-speed Internet, cable TV, Voice over IP telephone, and other entertainment packages in addition to its Charter Business unit providing data networking, Internet access, wireless and phone backhaul services to about 500,000 clients commercially. The company has around 300 service support and call-handling offices across the US. But it is important to note that Video is the biggest revenue generating segment of all around 50%, followed by Internet, and then Commercial and Voice with Advertising etc.

The company had a revenue of $9.75 billion in the financial year ending 2015. Charter Communications recently acquired Time Warner Cable, previously a strong competitor in the telecommunications market, and Bright House Networks for a sum total of $70 billion in 2016. This deal expanded the reach of the company, which has then taken the recent name Charter Spectrum.

The company consistently focuses on the strategy of providing services as a complete package like most of its competitors that includes providing Internet access, voice, and other related data services. In the recent years the company has noticed rises in Internet, telephone and enterprise subscribers count, though video subscribers have declined in both commercial and residential customers and also has realized that its network and services requires further substantial investment in the highly competitive environment.

Revenue (in $ billions): 17.9

No. of subscribers (in millions): 6.2


9. CenturyLink

Having its presence currently in 37 states of the United States, CenturyLink is headquartered in Monroe, Louisiana, United States and was founded in the year 1968.


Image: company website

In terms of number of lines served, this company is one of the largest in the USA close to AT&T and Verizon. CenturyLink provides data and network systems management, IT consulting and Big Data analytics in more than 55 data centers in Europe, North America, and Asia and primarily provides voice, data, broadband, video and other services. The company had comprehensive service portfolio, high bandwidth infrastructure and remarkable customer support to meet the demands of the customers. With a subscriber base of around 6 million, CenturyLink continuously focuses on higher subscriber retention and lower churn rates considering the extremely competitive telecommunications market that requires the companies to be highly capital-intensive and hence has turned out to be one of the reliable and largest service providers in the country.

The company aims to maximize the total number of business subscribers by their fiber network by designing and strongly engineering their fiber-to-tower builds, thereby creating additional revenue growth opportunities.

The company had a revenue of $17.9 billion in the financial year ending 2015. Frost & Sullivan honored CenturyLink with an award by title Company of the Year for the Cloud Industry in North America and also awards for excellence in data center services and related infrastructure.

As an integrated provider of global network, cloud solutions and data hosting, the company serves more than 6 million broadband customers and offer entertainment services under CenturyLink Prism TV and DirecTV brands. Recently the company acquired 2 companies Orchestrate and netAura LLC, to specialize more in engineering and consulting database and security technologies.

Revenue (in $ billions): 18

No. of subscribers (in millions): 6.2


8. Cox Communications

This private subsidiary of Cox Enterprises, founded in 1962 and headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, United States is a leading in the industry.


Image: flickr/photos/jeepersmedia

It provides telecommunication, digital cable television, and Home Automation services in United States and is one of the largest cable television provider and telephone carrier in the United States. Cox Communications offers voice, data, video solutions for commercial customers and national and local cable spot and new media advertising. It serves the education, healthcare, hospitality industries. It provides voice and data communication services to businesses (Cox Business) in addition to local and national advertising services (Cox Media). Cox Enterprises consists of Cox Communications (broadband & cable), Cox Automotive and Cox Media Group (newspapers, radio and TV stations).

This telecommunications company, having its presence in the central, southwest, southeast, and northeast regions of the US thereby covering about 20 states, attributes to providing fundamental cable services to more than 6 million subscribers, with 3 million subscribers mainly for digital cables and 3.5 million for Internet access, and thereby making it one the largest US cable companies in market providing services to more than 260,000 regional and small scale businesses. The company continues to expand its services and other products such as ConnectedHome and gigabit-speed Internet.

The company had a revenue of $18 billion in the financial year ending 2015. As part of its corporate social responsibility, Cox Communications tied up with the U.S. Dept of Housing and Urban Development, and announced plans to provide broadband Internet service with discounts to low-income families in 18 states of the U.S.

Revenue (in $ billions): 15.1

No. of subscribers (in millions): 13.9


7. DISH Network

This company was founded in 1980 and headquartered in Meridian, Colorado, United States.


Image: Wikimedia

It offers pay-TV services under the brand name of DISH and Sling, now collectively named as Pay-TV services and owns varied range of wireless spectrum licenses plus associated assets. The DISH brand uses direct broadcast satellite (DBS) in addition to Fixed Satellite Service (FSS) spectrum, with its leased and owned satellites, and other broadcasting devices and operations. Sling brand services consist of linear and live streaming Internet-based over-the-top (OTT) domestic and international video programming services.

The company made a total revenue of $15.07 billion in the financial year ending 2015. The company was featured in Fortune Magazine for the year 2015 for being the World’s Most Admired Company and also featured in Fast Company in the same year for taking the place in the Top 10 World’s Most Innovative Companies 2015 in the Video segment.

It is the second largest provider of satellite based pay-TV in the United States, behind AT&T-owned DIRECTV. Offering about 3,100 local channels in addition to standard definition channels in the whole US market and HD channels in 190 of 210 national markets, it provides services to 13.9 million TV and 628,000 broadband consumers. DISH Network carries around 250 channels that is broadcasted in 28 languages other than English.

DISH Network offers broadband Internet services delivered by satellite and targets rural areas with relatively less wired broadband connections. With an employee base of around 18000, the company consistently provides intermittent service with quality professionals for both its satellite TV service, that is offered nationally, and its voice and Internet services that are present in the states of Arizona, Dakotas, Colorado, Oregon, New Mexico, and Washington.

Revenue (in $ billions): 23.7

No. of subscribers (in millions): 15.9


6. Time Warner Cable

This Manhattan, New York, United States based cable Telecommunications Company is the second largest in the United States behind Comcast Corporation on the basis of revenue.


Image: Wikimedia

Founded in 1973, the company, in addition to its provision of cable communications, also offers security and home management services as part of its residential services and, transport and networking services, cloud-enabled hosting, enterprise-class, managed applications as part of its business services. The company also sells online and video advertising inventory to a wide range of local, national and regional customers. Time Warner Cable is one of the largest providers of high-speed data, voice, and video services in the United States, with well-clustered and technologically advanced cable systems that are located primarily in five main geographic areas – New York State, Carolinas, Texas, Midwest and Southern California.

Serving around 16 million customers as of 2015 and operating in 29 states in the United states, the company has a strong focus to improve customer experience and to expand its network every year and has recorded a remarkable 618,000 new additions for the year 2015 with voice and high speed data additions being the maximum of about 1,000,000 overall. 

The company made a total revenue of $23.7 billion in the financial year ending 2015 with a revenue growth of 3.9% for the given year which was the highest for a term of around 5 years mainly accelerated due to growth in both its Residential and Business Services.

Revenue (in $ billions): 34.82

No. of subscribers (in millions): 20.7


5. Sprint Corporation

Part of one of the oldest telecommunication companies in the United states, Sprint Corporation traced its foundation origin in 1899 and headquartered in Kansas, United States.


Image: Wikimedia

As one of the largest wireless network service provider in the United States behind AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile, the company offers voice, wireless, broadband and messaging services through its divisional subsidiaries under the brands Boost Mobile, Assurance Wireless and Virgin Mobiles. In 2013, Japan based Softbank acquired 80% of Sprint and the name of the company changed from Sprint Nextel to Sprint Communications. With a subscriber base of 57 million, the company operates in two segments primarily: Wireless and Wireless equipment in all 50 US states, Puerto Rico, and US Virgin Islands. Wireless mainly includes wholesale, retail, and affiliate revenue from voice, wireless and data transmission services, that majorly accounted for more than 75% of revenue in 2015 and the rest from wireless equipment, which includes devices and accessories related to wireless communication.

2015 has been extremely profitable and remarkable for the company over years till date. The company generated a positive operating income in 2015 for the first time in 9 years and made a total revenue of $34.5 billion in the financial year ending 2015. In addition postpaid net additions were the highest in last 3 years increasing by 2 million each year.

Faced with severe competition from its lead competitors AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon and other regional players, Sprint has rigorous partnering plans with many companies to cut operational costs and also increase liquidity. Sprint derives its revenue mainly as a wireline IP network operator and also as a telephony provider with long distance and hence the fourth largest long distance provider by United states subscribers.

Revenue (in $ billions): 34.53

No. of subscribers (in millions): 57.9


4. T-Mobile USA

T-Mobile US, Inc., part of the German telecommunications holding company T-Mobile International AG, was founded in 1994 and is headquartered in Bellevue, Washington.


Image: Wikimedia

This company is the third largest wireless carrier in the United States in terms of its subscriber base and is one of the most widely recognized brands. T-Mobile US provides voice, data, wireless and messaging services and operates in the United States, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. The company functions is the following three brands: T-Mobile, GoSmart Mobile and MetroPCS. With MetroPCS, the 6th largest carrier in the United States, being a huge contributor for achieving 21% growth in its subscriber base, T-Mobile has become the America’s leading facilities-based prepaid brand thereby delivering strong financial performance and also creating more shareholder value.

With an employee base of 50000, the company has consistently focused on improved customer service, collection rates, faster network performance, network optimization and improved customer roaming services through its un-carrier proposition that aims at reducing complexities in its communication modes and thereby provide its customers with the fastest LTE services nationwide. The company was also ranked first by JD Power as the highest in customer service performance among all the full service Wireless Providers.

This America’s fastest growing wireless company, holds a subscriber base of 63 million customers wherein 8.3 million total customers added in last year alone. It is essential to note that in last year’s postpaid growth, 3.5 million branded postpaid mobile customers were added for T-Mobile only thereby capturing a huge chunk of the overall industry’s postpaid phone growth in the year 2015.

The company has doubled its 4G LTE networks in 2015 alone and hence made it to an 8.4% increase in revenue thereby making it a $32.1 billion company in the financial year 2015.

Revenue (in $ billions): 32.1

No. of subscribers (in millions): 63.28


3. Comcast Corporation

This multinational cable and mass media company founded in the year 1963 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.


Image: flickr-photos/jeepersmedia/

It is the largest cable television and broadcasting company in the world in terms of total revenue. It has evolved from a regular cable operator service provider to an established communication and media company in its five-decade presence in the US Media and telecommunication industry. Comcast provides video, phone, high speed Internet and broadband services to general public and business customers in the United States.

This company was ranked 35th in Forbes 2000 Global Ranking 2016 of World’s Biggest company in terms of Revenue, Market value, Assets and Profits and 37th in Fortune 500 Ranking 2016 based on Revenue. The company had a revenue of $74.5 billion in the financial year ending 2015.

With an employee base of around 153000, Comcast has currently 17 million internet customers, 23 million cable customers, and 8 million mobile customers, which in sum provides to a nationwide market share of around 30 percent.

Comcast associates itself to the digital world with its Division Interactive Media which focuses on the development of interactive media exclusively and is currently Comcast.net (Xfinity), which supplies its users with information and web services.

The company operates in five segments: Cable Communications and Networks, Filmed Entertainment, Broadcast Television and Theme Parks. Cable Communications segment provides voice, video, high-speed Internet services to business and residential customers; Cable Networks segment provides national and international cable television networks, and related digital media properties; Broadcast Television segment provides broadcasting network services; Filmed Entertainment segment deals with filmed entertainment and stage plays worldwide; Theme Parks segment that provides for universal theme parks in Hollywood and Orlando.

Revenue (in $ billions): 74.51

No. of subscribers (in millions): 26.77


2. Verizon Communications

Verizon, previously Bell Atlantic Corporation, was founded in the year 1983 and is headquartered in New York, the United States.


Image: Wikimedia

It is one of the largest in provision of wireless communications services in the country and consistently the largest in terms of number of subscribers for it provides to 98% of the USA wireless network coverage and serves 99% of the Fortune 1000 customers. The company had a revenue of $131.6 billion in the financial year ending 2015. With a subscriber base of around 140 million, Verizon continuously focuses on higher subscriber retention and lower churn rates considering the extremely competitive telecommunications market that requires the companies to be highly capital-intensive and hence has turned out to be the nation’s most reliable and largest 4G LTE network presently.

With an employee base of around 173300, Verizon Communications' operations are segmented into four business units: Wireless services, Enterprise services, Residential and small business services, and Partner programs. Wireless services deals with mobile phone, data services and text messages; Enterprise services deals with providing services for wholesale, government and corporate clients; Residential and small business services involving wireline phone service, Internet access, and television service provision to residences and small businesses; Partner programs for different divisions of the group.

The company holds a strong corporate social responsibility program for nearly $9.6 million was donated by employees to schools and nonprofits, and also provided opportunities and technology access to more than 100,000 students in all the 50 states.

Revenue (in $ billions): 131.6

No. of subscribers (in millions): 140.1


1. AT&T

AT&T was founded in the year 1983 and headquartered in Dallas, Texas.


Image: flickr-photos/jeepersmedia/

AT&T, American Telephone and Telegraph Company, is the largest multinational telecommunications provider in the world followed by Verizon and China Mobile in terms of revenue. This company is one of the largest mobile and fixed line telephone provider in addition to broadband subscription television services through Wi-Fi, wireless LTE, satellite, and fiber optics and IP networks. With an employee base of around 280000, this North American Service provider is the largest in Dallas and third largest in Texas. It was ranked 12th in Forbes 2000 Global Ranking of World’s Biggest company 2016, in terms of Revenue, Market value, Assets and Profits and 10th in Fortune 500 Ranking based on Revenue in 2016.

AT&T is the most preferred 3G services provider in more than 170 countries in addition to being voice and roaming services provider in more than 220 countries and has a subscriber base of around 129 million.

The company had a remarkable revenue of $146.8 billion in the financial year ending 2015, with an 11.2% increase over the previous, mainly due to the acquisition of DIRECTV, the California based leading digital television entertainment service provider in both United States and Latin America, in addition to their new wireless operations in Mexico and other gains.

The company operates in the four segments as follows: Business Solutions, Entertainment Group, Consumer Mobility and International Services. The Business Solutions segment deals with wireless services to general public, government and other businesses; Video, voice and Internet services by the Entertainment Group segment; The Consumer Mobility segment providing data, voice, roaming and wireless services. The International segment includes provision of both video and wireless data services internationally.

Revenue (in $ billions): 146.8

No. of subscribers (in millions): 128.64

 

Ranking Methodology:

The top 15 telecommunication companies in USA are considered for this and parameters like revenue, subscribers and ARPU are considered and given weights of 0.5, 0.3 and 0.2 respectively. After calculating the final score, the rank wise list is created.

Top 10 Chocolate Brands in the World 2016

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Chocolate is a comfort food that everyone loves to eat be it dark, white or milk chocolate. Chocolate is a mood-enhancer for a lot of people and romance-inducer for some. The top chocolates brands include Cadbury, Kinder, Hershey's, Snickers & Galaxy, and others like KitKat, Reese's, Ferrero Rocher, Lindt and Mars. Here is the list of the top 10 chocolate brands in the world 2016.


10. MARS

The chocolate that ranks tenth in our list of Top 10 Chocolate brands of the world is MARS.


Image: flickr-photos/torbenh/

MARS is a British chocolate bar brand owned by MARS Inc., and was first manufactured in 1932, and is one of the leading chocolate brands worldwide. Mars, which was modelled after American Milky Way chocolate, is a delicious fusion of rich ingredients such as honey, nougat and caramel covered in milk chocolate. It comes in various sizes - king-size double bar also known as Mars Duo (85 g); the regular size single bar (58 g); miniature bars (sold in multiple packs) called Snack Time (36.5 g) and Fun Size (19.7 g). MARS is also an official sponsor of England national Football team and the Original MARS bar was customised and sold in Believe packaging in the UK from April 2006 until the end of the FIFA World Cup 2006 in July. MARS comes up with the tagline MARS a day helps you Work, Rest and Play. MARS was the first ever chocolate company to reduce the saturated fats in its bars to 8.3g per 100g, 45% less than the average of the top 25 chocolate brands.

MARS belongs to the company MARS Inc. which in total features 29 brands, including 5 billion-dollar global brands such as M&M’S, SNICKERS, DOVE/GALAXY, MARS/MILKY WAY and TWIX and many other world-class brands such as 3 Musketeers, Bounty, Wrigley’s, Skittles, and Orbit etc.

Approximately Three million MARS bars a day are produced at the UK plant in Slough. The delicious taste along with its beautiful packing makes it one of the top chocolate brands in the world with sales of approximately over a billion US$.

Revenues (US$ Bn)= 1.058


9. Lindt

The chocolate that ranks ninth in our list of Top 10 Chocolate brands of the world is Lindt.


Image: flickr-photos/mamchenkov/

The Chocolatiers from LINDT are real masters of their craft and are always striving to offer you a chocolate that gives a real treat to your palate. LINDT chocolate bar comes from a company - Lindt & Sprüngli AG, commonly known as Lindt, a Swiss confectioner and chocolatier. It takes care of each and every ingredients to make its desserts one in a lifetime, by deeply combining milk and granulated ingredient with some typical fruity flavors. Since 1845 LINDT Chocolatiers have been creating the ultimate LINDT chocolate delights driven by their dedication, passion, and innovative spirit.

Lindt has an assorted list of chocolates such as Lindor, Gold Bunny (Seasonal Confectionary), and creation range of chocolate-filled cubes: Dark Milk Mousse, Milk Mousse, Chocolate Mousse, White Milk Mousse, Orange Mousse and Cherry/Chili. The various flavors by Lindor are Extra Dark Chocolate, Dark peppermint, Hazelnut, Cinnamon, White chocolate, Stracciatella, Peanut Butter, Lemon, Strawberry and cream, Mint, Sea salt and Caramel etc. Careful selection, in-house processing, and blending of high quality beans from the world’s well-known destinations brings in the incomparable taste of LINDT. The Chocolatiers then roast the beans for perfect flavor and grind them extremely fine. This Lindt Excellence offers chocolate lovers a unique and sophisticated experience for the ultimate chocolate pleasure.

Lindt has also recently opened 8 chocolate cafes in Australia, 4 in Melbourne and Sydney each. These cafes sell handmade chocolates, macaroons, cakes, and ice cream.

Revenues (US$ Bn)= 1.29


8. Ferrero Rocher

The chocolate that ranks eighth in our list of Top 10 Chocolate brands of the world is Ferrero Rocher.


Image: pixabay

Ferrero Rocher was introduced in 1982 and it consists of a roasted hazelnut enclosed in a thin wafer shell filled with hazelnut chocolate and covered in milk chocolate and ground hazelnut. The brand’s focus on quality, its beautiful packaging of golden wrapper and generous amounts of hazelnut has made Ferrero Rocher one of the most loved and appreciated chocolate all over the world. Some 24 million Ferrero Rocher chocolates are made daily. Almost 6000 inhabitants of Alba are employed in the 340,000 sq. mts plant but only 64 people work on the main Ferrero Rocher line at a single point of time, most of which are in quality control. The manufacturing process is a closely guarded secret and involves high-tech machinery to ensure quality. Sales of last 3 months of the year amount to nearly two-thirds (61%) of annual sales of Ferrero Rocher. Ferrero Rocher is associated with New Year and Christmas and in some countries Rocher is marketed only during winter. Traditionally, Ferrero Rocher has become a chocolate highly consumed during Christmas. Ferrero Rocher is made by the Ferrero group, which is a world renowned Italian company and the third largest chocolate producer in the world. It makes famous chocolates and other confectionary like Raffaello, Mon Chéri, Nutella, Tic-Tac and Kinder. Ferrero Rocher contributed $1.41 billion to the group’s revenues and is a major growth driver.

Ferrero Rocher is a brand in itself and is no wonder that it features in Top 10 chocolate brands of the world year after year.

Revenues (US$ Bn)= 1.411


7. Reese's

The chocolate that ranks seventh in our list of Top 10 Chocolate brands of the world is Reese’s.


Image: flickr-photos/theimpulsivebuy/

Reese's Peanut Butter Cups are a milk chocolate cup made of chocolate-coated peanut butter, and these are some of the most popular chocolate brands and snacks loved by children across the world. This was originally created by HB Reese (Founder of The Harry Burnett Reese Candy Co.) in 1928. Reese was encouraged by Hershey and started his own business. Reese’s other products include 100 Calorie Peanut Butter Wafer Bar, Chips Ahoy With Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, Reese's Bar - a chocolate bar with chocolate squares with a peanut butter filling, Reese's Brownies, Reese's Crunchy Cookie Cups, Reese's Cookies, Reese's Crèmes, Reese's Crispy Crunchy Bar, Reese's Fast Break, Reese's Mini's, Reese's No Bake Bars, Reese's NutRageous etc.

Reese’s is the most popular candy in America over the last decade and has had the highest market share in U.S in the candy world in the last decade. Reese’s Peanut butter cup is the most favourite confection in the U.S and Reese’s success can be attributed to its successful ad campaigns, large number of offerings and strong backing of the parent company. These peanut butter cups were also called Penny cups as they were sold for a penny. Hershey’s acquired Reese’s company for $23.5mn. in 1963. Every year May 18th is observed as I love Reese’s day.

Reese’s produces so many peanut butter cups every year that it could feed one cup to each person in the USA, Australia, Europe, Japan, Africa, China, and India with its annual production.

Revenues (US$ Bn)= 1.529


6. KitKat

The chocolate that ranks sixth in our list of Top 10 Chocolate brands of the world is KitKat.


Image: company website

KitKat is a chocolate covered wafer biscuit confectionary created by Rowntree’s of York, England in the 1935 and was subsequently acquired by the Swiss FMCG giant Nestle. The license to sell in the United States is with The Hershey Company and it is marketed in the rest of the world by Nestle, and is one of the most popular brands. The standard bars consists of two or four fingers of three layers chocolate filled wafers and covered with a layer of chocolate with the bars are designed in such a way that they could be snapped into individual fingers. It was envisaged as a tea time snack and has been promoted over the years to perfectly depict this message. This is best signified by its tagline “the best companion to a cup of tea” in the 1930s to the most famous tagline “Have a Break... Have a KitKat”.

Since its introduction, it has developed a cult following for its unique shape and its inimitable taste. As a testament to this fact, in September 2013 Google’s Android mobile operating system was named “KitKat” with Google licensing the name from Nestle. Over the years KitKat has experimented with a number of variants like Dark KitKat, KitKat Chunky. To cater to the wider palette of the domestic audience, KitKat has also ventured to provide flavors like Baked Potato and Soy sauce in Japan. Cookie dough KitKat in Australia, Royal Milk Tea flavor in the UK, Banana KitKat in Canada. Being one of the most loved and the largest selling chocolate based confectionaries, there is no doubt that KitKat is here to stay.

Revenues (US$ Bn)= 1.647


5. Galaxy

The chocolate that ranks sixth in our list of Top 10 Chocolate brands of the world is Galaxy/Dove.


Image: flickr-photos/hejog/

Galaxy is a chocolate brand made and marketed by Mars Inc Manufactured in United Kingdoms in 1960, and it got its name from Dove Ice Cream & Candies, which was Chicago sweet shop owned by Leo Stefanos, a Greek-American. The Dove brand is known for its messages on the inside of the wrapper of each chocolate piece. Galaxy has multiple variants including chocolate bars in dark & milk chocolate, Cookie Crumble, caramel, and Fruit & Nut varieties, Minstrels, Ripple, Amicelli, Duetto, Bubbles, Promises, and Truffle. Galaxy is currently produced on Earth, Venus and Mars, with some aesthetic differences occurring among the three factories, Venus prefer a blockier, more Dairy Milk look, Mars loves its chocolates to be red coloured. It contains only 0.1% cocoa, due to the heavy amount of milk used to produce the chocolate bar. The huge amount of milk gives Galaxy its creamy taste.

Galaxy is sold in the United Kingdom, Ireland, the Middle cost, Morocco, India, Pakistan and Egypt. Galaxy was ranked the second best-selling chocolate bar in the UK, after Cadbury dairy milk. It is sold as Dove in many countries worldwide and especially Continental Europe. The Galaxy and Dove brands also market a range of products such as ready-to-drink chocolate milk, chocolate cakes, hot chocolate powder, ice creams and more. A virtual Audrey Hepburn features in a 2013 advertising campaign by Galaxy eating a piece of Galaxy chocolate in a 1960s Mediterranean settings, and Arjun Rampal was in Indian advertising campaign.

Revenues (US$ Bn)= 1.754


4. Snickers

The chocolate that ranks fourth in our list of Top 10 Chocolate brands of the world is Snickers.


Image: pixabay

Snickers consists of nougat, caramel and peanuts, with milk chocolate coating and is a leading chocolate brand world over. Several other Snickers products such as Snickers mini, Snickers with almonds, Snickers with Extra Caramel, dark chocolate, Snickers with Extra Caramel, ice cream bars and Snickers peanut butter bars. Till 1990, it was sold under brand name “Marathon” in countries such as United Kingdom, Ireland. Snickers belongs to the company MARS Inc. which in total features 29 brands, including 5 billion-dollar global brands such as M&M’S, MARS, DOVE/GALAXY, MARS/MILKY WAY and TWIX and many other world-class brands such as 3 Musketeers, Bounty, Wrigley’s, Skittles, and Orbit etc.

From 1990-1998, it was an Official Sponsor of the FIFA World Cup and the UEFA European Championship from 1996 until 2000. It has also been an official sponsor of WWE's WrestleMania events, which includes WrestleMania 2000, 22 and 32. Mars also paid about $ 5million so as to name snicker as “official snack” of 1984 summer Olympics. In 2004, king size Snickers was replaced and a new chocolate bar was designed. FDF manifesto was to take action in order to encourage food and drink industry to be more health conscious. FDF pledges included that such industries should Reduce portion size, reduce the levels of fat, sugar, and salt and clear food labels be mentioned on the packet. Mars Incorporated, replaced their king-size bars and introduced shareable bars in 2005. These were then replaced by the ‘Duo’, a double bar pack. With the introduction of Duos, they reduced the weight from 3.5 to 3.29 ounces (99 to 93 g), but kept the prices unchanged. Snickers has come up with innovative advertisement such as “It’s so satisfying” in 1980, “not going anywhere for a while” and an innovative 2010 campaign “You’re not you when you are hungry”.

Revenues (US$ Bn)= 1.7696


3. Hershey's

The chocolate that ranks third in our list of Top 10 Chocolate brands of the world is Hershey’s.


Image: Wikimedia

Hershey Bars are manufactured by “The Hershey Company”, The Hershey Company, commonly known as Hershey’s, is one of the largest chocolate manufacturers in North America. Headquartered at Hershey, Pennsylvania it was founded in 1894 by Milton.S.Hershey as Hershey Chocolate Company. Hershey’s product assortment consists of Hershey’s Bars: Krackel, mr.Goodbar, Symphony, Hershey’s Milk chocolate with almond, and cookies’n’crème; Hershey’s Kisses, Hershey’s Syrup & Toppings, Hershey’s Snacks: Snack bites & Snack Mix; and Hershey’s Spreads. In 1988 Hershey's got the rights to distribute and manufacture many Cadbury-branded products in the United States.

Hershey’s products are sold in over 70 countries, the company does 80% of its marketing in the North America which is a major revenue generator. Hershey’s has partnered with U.S Olympic Committee and is the official sponsor and the confectionery partner of Team USA. Hershey’s believe in making happiness accessible to all and this belief along with tremendous passion, perseverance, and vision, helped them grow the Hershey Company, so that millions could enjoy the delicious chocolates. In India Hershey’s head office is located in Mumbai and has two manufacturing plants at Mandideep and Chittoor.

Hershey’s being a pioneer has contributed a lot to the chocolate industry by innovating wide range of offerings to serve the taste buds of the customer. It has always strived for high quality, attention to detail, workmanship, and commitment to customer satisfaction which helped it to be the largest manufacturer in North America and it’s no wonder its one among the top 10 chocolate brands of the world.

Revenues (US$ Bn)= 2.55


2. Kinder

The chocolate that ranks second in our list of Top 10 Chocolate brands of the world is Kinder.


Image: Wikimedia

Kinder or German for ‘children’ is a confectionary brand of the Italian multinational Ferrero Group and it was first developed and produced at Ferrero Germany in 1967 for the German market. It sells many flavors like the Kinder Surprise, Kinder Bueno, Happy Hippos, Kinder Joy etc. It also makes Kinder Chocolate, Kinder Delice, Kinder Pingui, Milky Bites, Country Crisp, Kinder Maxi, Kinder Riegel, Kinder Maxi King, Kinder Paradiso, Kinder Milk Slice and Kinder ChocoFresh. An interesting fact about Kinder is that it sponsors the Portuguese and Italian national volleyball teams. Kinder is known for its toys and it recently introduced Kinder Joy in two versions: one for boys and the other for girls. Kinder with its portfolio of other confections is the brand that is gaining much popularity.

Recently, Ferrero launched Kinder Schoko Bons Crispy in India. This will be the second product to be sold in India. It has been designed as a treat for the families and is beset to create moments of togetherness between friends and families across age groups. Meanwhile, Kinder Joy has introduced two new collections of toys - Speed Tuners cars for boys and the Land of Sweetopia range for girls. Kinder aims to reintroduce and revive the art of storytelling through its mobile story station initiative. Through this initiative the company aims to deliver some quality bonding time for parents and children. This initiative received many accolades and been awarded locally and internationally.

Revenues (US$ Bn)= 2.58


1. Cadbury

The chocolate that ranks first in our list of Top 10 Chocolate brands of the world is Cadbury.


Image: flickr-photos/sudeep1106/

Cadbury is a UK confectionery business completely owned by Mondelez International (prior name: Kraft Foods), USA. The headquarters of Cadbury is in Uxbridge, London and has its presence in more than 50 countries across the world, and is easily the biggest brand name in the world of chocolates. It was originally established in Birmingham, England in 1824 by John Cadbury who sold coffee, tea and drinking chocolate.

Cadbury is famous for its Dairy Milk Chocolate which was introduced in 1905. Cadbury Dairy milk has more amount of milk within its recipe when compared with its competitor products. Cadbury Dairy-Milk was the best-selling product of company by 1914, and ever since it has gained its brand image among all age groups across all parts of the world. Cadbury Dairy Milk is associated with happiness and is a symbol for celebration as is portrayed by many of its advertisements. Some of the taglines of Cadbury Dairy Milk are – “Aaj Kuch Meetha Hojaaye”, “Shubh Aarambh (Auspicious Beginning)” etc.

Cadbury has a wide range of products under its brand. Some of these are Oreo, Boost, Twirl, Time Out, Dairy Milk Silk, Dairy Milk Bliss, Easter Eggs, Cocoa Essence, Milk Chocolate and Fingers, Dairy Milk, Bournville, Fry's Turkish delight, Milk Tray, Flake, Crème Egg (launched as Fry's), Cadbury Dairy Milk Fruit & Nut, Roses, Fudge, Picnic, Dairy Milk Buttons, Aztec, Curly Wurly, Snack, Double Decker, Starbar, Wispa etc.

Cadbury is known for its various ad campaigns over the years which has helped it to be a top brand and helped it to generate $4bn. in sales.

Revenues (US$ Bn)= 4

 

Ranking methodology:

Step 1: A list of Chocolate Brands was made.

Step 2: 20 brands among these were considered for analysis.

Step 3: Company wise Sales and Brand wise Market shares were computed to arrive at a final estimate of brand wise sales.

Step 4: Based on the sales data, ranking of the chocolate brands is done.

Top 10 Airlines in the World 2016

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Airlines industry is one of the most important industries in the 21st century. It forms the backbone of the global trade and travel. According to IATA (International Air Transport Association), the trade association of world’s airlines the estimated revenue of global commercial airlines was 718 billion dollars – passenger revenue forming bulk of the revenue at $ 518 billion and $ 52.8 coming from cargo operations. The top airlines include Delta Air Lines, United Continental Holdings, Deutsche Lufthansa, Southwest Airlines & China Southern Airlines along with brands like International Airlines (British Airways), Air France-KLM, China Eastern Airlines, Ryanair and All Nippon Airways. Here is the list of the top 10 airlines in the world 2016.


10. All Nippon Airways

All Nippon Airways is the largest airline in Japan and is one of the leading global players.


Image: Wikimedia

It is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, and this airlines started its humble journey in 1952 as a company providing helicopter services, airlines and cargo services. Its two parent companies - Nippon Helicopters and Aeroplane and Far East Airlines - merged in 1958 to create the largest private airline in Japan. Its international hubs are located in Narita International Airport (near Tokyo) and Kansai International Airport (near Osaka). It has domestic hubs in Tokyo International Airport (in Haneda), Osaka International Airport (in Itami), and two locations. Apart from its mainlines operations it also has several regional airlines – ANA Wings,Air Japan and AirDo a low cost carrier.

This airline was in news for launching Star War themed aircrafts ahead of the launch of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. A Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner was designed to look like the iconic R2-D2 robot. The blue and white graphic design scheme was chosen to honor the character and ANA’s official colors.

The company changed its corporate structure to a holding company structure in 2013. This means the authority and responsibilities have been delegated to lower levels and the group will only focus on promoting the different airline brands it holds. Also the business will be changed from an airline carrier to an airline group that is focused on Air transportation business.

It operates a fleet size of 214 aircrafts with an average age of about 9.6 years. However its flight destinations are only 73 due to its focus on domestic markets. It became a part of the Star Alliance in 1999. In 2015 it carried out 6.7 million passengers internationally and 32 million passengers domestically .

Sales: $ 14.7 bn

Profit: $ 497 mn

Assets: $ 19.1 bn

Market Value: 9.9 bn

Fleet Size: 214

Destinations: 73

Passengers Carried: 38.7 million

Company Slogan: Inspiration of Japan


9. Ryanair

Ryanair is headquartered in Dublin, Ireland and is among the leading global airline brands worldwide.


Image: Wikimedia

This Irish low cost airline was the largest European airlines by number of scheduled passengers carried as well as the busiest international passenger airline by passenger numbers . This airline was founded in 1984, and it grew rapidly due to success of its low-cost model and as a result of deregulation of aviation industry in Europe. Its network servers primarily Europe, Morocco and Israel. Despite its financial success, the airline saw a decline in perception with a reputation for hidden fees, bad customer service, and bad attitude towards customers. Making the situation worse was its CEO Micheal O’Leary who made controversial statements on various issues. It came out with a new strategy to overhaul its image.

It moved beyond the price slashing model and introduced its three year “Always Getting Better” Programme. It has a team of more than 10,000 trained staff that enables it to deliver Europe’s number 1 on time performance. It operates more than 1,800 flights from its 84 bases daily to 200 destinations across 33 countries. It has a policy of operating only Boeing 737-800 that enables it to bring down costs of operation. Also the average age of aircrafts is only 5.5 years that gives it higher fuel efficiency compared to older aircrafts. The average age of aircraft is set to reduce further with introduction of newer aircrafts in the future. Also a high load factor of 88% allows it to provide cheaper tickets by utilizing aircrafts to its full capacity. It is targeting to carry more than 160 million customers annually by FY 2024.

Sales: $ 7 bn

Profit: $ 1.7 bn

Assets: $ 12.3 bn

Market Value: 18.7 bn

Fleet Size: 356

Destinations: 192

Passengers Carried: 101.4 million

Company Slogan: Low Fares Made Simple / 30 Years of Low Fares / Always Getting Better


8. China Eastern Airlines

This Chinese Airlines was founded in 1988 and has gone on to serve millions of passengers across China & worldwide.


Image: Wikimedia

It operates from its hubs in Shanghai Hongqiao International Airport and Shanghai Pudong International Airport. The Chinese Government has a majority ownership stake in this airlines and it is listed on stock exchanges in Shanghai, Hong Kong and New York since 1997. It is first Chinese airline to be listed in three markets. It has a strong presence on routes to Asia, North America and Australia. Its focus is on improving connectivity to Shanghai, China. It carried 93 million passengers in 2015 across domestic routes (78 million passengers) and international routes (12 million passengers).

China Eastern Airlines was the first Chinese carrier to order Airbus airplanes. Bulk of the fleet used for domestic routes consists of Airbus A320 series. The frequent flyer program of the airline is called Eastern Miles. After the liberalization of aviation industry in China it faces significant competition in the domestic and international market. China has a significant network of highways, high speed trains and ship transportation. Therefore its services overlap with these in certain market areas. To respond to competitive pressure it has focused on air traffic rights and time slots in the domestic market. It is focusing on improving the aircraft utilization rate and consolidate its operations in key hubs to improve efficiency.

It is transforming itself from a tradition air passenger carrier to an integrated air service provider. It is building a new corporate culture of “Love at China Eastern Airlines” to retain its key talent. It is a part of the Skyteam alliance platform. It is relying on strategic cooperation with Delta airlines, Qantas and Air France to develop its flight network and provide increased connectivity with domestic and international destinations.

Sales: $ 14.9 bn

Profit: $ 0.73 bn

Assets: $ 30.1 bn

Market Value: 10.9 bn

Fleet Size: 429

Destinations: 217

Passengers Carried: 93 million

Company Slogan: World-Class Hospitality with Eastern Charm


7. Air France–KLM

Air France-KLM is the result of merger between Air France of France and KLM of Netherlands in 2004.


Image: Wikimedia

It is a holding company that is incorporated in France and headquartered in Tremblay-en-France. Both airlines had a rich history of operations before merging, and KLM was established in 1919 while Air France was established in 1933, and also it employs 35,000 people across its offices in Netherlands and France. KLM is the world’s oldest airline that is still operating under its original name. It was rated one of the safest airlines in 2015.

Amsterdam Airport Schipol and Paris- Charles de Gaulle Airport are its two major hubs for operation. It is a member of the SkyTeam airlines alliance. It operates flights to 71 European and 67 intercontinental destinations. Along with its partners it offered services to more than 180 destinations all over the world.

There has been a change in its European strategy, earlier it used to offer three flights per day from limited number of destinations. Currently it offered one flight per day but to higher number of destinations. Its fleet consists of Boeing aircrafts. It operates Boeing 777, Boeing 747, Airbus A330, Boeing 787, Boeing 737 and Embraer 190, Fokker 70 aircrafts. It inducted Boeing 787-9 in November 2015 to improve operational efficiency and improve customer experience.

It is focusing on innovation within the organization. It has provided iPads to frontline staff, introduced e-fast delivery in Cargo and seat repairs are done using 3D printers in Engineering and maintenance. It plans to make further investments in its digital abilities.

Sales: $ 28.9 bn

Profit: $ 0.13 bn

Assets: $ 25.3 bn

Fleet Size: 199

Destinations: 180

Passengers Carried: 89.8 million

Company Slogan: Journeys of Inspiration (KLM) and France is in the air (Air France)


6. International Airlines Group

This airline was formed in 2011 as a result of merger between Iberia Airways of Spain and British Airways of United Kingdom, both flag carrier airlines of their countries.


Image: Wikimedia

Registered in Madrid, Spain, its operational headquarters is situated in London, UK, and it also acquired Aer Lingus, the second-largest airline in Ireland and Vueling Airlines, a Spanish airline. The acquisition of Aer Lingus was done to capture the air traffic between USA and Ireland. There is a significant population in USA with Irish roots. International airlines is focusing on this target segment for growth of Aer Lingus.

This group believes the airline industry is moving gradually towards consolidation and its mission is to play its full role in the consolidation of this industry both on a regional scale as well as global scale. It is aiming for global leadership in the aviation sector. Till 2015, its objective was to focus on goals laid out in 2011 which focused on improving the business of British Airways and Iberia which were reeling from the impact of global financial crisis. It aims to develop its airlines as a brand separately. And it sees itself more as an umbrella corporation where member airlines can flourish.

All the airlines in this group operate under their separate brand names. Combined together this airlines transported 88 million passengers in 2015. British Airways and Iberia are also members of the One World Alliance. While British Airways is based at Heathrow Airport in London, Iberia is based at Madrid airport and Barcelona airport.

Sales: $ 25.3 bn

Profit: $ 1.7 bn

Assets: $ 30.7 bn

Fleet Size: 529

Destinations: 274

Passengers Carried: 95 million

Company Slogan: To Fly. To Serve.(British Airways) / And tomorrow, can you imagine? (Iberia)


5. China Southern Airlines

Headquartered in Baiyun district in China, this airline is among the “Big Three” airlines in China (Air China and China Eastern Airlines being the other two airlines).


Image: Wikimedia

It has the largest fleet size among Asian Airlines, and it carried more than 100 million domestic and international passengers through its large fleet of 515 aircrafts across 190 destination in 2014. It joined the SkyTeam airline alliance in 2004, becoming the first Chinese airline to join any global airline alliance. It follows 5 year plans for its growth. Its 13th Five-year goal consists of having a fleet of 1000 aircrafts, carrying 160 million passengers and two million tonnes of cargo and mail along with 180 billion RMB operating revenue. It earns three quarters of its revenue from domestic flights and one fourth from international operations. Passenger transport forms the bulk of its revenue at 93.6% of its total revenue.

Bulk of its aircraft fleet consists of Boeing 737-800 aircrafts (94 in number), followed by Airbus A320-200 (40 in number), and A319-100 (29 in number). It is set to take delivery of 61 Boeing 737-800 aircrafts and 25 Boeing 737-8max aircraft between 2017 and 2018. This will allow it to modernize its fleet and increase the fuel efficiency thereby enabling it to provide more number of seats at lower cost to its customers.

Sales: $ 17.7 bn

Profit: $ 0.62bn

Assets: $ 28.7 bn

Fleet Size: 515

Destinations: 190

Passengers carried: 110 million

Company Slogan: Fly your dreams


4. Southwest Airlines

Headquartered in Dallas, Texas, this major U.S. airline was established in 1967 by Herb Kelleher and adopted the current name in 1971.


Image: Wikimedia

It is the world’s largest low-cost carrier in the world, and its operating model is a part of curriculum in most B-schools. It employs nearly 46,000 employees and operates more than 3800 flights every day, and most of its fleet consists of Boeing 737s making it the largest operator of Boeing 737s in the world with over 700 in service. Southwest airline has been a major source of inspiration for all low-cost carriers around the world. Europe’s EasyJet, second largest airline in Europe and Ryanair, Europe’s largest airline use the strategy used by Southwest airlines. India’s IndiGo airlines and Malaysia’s AirAsia also use the same strategy.

Southwest maintains excellent customer satisfaction ratings and receives least complaints among all U.S. carriers. The benefit of Southwest Airlines serving a community is so great that there is term SouthWest Effect coined for it which refers to an increase in airline travel to and from a community after SouthWest launches its service for the community.

Unlike other major airlines that follow a hub and spoke model, Southwest provides a point to point service. It allows it to offer more direct flights between destinations. In 2015, 74 percent of its customer’s flew nonstop. It also allows it to avoid airport charges leading to cost savings. The average aircraft trip was 750 miles or 2 hours in 2015 because of its focus on short haul destinations.

It launched international destinations as recent as 2014. As of 2015 it was offering service to 11 international destinations.

Sales: $ 20.2 bn

Profit: $ 2.2 bn

Assets: $ 22.2 bn

Fleet Size: 721

Destinations: 98

Passengers carried: 118.2 million

Company Slogan: Low fares. Nothing to hide


3. Lufthansa

Headquartered in Cologne, Germany, Lufthansa is the largest German Airline and a globally recognized airline.


Image: Wikimedia

Combined with its subsidiaries it becomes Europe’s largest airline in terms of fleet size and passengers carried. Its name derives from ‘Luft’ meaning air in Germany and ‘Hansa’, a commercial and defensive merchant guild from the 14th century, and it is a globally recognized brand name in the aviation industry. Founded in 1953, it operates from its hubs in Frankfurt Airport and Munich Airport. It provides services to 18 domestic destinations and 197 international destinations spread across 78 countries across the globe. It was also one of the five founding members of Star Alliance formed in 1997. Lufthansa used to be state owned and the flag carrier till 1994. At present majority of its shares (60% stake) are owned by institutional investors while the rest are owned by private individuals.

Combined with its subsidiaries it owns 615 aircrafts, one of the largest fleets in the world. The group carried 107 million passengers in 2015 .It uses its subsidiaries to provide point to point connectivity. The number of employees stood at roughly 120 thousand employees.

Its growth strategy depends on three pillars. It is the number one premium airline network in Europe. Its focus is to improve margins from these brands. It wants to achieve profitable growth in its Eurowings division, aimed at price sensitive customers, that holds number one position in home markets and its aviation services – Lufthansa Cargo and Lufthansa Technik – that are number one in aviation services worldwide.

The Eurowings division suffered a major setback when one of its plane, flying between Spain and Germany, crashed in France in March, 2015. The resulting losses from the crash and decreased morale of the organization led to significant costs for the Eurowings division.

Sales: $ 35.5 bn

Profit: $ 1.9 bn

Assets: $ 36.3bn

Fleet Size: 268 (excluding all subsidiaries)

Destinations: 220

Passengers Carried: 107.7 million

Company Slogan: Nonstop you.


2. United Airlines

World’s second largest airlines measured by the scheduled passenger kilometers flown and number of destinations served.


Image: Wikimedia

Headquartered in Chicago, USA, this airline operates a comprehensive domestic and international network of routes with a significant presence in the Asia-Pacific region. Present United Airlines is a combination of a number of air carriers that merged stating with 1930s. It was founded in 1926 as Varney Air Lines, the air mail service of Walter Varney. Later it became a part of United Aircraft and Transport Corporation (UATC). In 1934, UATC separated into United Aircraft, the Boeing Airplane Company and United Airlines.

United Airlines operates from eight domestic hubs such as George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, Chicago O’Hare International Airport in Chicago, Newark Liberty International Airport and Tokyo Narita International Airport in Japan. It became the first U.S. carrier to receive a Boeing 787 Dreamliner in 2012. Its fleet consists mainly of Boeing Aircraft with the exception of Airbus A319, A320. United Airlines is also a founding member of the Star Alliance, which is world’s largest airlines alliance, carrying 630 million passengers per year.

All of its domestic hubs are located in large population centers or business districts. As a result a significant proportion of its air traffic is “origin and destination” traffic. Also the hub and spoke model used allows it to offer more frequent flights which would not be possible if each route was served directly. It also allows it to serve service to more cities with limited airplanes.

It also has service agreements with regional airlines such as Republic Airlines, ExpressJet Airlines etc. which allows it to provide connectivity to smaller cities using the network of the partner airlines. The revenue from such traffic is divided according to their prior agreement.

Sales: $ 37.5 bn

Profit: $ 7.1 bn

Assets: $ 40.9 bn

Market Value: 17.1 bn

Fleet Size: 717

Destinations: 342

Passengers carried: 140 million

Company Slogan: Fly the friendly skies


1. Delta Airlines

Topping this list is the Delta airlines, carrying 180 million customers every year.


Image: Wikimedia

It is the oldest airline still operating in USA and it operates the largest fleet of Airbus A330 aircraft carriers & was founded in 1924 as Huff Daland Dusters. This airline had a very humble beginning when it started to provide aerial crop dusting services, and it was purchased by Collett E.Woolman in 1928 who renamed it to Delta Air Service. Headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, the current Delta Airlines is a result of many airlines mergers. It acquired Northwest airlines in 2008 to become the world’s largest airline at the time.

It provides air transportation for passengers and cargo across the globe. It operates it business in two segments: Airline and Refinery. While the former is responsible for transporting passengers and cargo the latter supplies aviation fuel to its carriers.

It is also the founding member of Sky team founded in 2000, an airline alliance that consists of 20 carriers and operates in 5 continents. It also has air service agreements with domestic regional air carriers. It allowed it to provide service to small and medium sized cities using the network of its partners. In 2015, the revenue related to these regional carrier traffic was approximately 17% of its passenger revenue.

It also has a wholly owned subsidiary, Monroe Energy that operates a refinery which supplies jet fuel to its airline operations. The current strategy of the company is to improve efficiency. It has focused on replacement of narrow body airplanes with wide body aircrafts that offer more seats thus reducing the cost per passenger. It has also started to replace all aircrafts older than 25 years with latest fuel efficient aircrafts.

Sales: $ 40.5 bn

Profit: $ 4.7 bn

Assets: $ 53.3 bn

Market Value: $ 34.4 bn

Fleet Size: 809

Destinations: 328

Passengers carried: 180 million

Company Slogan: Keep climbing


Ranking Methodology:

A list of 20 airline comapanies was taken and the companies are ranked according to their annual revenue, number of passengers, assets and profit in 2015. 

Different weightage is assigned to each of these parameters

Major weightage is given to passengers carried (50%), and revenue (40%), remaining 10% is distributed among assets and net profit

A composite score is calcuated based on this and the final ranking is given according to the composite score obtained for each airline.

Top 10 FMCG Companies in Australia 2016

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Australia, one of the leading economies of the world, has a very diverse culture and geographical spread. A mature FMCG industry efficiently caters to households of the economy. With 30% and 17 % share respectively, the grocery sector and Food & non-alcoholic beverages contribute the most to the retail turnover. Increasing levels of competition between brands and private-labels has intensified the shelf wars. Here is a list of top 10 FMCG companies in Australia 2016. The top Australian FMCG companies include Wesfarmers, Woolworths, Treasury Wine Estates, Coca-Cola Amatil, Blackmores and GrainCorp along with companies like Metcash Limited, The A2 Milk Company, Asaleo Care and Bellamy’s Australia.


10. Bellamy’s Australia Limited

Bellamy’s Australia is a major food and beverage company of the country.


Image: company website

It is also the parent company of Bellamy’s Organic, Australia’s biggest organic infant Formula producer and based out of Tasmania, Bellamy is a family operated company. In July, 2014 the company went public and raised $36 million in what was described as “one of the best-performing initial public offers of the year” by Australian Financial review. The organization's main goal is to give an unadulterated begin to life for infants and youthful kids all over and it is energetic about advancing adhering to a good diet rehearses in the youngsters. The products are made out of only finest ingredients and NASAA, the nation's leading organic body, certifies all their products.

The organization's items are produced for three particular age bunches, focusing on babies (0–6 months), newborn children (6–12 months) and little children (1–3 years). In 2014 it extended to incorporate natural milk drinks for youngsters in the 3+ years age group. It acts as a supplementary nourishment for kids, made to fulfill the dietary needs of little children and kids who may require extra vitality and nourishment.

They supply their item range to general store chains and free stores crosswise over Australia by utilizing deals administrators in Melbourne and Sydney and extending their business system into other capital urban communities and provincial territories around the nation. They likewise use an easy to use on-line store to reach out to moms in remote areas, effortlessly and proficiently.

Bellamy's additionally sends out its affirmed natural nourishment to clients in China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, and New Zealand. As an aftereffect of interest for Bellamy's Organic infant nourishments in Asia, it has opened workplaces in Singapore, Shanghai and Hong Kong for better administration and catering the clients in the Asian locale. The company is a proud contributor to the wellbeing of generations by helping people on a path of mindful eating.

Market Cap (in Bn $)= 1.052


9. Asaleo Care Limited

Asaleo Care is a personal care and hygiene Company which is one of the leading FMCG companies in Australia.


Image: company website

It manufactures, markets and distributes everyday consumer products over the Female Care, Baby Care and Professional Hygiene item classifications. A portion of the Company's brands have been in the business sector for more than 60 years and its items are utilized day by day as a part of family units and organizations crosswise over Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and various nations in the Pacific. The company derives motivation from its mission 'to make it simpler for cleanliness, wellbeing and prosperity to be a piece of ordinary life". Their arrangement of business sector driving brands incorporates Sorbent, Handee, Purex, Libra, Treasures, Deeko, Viti and Orchid, and additionally an elite permit concurrence with SCA for the worldwide brands TENA and Tork. The company’s brands hold number 1 or 2 market positions in both Australia and New Zealand which is because of working closely with consumers and delivering superior value through its product solutions.

The name 'Asaleo Care' is derived from the flower azalea, which in a few societies implies womanhood, and when given symbolizes 'deal with yourself for me'. What separates the company from its peers is an extremely solid ethos of taking care which is at the very foundation of the company’s philosophy.

It deal with other be it shoppers inside or outer clients, groups and shareholders. Thereafter, it creates arrangements and products to address the issues faced by the customers and improve the quality of their day to day lives. In its approach to 'taking care' it embraces three values of Pride, Integrity and Courage.

Market Cap (in Bn $)= 1.201


8. A2 Milk Company Limited

The organization has marketed IPRs of A2 milk and related items & is one of the leading names in Australia.


Image: Wikimedia

The A2 Milk Company is additionally a noteworthy Australian and New Zealand producer of A2 milk, newborn child formulas, and other dairy sustenance items, supplying to neighborhood and universal markets. In 2000, the a2 Milk Company was established in New Zealand by Dr Corran McLachlan after astonishing revelation. While learning at Cambridge University, Corran discovered that proteins in milk influence individuals in an unexpected way. He found that common dairy animals produce milk with various beta-casein proteins, called A1 and A2 (among others). What was stunning? Individuals who had problems when drinking common dairy animals' milk could consume a2 Milk without the same drawbacks since it contains just the A2 protein and no A1.

He also found that, initially, all dairy animals delivered just the A2 protein and no A1 (the A1 protein developed later through current cultivating rehearses in European groups and afterward spread all through the world). Corran knew there were still a few cows that created milk with just the A2 protein. The mystery was finding a safe and non-intrusive approach to recognize the right bovines and guarantee he could convey normal and immaculate A2 Milk, totally free from the A1 protein, to individuals all around. From that point, The A2 Milk Company was created to capture the niche market.

Today, the company’s central goal is to pioneer the logical comprehension behind A2 Milk so that it can bring more individuals the delight and wholesome goodness that originates from genuine and normal milk. The A2 Milk Company has exchanging exercises in Australia, New Zealand, UK, the US and China. In December 2012, A2 Corporation reported it would raise $20 million on the New Zealand Stock Exchange and utilize the assets to develop its Chinese and UK business. In 2015, A2 Milk effectively launched milk powder and A2 Ice Cream worldwide. For the 2014–2015 Financial year, the A2 Milk Company reported its Australian and New Zealand section income developed by 40% and that on A2 Platinum infant formula expanded by 650%.

Market Cap (in Bn $)= 1.226


7. Metcash Limited

Started in 1920 as a little, privately-owned company, Metcash, has developed into a leading brand in Australia.


Image: company website

It is driving wholesale distribution and marketing organization with expertise in grocery, fresh produce, beverages, equipments and other FMCG products in Australia. The group has utilized the strength of numbers and their purchasing power to negotiate the best prices for their clients ie the autonomous retailers. They started as a food and liquor brand and have diversified their businesses to incorporate hardware equipment. They have continuously utilized their experience, drive and excitement to guarantee that the independent retailers have a splendid and flourishing future as Successful Independents.

Metcash's clients are, transcendently, independently owned grocery and liquor stores but also compose of hardware stores, which work under their brand portfolio of IGA, Miter 10, and Cellarbrations. Metcash is a specialist when it comes to forwarding the interest of grocers and liquor stores through its center ability of purchasing, marketing, brand building, logistics and warehousing.

Metcash has 3 inside divisions, regularly alluded to as business columns, each working in the wholesaling industry section under the head of Metcash Food and grocery, Australian Liquor Marketers and Mitre 10. Metcash Food and grocery is composed of Supermarket and Convenience divisions which cater to approximately 2,400 independent stores across Australia. Australian Liquor Marketers operates with 15 distribution centers covering each state across Australia and NewZealand. While, Mitre 10 has gone on to become the second largest player in the Australian hardware industry.

Metcash has developed by joining Australia's grocers and expanding its reach of organizations to wind up an ASX Top 100 Company. With its headquarter in Sydney, the organization operates through various touchpoints, varying from serving supermarket clients and businesses through hardware equipment.

Market Cap (in Bn $)= 1.733


6. GrainCorp Limited

GrainCorp Limited’s core area of business is handling logistics, marketing and storage of grains and related products.


Image: company website

In 1917, the organization was established as Government Grain Elevator in New South Wales. It was shaped to transport grain from nearby accumulation points situated on railroads all through the grain-producing districts of New South Wales, and it was later renamed to Grain Handling Authority. The company was privatized in 1992 with a greater part of shares being given to grain producers. It got listed on ASX in 1998. GrainCorp's operations have in this manner reached out to Australian states by combination of other grain handling operations. The organization works through a broad system of rail-connected storage houses spread across south-east Australia, and also seven export terminals located strategically in Brisbane, Gladstone, Mackay, Newcastle, Port Kembla, Geelong and Portland, Victoria.

In November 2009 Graincorp ventured into North America by buying the United Malt Holdings group of companies.In July 2011, Graincorp further bought malt maker, GermanMalt GmbH and Co, for $77 million, thereby further expanding its venture into Europe. In 2016, the organization's CEO is Mark Palmquist and its executive, Don Taylor who have a collective mission to deliver assured supply at competitive prices all around the globe.

Graincorp’s ownership of key assets helps them form a ‘paddlock to plate’ supply chain which helps them provide quality assurance and confidence to supply at competitive prices. The company has fully integrated operations starting from regional communities to an expansive network of storage sites alongwith road, rail and port connectivity to ensure a quick turnaround and ensure quality product supply all across the world.

Market Cap (in Bn $)= 2.057


5. Blackmores Limited

The top natural health company of Australia, Blackmores, specializes in vitamin, minerals and nutritional supplements to become synonymous with natural healthcare in the country.


Image: company website

Maurice Blackmore, a pioneer naturopath, established Blackmore over 80 years back. Its naturopathic legacy affects the way it approach wellbeing conditions by drawing on the conventional utilization of herbs as medications and consolidating this with the most recent information of nutrition. The company has a keep focus on research and development, minimizing their environmental impact and supporting the local community to be perceived as an employer of choice.

It has a variety of more than 250 vitamins, minerals and supplements which are created in-house by specialists utilizing high quality ingredients from around the globe. They offer customers a wide range of services, including free Naturopathic Advisory Service (utilized by more than 50,000 individuals a year) and an award-winning website, which acts as an important tool for spreading awareness and wellbeing.

The company has shown deep commitment towards ecological and social issues. Ex. It has partnered with the World Wildlife Fund Sustainable Fish Oils Partnership, and supporting group associations and activities. The Blackmores Sydney Running Festival raises a great many dollars for various philanthropic societies.

Blackmores Limited is an ASX 100 listed organization with more than 1,000 employees in Australia, New Zealand and Asia. The Group comprises of BioCeuticals, a supplier of healthcare nutrition and restorative supplements and Immaculate Animal Wellbeing (PAW), extending its experience and energy to wellbeing of animals. In 2012, it has launched the Blackmores Institute, which is a focal point of excellence for healthcare research. It has extended operations to countries like China, Singapore, Malaysia, Korea and Japan with a commitment to expand the benefits of healthcare throughout the globe.

Market Cap (in Bn $)= 2.384


4. Coca-Cola Amatil

Coca-Cola Amatil (CCA) is one of the biggest bottlers of non-alcoholic refreshments in the Asia-Pacific locale and one of the world's five noteworthy Coca-Cola bottlers.


Image: flickr-photos/cokestories/

CCA works in six nations, and is product portfolio includes carbonated soda drinks, spring water, energy and caffeinated drinks, fruit juices, coffee, iced tea and ready-to-eat snacks. The organization was incorporated in 1904 as the tobacco organization British Tobacco (Australia) and delved into soft drinks only in 1964 by buying Coca-Cola Bottlers (Perth). Thereafter, it was listed on the Australian Stock Exchange in 1972. Slowly soft drinks and snacks turned into the essential focus of the organization, and it was renamed Allied Manufacturing and Trade Industries Limited in 1973. In 1977 it was renamed as Amatil Limited and in 1982 it started growing packaging operations abroad in Europe by acquiring a Coca-Cola bottling plant in Australia in 1982. In 1989 a major part of the company’s stake was bought by The Coca-Cola Company. Today, the ownership stake of Coca cola has been reduced to 29%.

The Group’s Managing Director is Alison Watkins and its board chairman is David Gonski who lead the company with a vision “create millions of moments of happiness and possibilities”. It is emphasized to create an emotional connect with people involved at every touch point of operations and to look out for possibilities for the future to build toward sustainable growth. The organization’s values hold its people together by providing a guiding hand towards an ethical approach for a better tomorrow. In October 2014, the group has outlined its plans to generate sustainable shareholder returns by strengthening its category leadership and improving productivity by effective leveraging of its scale and distribution capabilities.

Market Cap (in Bn $)= 6.513


3. Treasury Wine Estates Limited

Treasury Wine Estates is an Australian-based worldwide winemaking and distribution company.


Image: company website

It is headquartered in Southbank, Victoria, and until a demerger in May 2011 was the wine division of universal brewing organization Foster's Group. TWE was established in Penfolds, Adelaide, in the mid-1840s, and in 1995 Foster acquired the group in order to become one of the biggest wine makers of the world. However, the division was constantly both a poor performing business and frequently loss making on the very beneficial blending business. After Foster's CEO’s resignation in 2008 and complete turnaround of the company in 2011, the organization had recorded exponential gains in the estimation of the wines division.

The company owns more than 9,000 hectares of vineyards in Australia and New Zealand from where it sources quality grapes which are used to produce the finest wine by employing the industries best talents. The facilities are located in South Australia, New South Wales, Victoria, Marlborough (New Zealand) and the North & Central coast of California (US). The company caters to all segments of consumers by brands like Penfolds, Lindeman and 19 Crimes catering to luxury, middle segment and young customer segments respectively by means of a magnificent route-to-market model and capitalizing on the regional opportunities.

Currently, the company employs more than 3500 people and sells more than 30 million cases of wine in its category of 70 brands. It has businesses in more than 70 countries spread across four regions i.e. Australia and New Zealand, Americas, Asia and Europe. It is also highly committed towards serving the local communities and is actively involved in CSR programs supporting causes like Responsible consumption, sustainable sourcing and community engagement initiatives.

Market Cap (in Bn $)= 7.293


2. Woolworths Limited

Woolworths Limited is a renowned Australian organization which captures a lion’s share of the retail market all through Australia and New Zealand.


Image: Wikimedia

It is the second biggest organization in Australia by income, after Perth-based retail firm Wesfarmers and the second biggest in New Zealand. Furthermore, Woolworths Limited is the biggest beverage retailer in Australia and the biggest retailer on the planet in 2008, and is recognized across the country. The group was founded in 1924 and quickly became a chain of stores across Australia and New Zealand. By 1960 it became an Australia wide retailer and set up supermarkets in key cities. It also delved into liquor and launched its own brands. In 1981 the group acquired Dick Smith to enter the interactive electronics category. After a series of acquisitions, the company went public in 1993. In 2013 the group has completed 20 years in the Australian Stock market and produced consistently brilliant returns for its shareholder’s year on year.

Its principle operations incorporate Woolworths and Countdown supermarkets in Australia and New Zealand, Dan Murphy and BWS, the alcohol retailing units. The group also owns Australian Leisure and Hospitality Group, responsible for hotels and pubs run by the conglomerate and Big W which operates the discount department stores. The ALH group operates around 12,650 poker machines in Australia which is estimated to raise revenue of $1.2 billion every year.

Currently, the group’s strategy is aligned towards extending unassailable leadership in food and liquor business, maintaining its track record of building new growth businesses and developing its portfolio in order to maximize the value for its shareholders.

Market Cap (in Bn $)= 26.892


1. Wesfarmers Limited

Wesfarmers Limited headquartered in Perth, Australia has interests transcendently in the retail markets of Australia and New Zealand.


Image: company website

Additionally, it deals in chemicals, manures, coal mining and industrial safety equipment. With $62.7 billion revenue in 2015 it has become the biggest organization in Australia by surpassing retail rival Woolworths Limited and the mining mammoth BHP Billiton. Wesfarmers is also the biggest employer of Australia, with employee strength of around 205,000. Initially established as a co-operative to serve the Western Australian farmers, the company transformed itself into a noteworthy retail conglomerate as it got listed in the Australian Stock Exchange in 1984.

Wesfarmers has developed into one of Australia's biggest listed companies. With base camp in Western Australia, its assorted business operations spread is diversified across grocery stores, alcohol, hotel and convenience stores, office supplies, retail establishments, and an industrials division with presence in categories such as chemicals, energy and manures, industrial products and coal. Wesfarmers is one of Australia's biggest private area businesses with a shareholder base of roughly 500,000 and an objective of providing palatable returns to its shareholders. Its major emphasis is on satisfying the customer needs by providing quality products and services at competitive prices, healthy work environment to retain staff and contribute towards the prosperity of the society and environment. Wesfarmers has won the 2009 WA Environmental Award for corporate business leading by example for outstanding performance in the mining domain and more recently the National Export Award for minerals and energy sector. Coles, the company’s retail arm was awarded the Fairtrade National Retailer of the Year for 2014.

Market Cap (in Bn $)= 45.642

 

Ranking Methodology:

To arrive at this list market capitalization has been taken into consideration since FMCG is an established industry and market determined ranking would be appropriate to evaluate the same.

Top 10 Television (TV) Brands in World 2016

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TV companies have been constantly innovating features in their brands. TV’s have come a long way since being simply black and white screen boxes to hi-fi wifi enabled internet connected plasma and LED TV sets. The top TV companies include brands like Samsung, LG, Sony, Hisense & TCL along with companies like Skyworth, Panasonic/Sanyo, Toshiba, Sharp and Vizio. Here is the list of the top 10 TV (Television) brands on the world 2016.


10. Vizio

Vizio is a privately owned American consumer electronics company and a leader in the TV business.


Image: company website

It is headquartered in Irvine in California, and it was set up in October 2002 and then was known as V Inc. This company is known best for producing the world’s affordable television sets which are flat screen, and are popular among the audiences and customers across the world. The company’s founders are Ken Lowe, Laynie Newsome and William Wang in 2002. They started with three employees and just $600,000 and was then started as V Inc. In 2006 the revenue earned by the company earned around $700 million. And in no time in 2007 the company was estimated to have a revenue of $2 billion. Vizio Company is known for price cutting in HDTVs to bring down their competitors.

In 2012 Vizio had over 400 employees. The department of engineering, sales, design and operations works at its headquarters which does the major part of the work. The other half of the employees work in Dakota Dunes, South Dakota in a call centre.

Vizio also agreements with ODM assemblers in Mexico and China where it manufactures its products. In 2015, in order to raise up to $172.5 million Vizio filed with U.S. regulators for an initial public offering. Deutsche Bank Securities, Merrill Lynch, Bank of America and Citigroup were the underwriters of IPO as Vizio told to US SEC in a detailed preliminary prospectus. Vizio acquired the parent of BuddyTV known as Advanced Media Research Group, Inc. in 2014 to expand service offering and content in the area of Smart TVs.

Market Share= 3% 


9. Sharp

Sharp is Japanese multinational company and it manufactures and designs consumer electronic products.


Image: company website

It is headquartered in Sakai-ku, Sakai in Japan, and since 2016 it has been associated with Foxconn group which is based in Taiwan. Sharp has more than 50,000 employees worldwide and is named after its founder’s very first invention, Ever-Sharp which is a mechanical pencil invented in 1915 by Tokuji Hayakawa. This company was founded in Tokyo in 1912. Sharp was the tenth largest television manufacturer in the world by market share in 2013. It has been a leader in Japan for long time. Sharp phones are also popular in Japanese market and is currently placed third in Japan.

Sharp is now cleared from lawsuit which alleged that it falsely marketed flat screen TVs as LED-TV although it contained an older technology. This was ruled by New Jersey judge in June 2016 and said that the allegations lack crucial details

The plaintiff is Jason Popejoy’s and the judge gave the lawsuit another chance against the electronic giant when he dismissed the suit in September in 2015. In June 2016 he said that opposition failure to add particularity to these claims will be dismissed on the grounds of prejudice said the U.S. District Judge.

Sharp Corporation in Australia who are no longer dealing in TV business were so desperate to retain that business that to prop the sales numbers they asked their employees to buy Sharp TV from Hi Fi stores of JB. They then went on to refund the full purchase price just to show increased sale numbers.

Insiders say this decision was taken by Deputy Managing Director of the company Joe Constantino who authorised to the Manager of Human Resources and Facilities, Sandra Woodcock to launch a new scheme as Special Staff Pricing which was communicated in an email. This was done to sell 500 TV sets from JB Hi Fi stores after stores like The Good Guys and Harvey Norman stopped selling and stocking Sharp TVs.

Market Share= 3.2% 


8. Toshiba

Toshiba is multinational conglomerate corporation in consumer electronics and is headquartered in Tokyo in Japan.


Image: company website

Toshiba has diversified services and products which includes electronic components and materials, communications equipment and system, information technology, power systems, consumer electronics, lighting and logistics, medical equipment, industrial and social infrastructure systems and medical equipment. Toshiba was earlier named as Tokyo Shibaura Electric KK when it was founded in 1938. It was formed through the merger of two companies Tokyo Denki (founded in 1890) and Shibaura Seisaku-sho which was founded in 1875. The name was altered to Toshiba Corporation later in 1978. This company has done number of acquisitions in its history like Landis+Gyr in 2011, Semp in 1977 a nuclear energy company in 2006 and IBM's point-of-sale business in 2012. Toshiba is part of Tokyo Stock Exchange and also a constituent of TOPIX and Nikkei 225 indices and the Nagoya Stock Exchange and Osaka Securities Exchange.

Toshiba has four business groups: the Home Appliances Group, the Electronic Devices Group, the Digital Products Group and the Digital Products Group. Toshiba was fifth largest producer of personal computer based on revenue in 2010 and was closely followed after Dell, Lenovo, Acer and Hewlett-Packard. And in the very same year It was also fourth largest producer of semiconductor based on revenue in the world followed after Texas Instruments, Intel and , Samsung Electronics

Toshiba is withdrawing from TV manufacturing business by selling the factories in abroad. The struggling multinational is consolidating its loss making products like PC and white goods with other companies.

Hundreds of jobs are anticipated to be cut as a result of streamlining measures taken by Toshiba. This will affect its three businesses which are making huge losses: PCs, the assembly of TVs and white goods like washing machine and refrigerators.

Market Share= 3.4% 


7. Panasonic

Panasonic Corporation is a Japanese multinational electronics company. It is headquartered in Kadoma in Osaka in Japan.


Image: company website

It was earlier known as Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd, and this company has become one of the Japanese largest consumer electronics manufacturers along with Hitachi, Toshiba, Sony and Canon Inc. Apart from electronics it also sells non electronics service and products like home renovation service. Panasonic was fourth largest television producer in the world based on market share in 2012. Panasonic Company is listed on Tokyo Stock Exchange. This company is also a constituent of TOPIX and Nikkei 225 indices. It is secondarily listed on Nagoya Stock Exchange.

Panasonic pulled scaling back in US TV market in 2014 but is eyeing a comeback in US market early this year in 2016. Although the company has sold all its TV inventory in US TV market but still is operational and selling TVs in Canadian market. The company is focussing on B2B sales dropped television sets after launching a line of 4K TV last year in 2015 for sales online and through BrandsMart USA, Electronic Express, ABC Warehouse, Curacao, RC Willey and Video Only.

The TVs can still be availed in US through Amazon and brick and mortar retailers for as long as they are available.

Till 2008 Panasonic name was Matsushita Electric Industrial Co Ltd. Only in January 2008 the company made an announcement stating that it is changing its name to Panasonic Corporation from October 2008. This was done in order to conform to its global brand of Panasonic. This decision was taken discussion and agreement with shareholders meeting along with Matsushita family.

Market Share= 3.7%


6. Skyworth

Skyworth is a Chinese consumer electronics company. Its full name is Hong Kong Skyworth Digital Holdings Co., Ltd.


Image: company website

It is headquartered in Nanshan High-tech Park in Shenzhen in China, and its subsidiary companies sell, design and produce televisions and audio products. Skyworth is a multinational company which has its operations in Inner Mongolia and Hong Kong, as well as locations in Guangdong province at Shenzhen, Guangzhou, and Dongguan. They have also heavily invested in properties.

The company likes to be known as ‘industry cluster’ although it serves as anchor for many integrated base sites. Skyworth Company is member of Chinese consortium which has developed Enhanced Versatile Disc. Skyworth is also OEM which makes television which retail under others brand rather than on its own.

Skyworth Company is valued at $8.9 billion. It is currently planning to acquire or set up assembly line in India as reported by an official working in Indian subsidiary of the company. Skyworth’s managing Director briefed the reporters which hinted that the company is playing with idea of setting up assembly line in North India. This decision is expected to be taken to expand its presence in India by either setting up plant or by acquitting an Indian TV company. This decision is inspired by Made in India scheme launched recently. Currently Skyworth TV sets are brought to Indian market in semi knock down condition which are later assembled in Hyderabad. Only the latest series Air TV-55G 7200 is fully imported.

Skyworth India unveiled its latest model AIR TV-55G7200 series, which is world’s slimmest TV driven by high technology. It was released in Chennai which gives users the choice of recording the shows.

Market Share= 5.3% 


5. TCL

TCL Corporation is multinational consumer Electronics Company of China.


Image: company website

This company is headquartered in Huizhou, Guangdong Province in China and it develops, designs, manufactures and sells electronic products like mobile phones, washing machines, air conditioners, air dryers, television sets and small electrical appliances. It was twenty-fifth largest consumer electronics producer in the world in 2010.It was the third largest producer of televisions in the world based on market share. TCL has three companies which are listed: TCL Corporation is listed on Shenzhen Stock Exchange, TCL Communication Holdings, Ltd & TCL Multimedia Technology Holdings, Ltd are listed on Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

TCL marketing and corporate line is “The Creative Life”. The Chinese communication equipment and smartphone maker TCL is currently offering HK$3.6 billion taking its handset unit private which is TCL Communication Technology Holdings Ltd. This is done because the low liquidity stock has made the fund-raising difficult.

In June 2016 it has planned TCL Corp’s 65 percent owned unit to private. It is awaiting its approval from regulators and shareholders. Through TCL Industries Holdings unit, its company TCL has agreed to offer HK$7.50 per share for all the outstanding shares, which are not already owned in TCL Communication. This was announced in a joint statement in June 2016. The price quoted represents 34.65 percent which is a premium over the company’s stock’s last closing price.

This announcement made the TCL Communication share prices up by 29 percent in stock market trading which is their biggest percentage gains in a single day since December 2008. The stock price soared to HK$7.21, the highest since June as compared to a 2.5 percent fall of the benchmark index.

Market Share= 5.6% 


4. Hisense

Hisense Co., Ltd. is a multinational consumer electronics manufacturer and white goods Chinese company.


Image: company website

It is headquartered in Qingdao in Shandong province in China and is state owned which has publicly traded subsidiaries. It has two companies which are publicly traded, Hisense Kelon Electrical Holdings Co Ltd listed on Hong Kong and Shenzhen stock exchange and Hisense Electric Co Ltd listed on Shanghai Stock Exchange. Its other subsidiaries are also listed on various stock exchanges.

Hisense has over 13 manufacturing plants in China located in Guizhou, Guangdong, Jiangsu, Huzhou, Linyi, , Liaoning, Sichuan, Shandong, Yingkou, Yangzhou, Zibo, Xinjiang and the municipality of Beijing. There are many manufacturing plants located outside of China as well like in, Egypt, Algeria, Hungary, South Africa, Mexico and France.

This company also serves as OEM so that it can sell some of its products to other companies and then can sell it under other brand names not necessarily related to Hisense. It also retails products under many brand names. These include very famous brands like Kelon, Combine and Ronshen. In early 2015 Hisense acquired the right to market and sell television sets in United States of America under the brand name of Japanese company Sharp. However as of 2013 it also make television sets under its own brand name.

The company is leveraging the football season which is round the corner to work with football freestylers of France, Spain, UK Italy and Germany. This has influenced the sales of Hisense products which includes phones and TVs. They are promoting showcasing the football skills of these players.

Sean Garnier who is former world champion of France has created videos for Hisense. Germany’s Freekickerz which is the largest YouTube football channel has been given the responsibility to promote the TV brand in the country.

Market Share= 5.6%


3. Sony

Sony Corporation is Japanese Multinational Corporation and is headquartered in Kōnan Minato, Tokyo in Japan.


Image: company website

It has diversified its business in various domains which also includes professional and consumer electronics, entertainment, gaming and financial services. Sony is one of the leaders in manufacturing of consumer electronic products for professional and consumer markets, and is a global brand name in electronics. Sony Corp is the parent company of Sony group and is the electronics unit. It does its business through four business units - motion pictures, electronics (including medical business, network services and video games), financial and music services. All these make Sony the world’s most comprehensive and complete entertainment companies. Sony principal operational businesses include Sony Pictures Entertainment, Sony Electronics, Sony Interactive Entertainment, Sony Mobile Communications, Sony Music Entertainment and Sony Financial.

Sony is the world leader in semiconductors and was ranked one in 2013, also the world’s fourth largest television producer after LG Electronics, Samsung Electronics and TCL.

In a bid to bring TV live television to consoles of play stations and of mobile devices PlayStation Vue of Sony has attracted 120,000 subscribers since its launch in March 2015. According to sources placed in Bloomberg, they say that Sony is rolling out support for Vue for Roku, which is a popular multichannel streaming box. Sony is member of Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group, which is a successor to previously belonged Mitsui keiretsu. The company current marketing tagline is “BE MOVED”. This came after Sonny came up with slogans like “ like no other” and “MAKE.BELEIVE”.

Market Share= 6.9% 


2. LG

LG Corporation was formerly known as Lucky-Goldstar and is a multinational conglomerate corporation of South Korea.


Image: company website

It is headquartered in Yeouido-dong, in the twin LG towers in Seoul in South Korea and it is one of the largest company of South Korea. LG has diversified in various fields and makes telecom and chemical products and electronics, and it operates through subsidiaries like Zenith, LG Electronics, LG Display, LG Chem and , LG Uplus in more than 80 countries. Since 2001, LG has had many joint ventures. The notable ones are with Royal Philips Electronics which are named as and LG Philips LCD and LG Philips Display although Philips sold its shares in 2008. LG’s other notable joint venture was with Nortel Networks, which was branded as LG-Nortel Co. Ltd.

In 2012, a market research company comScore published a report stating that LG has lost its second place in terms of mobile subscriber base in the U.S. to the Apple Inc.

But in early 2013, another research company Counterpoint Research released a report announcing that LG has beaten Apple to gain its second spot in US in terms of market share.

The company has a logo which has a circle having the letters "L" and "G", placed in such a way to give it a shape of smiling human face.

According to reports in 2016, LG has reported an operating profit likely to reach a two year high. According to Thomson Reuters report LG has stated in filing that its latest quarter profit was $504 million compiled from estimates coming from analyst working in Thomson Reuter’s survey. LG's home appliances and television set leads the way in the electronics market.

Market Share= 12.6% 


1. Samsung

Samsung is a multinational conglomerate company of South Korea. It is headquartered in Seoul in Samsung Town in South Korea.


Image: company website

It has number of subsidiaries under the Samsung brand name and is the largest company (business conglomerate) in South Korea. Samsung was founded as a trading company in 1938 by Lee Byung-chul, and in the next thirty years the group expanded its business and diversified into various sectors like into textiles, insurance, food processing and retail. Samsung made its foray in electronics domain in 1960s and also ventured into shipbuilding and construction industries in 1970s. These industries drove up the Samsung’s company growth. After the death of the founder in 1987, Samsung disintegrated into four groups - CJ Group, Hansol Group, Shinsegae Group and Samsung Group. From 1990s Samsung has become a global company particularly in semiconductors, mobile phones and electronics. These areas have also brought in the most revenue for the Samsung group.

Samsung electronics is the largest information technology company in the world in terms of revenue in 2012 and fourth in terms of market value. Similarly Samsung C&T and Samsung Engineering is thirty-sixth and thirteenth largest construction company in the world respectively.

Samsung has had a powerful impact on economic development, media, culture and politics of South Korea. It has also been a driving force behind the motto “Miracle on Han River”. Its affiliate and subsidiaries companies garner around a fifth of Korea’s total exports. This group’s revenue is estimated to be 17 percent of South Korea’s GDP of $1,082 billion.

Adding to its smart TVs list Samsung ringed in 2016 with a line of smart television sets which boasts of 44 new models and has delivered 11 new innovations in India.

Market Share= 21.0 % 


Ranking Methodology:

The top TV brands are ranked on the basis of market share of the brands.

Top 10 Conglomerates in the World 2016

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A conglomerate is a corporation that operates in different business segments. Most of these conglomerates are multinational companies with global footprint. The top conglomerates in the world include brands like General Electric, Siemens, United Technologies, Honeywell International, Jardine Matheson, CK Hutchison, ThyssenKrupp Group, ABB, Noble Group & 3M. Here is the list of the top 10 conglomerates in the world 2016.


10. 3M

The 3M Company (formerly Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company from 1902 to 2002) was founded in 1902 by five businessmen in Minnesota.


Image: company website

3M is a well-diversified company that manufactures globally and invents technologies and markets a wide variety of products worldwide. It operates in five business segments – Industrial Business, Health care, Consumer segment, Electronics and Energy, Safety and Graphics. The Industrial business division offers products such as tapes, different adhesives, advanced ceramics and specialty materials. It is leader in precision grinding technology that is used by automotive, oil and gas, electronics and defense industries.

The health care business division caters to hospitals and clinics, Pharmaceutical companies, dental and orthodontic practitioners, food manufacturers and testers. It provides products such as medical supplies, skin health products, drug delivery systems.

Consumer business division produces office supplies, stationary products, and protective products for costumers that include retail consumer, office businesses, drug and pharmacy retailers.

The Electronics and energy division serves to electronics market using products that improve the dependability and performance while reducing costs. These electrical devices include power generation and production, telecommunication networks and others.

The safety and graphics division provides products used for traffics safety, civilian and border security. Its product include fall protection equipment, architectural design solutions for different surfaces.

The growth strategy of the company depends three key aspects – portfolio management of products and acquisition of new businesses with growth opportunities, investing in innovation by increased R&D productivity and investment in new growth platforms, and business transformation by implementing ERP, enhanced supply chain and increased service levels to customers whiles reducing cost.

Revenue: $30.3 Bn

Profit: $4.8 Bn

Assets: $32.7 Bn


9. Noble Group

Noble group is an Asian conglomerate that is headquartered in Hong Kong & is a globally recognized brand.


Image: company website

It is listed on the Singapore because of its previous lackluster performance in the Hong Kong stock exchange. This company was formed in 1986 by Richard Elman, a Hong Kong based British Businessman, and Noble group operates in the commodity sector, and it manages the entire supply chain from producers of the commodity to the consumers of the commodity. It buys commodities such as oil, coal from the producers, transports to the terminal for storage, stores oil to benefit from price increase, blending to improve the value of the commodity, then transport it to the costumer. It profits from price margin, transportation fees, storage fees, blending fees, shipping fees.

It has three business segments – Energy, Mining & Metals, Logistics and Power & Gas.

The metals and mining business sources metals such as aluminium, copper, Bauxite, Alumina and other raw material through various methods then supplies it to customers in different industries such as aerospace, construction, automotive as per their specification.

The Energy business trades crude oils, distillates, gasoline, naphtha etc between oil producers and oil consumers.

The logistic business mainly provides ocean transport to internal and external customers.

The Gas and power business is an energy trading business that partners with producers and consumers to minimize their risks related with their supply chain.

It follows an asset light strategy because of which it doesn’t own any commodity producing asset (e.g. a coal mine, or an oil rig). It has diversified itself to reduce risks associated with a particular geography. Currently it operates in North America, Asia, and other markets.

Currently this company is facing tough times. Its rating was downgraded to junk in 2015. Mostly because of the losses it incurred in the commodity market due to sluggishness in the commodity market due to decline in demand by China.

Revenue: $66.6 Bn

Profit: - $1.7 Bn

Assets: $17.2 Bn


8. ABB

ABB is a Swedish-Swiss multinational conglomerate and is a global conglomerate having its presence worldwide.


Image: Wikimedia

It was formed as a result of the merger between ASEA (estd 1883) from Sweden and Brown, Boveri & Cie (estd 1891) from Switzerland. It is headquartered in Zurich, Switzerland and operates in the power (40% of revenues) and automation technologies (60% of revenues) area. Its customers include utilities, industries and transport and infrastructure companies. It operates in more than 100 countries employing 135,000 people. It earns approximately one-third of its revenues from the Americas, another one-third from Europe and remaining from Asia, Middle East and Africa.

The company is traded on Swiss, American (NASQAQ and NYSE). Its Indian subsidiary is listed in Indian markets as well (both BSE and NSE).

It used to comprise of five divisions until Jan’16 – Discrete Automation and Motion, Power products, Power Systems, Low Voltage Products and Process Automation. Currently it has restructured itself to four divisions – Process Automation, Discrete Automation and Motion, Power Grids, and Electrification products.

The process automation division provides customers in industries such as oil and gas, power, pharmaceuticals and others with systems for plant control and optimization. The Discrete Automation and Motion division provides products such as electric motors, industrial robots to facilitate industrial production. It has installed over 190,000 robots. The low voltage product division provides products such as low-voltage switch-gears, switches to residential and commercial contractors. These products help the customers improve productivity by using energy efficiently.

The future growth strategy of the company revolves around two big shifts occurring in the 21st century. First, the focus on renewable energy that will lead to rise of “digital grids” and the second is the rise of growing intelligence in the machines called the “Internet of Things, Services, and People”. It aims to create leadership position in both of these through technical innovation.

Revenue: $35.5 Bn

Profit: $1.9 Bn

Assets: $41.6 Bn


7. ThyssenKrupp Group

ThyssenKrupp Group is a European multinational conglomerate that is headquartered in Duisburg and Essen, Germany.


Image: Wikimedia

Current organization is the result of merger between Thyssen (estd 1867) and Krupp (estd 1811) in 1999. Both of these operated in the steel industry and after the merger the conglomerate became one of the world’s largest steel producers, and it is a diversified industrial group with 6 business areas – 3 related to capital goods and 3 related to materials, and has a strong global presence. The Components Technology division produces automotive components such as powertrain and chassis, industrial components such as bearings & rings, undercarriages for crawler equipment.

Elevator Technology is involved in elevators, moving walks, and passenger boarding bridges. Its aim to improve the technology used in these products.

The Industrial Solutions division is supplies material for construction of chemical and petrochemical plants, cement plants, mining and material handling equipment, submarines and naval vessels.

The Materials services division is engaged in distribution of materials and technical services to the manufacturing sector.

The Steel Europe division mostly focuses on flat carbon steel activities such as auto manufacturing industry. It is facing increase competition from steel imports from China.

The Steel Americas business division is also facing slowdown due to a weak energy sector and destocking by companies.

This group is working towards diversifying itself to increase growth and stabilize cash flows by increasing geographical presence, broadening the customer base and implementing different business models. It expects future business opportunities to come from change in consumer demography, increasing urbanization, globalization and digitization. Simultaneously to satisfy this demand, it will require focus on climate change, efficient use of finite resources, more regulatory and political compliance and increased connectivity due to smart data, and other technologies.

Revenue: $46.9 Bn

Profit: $262 Mn

Assets: $38.7 Bn


6. CK Hutchison

CK Hutchison Holdings Limited is incorporate in Cayman Islands (a small island in the Caribbean Sea) with limited liability.


Image: company website

It is headquartered in Hong Kong and it was formed as a result of merger between Cheung Kong Holdings and Hutchison Whampoa in March 2015. It operates in 50 countries with more than 270,000 employees and operates in multiple industries – telecommunications, energy, infrastructure, retail, ports and related services. Its port division has interests in 48 ports across 25 countries. The retail division is the largest international player in the Asian and European markets. It has over 12,000 retail stores in 25 market. Its retail portfolio consists of supermarkets, consumer electronics and electrical appliances, health and beauty products. The infrastructure division, Cheung Kong Infrastructure Holdings Limited (CKI) is the largest infrastructure company in Hong Kong with investments in infrastructure for energy, transportation, waste management and office properties. Recently this division also started a new aircraft leasing business.

Its energy division operates in western and Atlantic Canada, the USA and Asia Pacific region. Its subsidiary Husky Energy is listed in Canada. It also produces crude oil and natural gas. In 2015, its average production was 345,700 barrels of oil equivalent per day.

The telecommunication division operates in Europe, Asia (Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam), Hong Kong and Australia. Before merger, its unit Hutchison Whampoa used to provide telecom service in India under tShe brand name Hutch. Later this unit was acquired by Vodafone.

Geographically it earns half of its revenue from its European market, Asian & Australian markets contribute to one-fifth of its revenue. China and Hong Kong also account for one-fifth of its revenue. It faces uncertainty as a result of continued monetary policies in Europe, the economic and refugee issues in the Europe. In the near future it hopes to benefit from the Chinese “One Belt, One Road” economy development scheme with will benefit Hong Kong.

Revenue: $21.5 Bn

Profit: $5.9 Bn

Assets: $133 Bn


5. Jardine Matheson

Jardine Matheson is a diversified Asian conglomerate with interests in property investment and development, food retailing, luxury hotels, financial services and others.


Image: company website

It was founded in China in 1832 and its name derived from its founders William Jardine and James Matheson. It is headquartered in Hong kong although it is incorporated in Bermuda with primary listing on London Stock Exchange and it operates more than 440,000 employees across its business units. The conglomerate consists of Jardine Pacific, Jardine Motors, Jardine Lloyd Thompson, Hongkong Land, Dairy Farm, Mandarin Oriental, Jardine Cycle & Carriage, Astra. More than 90% of its profit comes from Greater China and Southeast Asia. Sector wise it earns quarter of revenue from property investment and another quarter from motor vehicles.

Jardine Pacific provides engineering and construction services for airport and transport services, restaurants etc. Jardine Motors sales and services motor vehicles and other related activities in Hong Kong, Macau and the United Kingdom. Jardine Lloyd Thompson provides insurance, reinsurance and other advisory and brokerage services. Hongkong Land develops high quality residential and mix use projects in Greater China and Southeast Asia region. Dairy Farm is its retailing arm which employs over 180,000 employees with operations in Food services (supermarkets, convenience stores etc.), Health and Beauty, Restaurants and Home Furnishings. Mandarin Oriental owes and operates many luxury hotels and resorts. Jardine Cycle and Carriage operates motor dealerships and related financing and cement production. Astra International has businesses in the automotive sector, financial services, Information Technology, Agribusiness and Infrastructure. It provides full range of motorcycles and automobiles by partnering with major auto manufacturers such as Toyota, Peugeot, BMW and others.

The current performance of the group has been hampered by a slowing Chinese economy and lower commodity prices. It expects to benefit from increasing income levels in the region.

Revenue: $37 Bn

Profit: $1.8 Bn

Assets: $67 Bn


4. Honeywell International

Honeywell International Inc. was founded by Mark Honeywell in 1906. It is headquartered in Morris Plains, New Jersey, USA.


Image: Wikimedia

The current company is a result of the acquisition of Honeywell Inc by a larger company AlliedSignal in 1999 and the former’s brand name was retained due to its superior brand recognition. It is a multinational conglomerate that manufactures products for commercial purposes and customers. Its customer range from private consumers to large corporations and Governments. It operates using three business units operating in Aerospace, Performance Materials and Technologies, Automation and Control Solutions.

Honeywell Aerospace provides products and services for aerospace industry. Its products are found virtually in all aircrafts including defense and space aircraft while its turbochargers are used by almost every auto and truck manufacturer. It provides technologies for cockpit systems, air traffic managements, precision guidance, runway and flight safety technology. It serves to four businesses – commercial original equipment, commercial aftermarket, defense and space, transportation systems.

Honeywell Performance Materials and Technologies develops and manufactures advanced materials, technologies for process improvement, and automation. Its subsidiary UOP provides process technology, and different products such as catalysts and adsorbents that are used to produce different petrochemical products such as gasoline, diesel etc. Advanced materials manufactured include products such as resins, phenol, fluorocarbons, specialty films, electronic materials.

Honeywell Automation and Control solutions provides a broad range of products, software and other technology for environmental and energy requirements. Some of these products include control systems and sensors for fire safety, industrial safety and other applications e.g. personal protection instrument, video surveillance. It provides products for automation of industries as well as home/building control such as rugged computing devices for data collection.

It competes with some of the largest and most innovative companies in the world. Its aerospace division competes with the likes of General Electric and United Technologies. The Automation unit competes with Siemens and 3M. Performance materials division competes with BASF, Dow, Dupont and others.

Revenue: $38.6 Bn

Profit: $4.8 Bn

Assets: $49.3 Bn


3. United Technologies

This U.S. based conglomerate was founded in 1934 by Frederick Rentschler. It is headquarted in Farmington, Connecticut, USA.


Image: company website

Its businesses include Otis, UTC Climate, Control & Security, Pratt & Whitney, and UTC Aerospace Systems. Otis is the world leader in manufacturing and installation of elevators, escalators, and moving walkways, and it introduced world’s first safety elevator in 1853. It maintains around 1.9 million escalators, moving walkways and escalators worldwide. In India, it is providing 670 elevators and escalators for Hyderabad metro which is largest contract in Indian history.

UTC climate control and security provides HVAC equipment and fire and security equipment (such as smoke detectors, CO alarms etc through its Kidde brand). Carrier which is a global HVAC manufacture is a part of this conglomerate. Refrigerated containers by Carrier are estimated to carry more than $6 billion worth of goods every day.

UTC Aerospace Systems was formed in 2012 by the merger of Hamilton Sundstrand and Goodrich. It is one of the world’s largest suppliers of aerospace components for businesses, military and space agencies. Its product were used in the Apollo landing on moon in 1969. Its products are used in nearly all aircrafts in the world.

Pratt & Whitney is a leader in the designing, manufacturing, and servicing of aircraft propulsion systems. It builds turbofan engines for all kinds of aircrafts – commercial, military and business, including helicopters. It also provides Turbofan engine for the Airbus A320neo. Its commercial engines are used in more than a quarter of all mainline passenger fleet. Its military engines are used in front line fighters such as F-15 Eagle, F-22 Raptor and F-35 Lightning, military transport such as C-17 Globemaster.

UTC is a global conglomerate. It earns more than 60% of its revenue outside the USA. It has a strong focus on sustainability. It managed to triple its business size since 1997 while reducing 34% greenhouse gases and 57% water consumption.

Revenue: $59.1 Bn

Profit: $4 Bn

Assets: $87.5 Bn


2. Siemens

Siemens is the world’s second largest conglomerate by revenue and has a global presence.


Image: flickr-photos/nostri-imago/

It has operations in various business segments including Healthcare, Power and Gas, Wind Power and Renewables, Energy Management, Digital Factory, Mobility and Building Technologies. Siemens was founded in 1847 by Werner von Siemens and has headquarters in Berlin and Munich, Germany. It earns most of its revenue outside its home country – 20% from Asia and Australia, 29% from Americas, 36% from Europe (excluding Germany), Africa, Common Wealth of Independent States and Middle East, 15% from Germany. It employs more than 348,000 employees (as of Sept’15) across the world including 114,000 employees in Germany.

It has a rich legacy of 168 years. In 1848, it built the first long-distance telegraph line in Europe – the 500km line between Berlin and Frankfurt. In 1881, its AC generator was used to provide world’s first electric street lighting (Godalming, United Kingdom). It opened its international office in Japan as early as 1887. On its dark side, it was associated with the Nazis during the World War 2. It owned a plant in one of the concentration camps.

It relies on innovation and engineering for its long term growth. It is a world leader in Wind energy. It started to operate world’s largest rotor for wind turbines in 2012. It has over 31,000 MW of wind power installed. It has an extensive focus on innovation. It expenditure in R&D was around $5 billion in 2015 alone employing 32,100 employees in R&D department which produced 7,650 inventions and 3,700 patents (FY 2015).

Apart for engineering products it also provides financial solutions for business customers. It provides support to costumer investments using financing as well as financing for equipment and leasing services.

Siemens had a partnership with Nokia which it ended in 2013 ending its role in the telecommunication business.

Revenue: $85.5 Bn

Profit: $6.5 Bn

Assets: $133.9 Bn


1. General Electric

This US multinational conglomerate was founded by the famous inventor Thomas Edison himself.


Image: company website

It was incorporated in 1892 in New York and was formed by the merger of Edison General Electric Company and the Thomson-Houston Company. It is currently headquartered in Fairfield, Connecticut, USA and has been a publicly listed company for a long time. It was part of the 12 companies that formed the then newly formed Dow Jones Industrial Average in 1896. After 120 years, it is the only company of the original 12 that were listed at that time.

Currently it operates in ten major industries such as Automotive industry, Aviation Industry, Chemical Industry, Food and Beverage Industry, Healthcare Industry, Industrial Manufacturing, Intelligent Environments (improve energy performance and reduce costs), Oil and Gas Industry, Power and Utilities, and Transportation.

General Electric initially started as a manufacturer of dynamos and electric lights and dynamos (to produce electricity). By 1895, it started to make electric locomotives and transformers creating its entry in the power and transportation industry. A year later when X-Rays were discovered, GE build the electrical equipment required for the production of X-rays starting its journey in the Healthcare industry. In 1905, it recognized that capitalization and cash flows are essential to doing business so it created a division to provide financing to small utilities. This became the precursor of GE’s commercial finance division. In 1940s, it made progress into the Aviation sector after it developed U.S.’s first jet engine. By the 60s, GE was one of the eight computer companies. Throughout its existence GE has been a company focused on innovation. Its current focus is to become a digital industrial company that provides analytical and digital solutions to decrease costs and thereby increase the profitability of other businesses.

Revenue: $122.4 Bn

Profit: $1.7 Bn

Assets: $492.7 Bn

 

Ranking Methodology:

The leading conglomerates of the world are taken for the analysis. Various parameters like revenues, profits and assets are taken for each company and they are given weightages of 50%, 40% and 10% respectively. Based on this a final score is calculated and the final rankings are created.

Top 10 Film Production Houses of Hollywood 2016

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In today’s world movies are one form of entertainment on which people spend a lot. They want quality entertainment and are willing to spend more out of their pocket if they get so. It is at this place where production houses put their maximum efforts and give audiences what they want. The top Hollywood companies include Universal studios, Beuna Vista, Warner Bros, 20th Century Fox & Sony / Columbia Pictures along with brands like Paramount / Viacom, Lionsgate, New line, Weinstein Company & Focus Features. Here is a list of the top 10 film production houses of Hollywood in 2016.


10. Focus Features

Focus Features is a wholly owned subsidiary of NBC Universal and has its corporate offices in California and New York.


Image: Wikimedia

It is a motion picture production, financing and distribution company that brings to the audience movies from rising and established filmmakers. It is committed to bringing the finest movies for the moviegoers from the world’s best moviemakers, and in 1991 James Schamus and Ted Hope formed a film production company named Good Machine in New York. In 2002 Good Machine was purchased by Universal and merged with USA Films and the name Focus Features was given to the combined enterprises. Principal subsidiaries of Focus include Rogue Pictures and Focus International Incorporation. Rogue Pictures was formed in 2004 and it produces and distributes suspense, action, comedy, thriller and urban entertainment. Focus Features markets films abroad through Focus International Incorporation.

Recently the company made an announcement of its merger with Universal Pictures and International Productions (UPIP) in order to form a global specialty brand. Once the merger is done Peter Kujawski, the managing director of UPIP, will lead Focus Features as the Chairman.

Some of the movie releases of Focus Features till June 2016 include London had Fallen, The Forest, Race, Ratchet & Clank, The Young Messiah, Puerto Ricans in Paris, Mr. Right, Term Life and Search Party. The future movie releases include Bastille Day, Kubo and the Two Strings, Kicks, The Book of Henry, A Monster Calls, Loving, Nocturnal Animals, The Zookeeper’s Wife, The Coldest City and A Little Game. Some of the best movie releases under Focus Features are Shaun of the Dead, External Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Hot Fuzz, In Bruges, Moonrise Kingdom, Brick, Lost in Translation, The Pianist, The World’s End and Eastern Promise.

Gross Earnings: $ 117.7 million


9. Weinstein Company

The Weinstein Company is a multimedia production and distribution company and has its headquarters in New York.


Image: company website

Two brothers, Bob Weinstein and Harvey Weinstein, who founded Miramax films in 1979 left it later and incorporated the Weinstein Company in 2005. Bob Weinstein and Harvey Weinstein are the co-chairman of the company, and Weinstein Company also owns Dimension Films and Radius-TWC. Dimension Films is a television and motion picture production studio. Initially it was founded to distribute horror films but later it began to cater to other genres of movies also. Some of the best movies released under Dimension Films include Scream series, Halloween series, Halloween H20: 20 years later, Bad Santa, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, From Dusk Till Dawn, Sin City, The Mist, 1408, Mimic and The Amityville Horror. Radius-TWC is a multi-platform VOD and theatrical distribution studio. It was founded by Jason Janego and Tom Quinn who are also the Co-President. Some of the short films released under its banner are Goodnight Mommy, Before We Go, When Animals Dream, Heaven Knows That, Adult Beginners, Monsters: Dark Continents, The Hunting Ground, Everly, The Last Five Years, The Great Invisible and Horns.

Movies that have been released in the current year by Weinstein Company are Sing Street, Jane Got a Gun, Regression, Clown and some of the movies to be released in the future include The Founder, Hands of Stone, Lion, Tulip Fever, The Six Billion Dollar Man and the Amityville: The Awakening.

Besides films Weinstein Company offers television production series. Some of the television series that are or were released under the production house of Weinstein Company are Marco Polo, Project Runaway, Mob Wives, War & Peace, Welcome to Myrtle Manor, Mob Wives Chicago, Supermarket Superstar, Big Ang and Under the Gunn.

Gross Earnings: $ 301.5 million


8. New Line Cinema

New Line Cinema, an American film studio, is a leading producer and distributor of films. It has its headquarters in California.


Image: company website

New Line Cinema was founded in 1967 by Robert Shaye, and it was acquired by Turner Broadcasting System in 1994 which itself was acquired by Time Warner in 1996. The New Line Cinema was finally merged with parent company Warner Bros in 2008, and Kevin Tsujihara is the incumbent Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. After its incorporation in 1967, New Line Cinema as a film distribution company mainly focused on supplying films for the college campuses in the United States. The initial focus of the company was on horror films, low budget movies and the ones that had limited mainstream audience. Pink Flamingos, Night of the Living Dead, Madame Rosa and Get Out Your Handkerchiefs are some of the initial movies that were distributed.

In early 1980s New Line decided to venture into production of the films along with its distribution and released its first movie Nightmare on Elm Street in 1984 which was an instant hit. Since then it has released many movies that earned it a lot of name in the industry. It also diversified into the television line. Semi-Pro was the last movie released as a separate company in 2008. Even after the merger with Warner Bros New Line Cinema remains a separate unit in terms of development, production, marketing, distribution and business affairs.

Some of the famous movies under its banner include The Lord of the Rings, Rush Hour, Dumb and Dumber, the Mask, Seven, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Mortal Kombat, The Golden Compass, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Final Destination, Spawn and Blade.

Gross Earnings: $ 337.4 million


7. Lionsgate

Lionsgate is a film production and distribution studio with the corporate headquarters in California. Lionsgate is domiciled in Canada.


Image: company website

It was formed in November 1997 with the merger of Lions Gate Entertainment Corporation and Beringer Gold Corporation, and it has approximately 650 full-time employees across the globe. John Feltheimer is the Chief Executive Officer and the divisions of Lionsgate include Lionsgate Movies, Lionsgate Television, Lionsgate At Home and Lionsgate Channels. The Lionsgate Movies division has generated an average of $ 2 billion in each of the past three years at the global box office. It has won 20 academy awards and has 90 academy award nominations. Some of the movies to be released in the current year are Cafe Society, Nerve, The Wild Life, The Woods, Deepwater Horizon, American Pastoral, Hacksaw Ridge and The Shack.

Lionsgate Television division provides premium content for cable and broadcast services and also streaming networks. It has 29 Primetime Emmy wins and 186 Primetime Emmy Nominations. Some of current television shows include Orange is the New Black, Greenleaf, Casual, Feed The Beast, Nashville, Deadbeat, Rocketjump: The Show and The Royals. Lionsgate At Home division provides packaged media and digital entertainment. The library contains all Lionsgate theatrical films, Lionsgate Television shows and home entertainment releases for Miramax, Studio Canal and many more. The Lionsgate Channels has partnered with nine branded channels around the world. This channel business was established in 2006 in order to extend growing content businesses. Pop (joint venture of Lionsgate and CBS Corporation), EPIX, Lionsgate BeFit, Defy Media, Kix and Thrill are some of the channels. On 30th June 2016 Lionsgate made an announcement of acquiring Starz for a combination of cash and stock totaling $ 4.4 billion.

Gross Earnings: $ 673.8 million


6. Paramount

Paramount is amongst the industry leaders in television and motion picture production. The company headquarters is in California.


Image: pixabay

It was founded in 1912 by Adolph Zukor as Famous Players Film Company. It is the longest operating studio in Hollywood and has now an experience of over a century in providing services from development to post production stages of TV and film entertainment and it became the first studio in Hollywood to start distribution of all films in digital form only from 2014. Paramount is a subsidiary of Viacom. Brad Grey is the Chairman and the Chief Executive Officer of Paramount. Paramount offer best in class lot locations and digital stages that allows one to create a set up resembling any part of the world. It has about 30 digital stages with 12 digital stages over 15000 square feet area. It has 8 stages with pits and 16 stages that are over 25 feet tall. In terms of lot location it has blue sky tank, stylish theatres, scenic parks, variety of shops, and architecture structure and facades. Along with these it provides a number of other services that makes it a one stop shop. These include production services, lighting services, grip services, transportation, art services and post production services.

Famous movies that have been released under its banner include Titanic, Paranormal Activity, the Wolf of the Wall Street, Rango, Shutter Island, The Godfather, Kung Fu Panda 2, Mission: Impossible, Iron Man, Forest Gump and Transformers. Some of the movies released in the current year include 10 Cloverfield Lane, 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi, Zoolander 2, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot and Everybody Wants Someone. Movies to be released in the future are Silence, Star Trek Beyond, Rings, Friday the 13th, Ghost in the Shell and God Particle.

Gross Earnings: $ 674.7 million


5. Sony Pictures

Sony Pictures Studios is a film and television studio and has its headquarters in Culver City, California.


Image: denofgeek

The history of Sony Pictures Studios dates back to 1918 when two brothers Harry and Jack Cohn partnered with Joe Brandt to form a company called CBC Film Sales to produce low budget short films. In 1990 Sony Corporation acquired Columbia Pictures Entertainment and a MGM lot and later renamed the studio to Sony Pictures Studio. Michael Lynton is the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Sony Pictures Entertainment. Sony Pictures Studios is one of the divisions of Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE). SPE is a subsidiary of Sony Entertainment Incorporation which in turn is a subsidiary of Sony Corporation based in Tokyo city. Sony Pictures Studios is one of the most sought after studios for motion picture production.

It offers services in the form of stages and locations, sound, picture, mastering and versioning and rentals. Besides Studios other two divisions are Sony Pictures Motion Pictures Group and Sony Pictures Television. Motion Pictures Group division includes Columbia Pictures, Screen Gems, Sony Picture Animation, Sony Pictures Classics, Tristar Pictures, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, Sony Pictures Imageworks and Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions. The Television division has a huge library of TV programs and motion pictures and has developed international networks with 150 channel feeds in 178 countries.

Some of the famous movies released by Sony are Spider Man, Skyfall, The Amazing Spider Man, Men in Black, Ghostbusters, The Da Vinci Code, Terminator, Casino Royale, 2012, Rambo, The Smurfs and Godzilla. Movies planned for future release include Equity, the Hollars, Sausage Party, When the Bough Breaks, Inferno, Elle, Patient Zero, Resident Evil: the Final Chapter, Life, Jumanji (2017) and Baby Driver.

Gross Earnings: $ 1028.3 million


4. 20th Century Fox

20th Century Fox is an American film studio and its headquarters is in Los Angeles, California.


Image: company website

It is a member of Motion Picture Association of America and is amongst the six major film studios in America. In 1915 William Fox formed the Fox Film Corporation by the merger of Greater New York Film Rental and Fox Office Attractions Company, and in 1932 Twentieth Century Pictures was formed by Joseph Schenck. In 1935 Fox film and Twentieth Century Pictures were merged to form the Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation. Jim Gianopulos is the incumbent Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. 20th Century Fox Studio services encompass production services, stages and exteriors, food services and special events and post production sound services. The production services department offers costumes, print services, paint shop, set lightning, staff shop and transportation, Stages and Exteriors include sound stages, stages-16 tank, avenue D and fox studios Australia. Food services and special events offers cafeteria, commissary and Moe’s cafe. Post production services include audio services, media services, screening rooms and sound mixing rooms.

Famous movies released under the banner of 20th Century Fox include The Martian, Home, Kingsman: The Secret Service, Spy, Taken, Fantastic Four, Poltergeist, Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb, Wild, Birdman, Rio, Life of Pi, Exodus: Gods and Kings and the Longest Ride. Some of the movies to come up in the future are Absolutely Fabulous: The Movie, Ice Age: Collision Course, Morgan, The Birth of a Nation, Trolls, Keeping up with the Joneses, Assasin’s Creed, Hidden Figures, Table 19, A Cure for Wellness and the Boss Baby.

Gross Earnings: $ 1422.2 million


3. Warner Bros

Warner Bros Entertainment Incorporation is a fully integrated entertainment company and has headquarters in Burbank, California.


Image: Wikimedia

It offers services in all forms of entertainment starting from creation, production, distribution, licensing and marketing stages. Warner Bros Studios is one of the most successful motion picture and television studios in the world, and it was incorporated in 1923 by the four Warner Brothers Albert, Sam, Harry and Jack L. Today it has a vast library of nearly 790000 of programming that includes 7500 films and 4500 television programs comprising thousands of individual episodes. Kevin Tsujihara is the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the company. The company divisions are Motion Pictures, Home Entertainment, Television, Consumer Products, DC Entertainment, Studios Facilities and Live Theatre. Motions Picture division is the core in creating value for the company.

It has domestic distribution team responsible for all operation in over 39000 screens in North America and an international team that takes care of the overseas business in about 30 countries. Home Entertainment division offers home entertainment content that includes Warner Home Video, Warner Bros. Digital and Warner Bros. interactive Entertainment. Television division. The Television division oversees the television business and the Consumer Products is related to all the merchandise business related to the characters that appear in the Warner Bros movies. DC Entertainment deals mainly in comics business whereas the Live Theatre division produces first class musicals and other stage productions.

The Dark Knight, Harry Porter series, The Hobbit, Inception, Man of Steel, The Hangover, Gravity, I am Legend, Batman, Twister, 300, Sherlock Homes, Happy Feet and Exorcist are some of the famous movies by Warner Bros production house. Movie releases for the future include Lights Out, Suicide Squad, War Dogs, The Accountant, Collateral Beauty, Live by Night, Chicken Soup for the Soul, King Arthur and Annabelle 2.

Gross Earnings: $ 1603.1 million


2. Walt Disney Company

Buena Vista is the brand name that was often used historically for the subsidiaries of Walt Disney Company.


Image: company website

The Company was established in 1923 as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio by Walt Disney and his brother Roy, and at Roy’s suggestion the company name was soon changed to Walt Disney Studio. The headquarters of the company is in Burbank, California and Alan Horn is the Chairman of the company. Walt Disney Studio bring to the consumers movies, music and plays. The movies are released through Walt Disney Animation Studio, Disneytoon Studios, Marvel Studio, Touchstone Pictures, Disneynature and Pixar Animation Studio. Marvel Studio is a division of Marvel Entertainment which is fully owned subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company. Marvel Studio produces movies based on iconic comic characters. The Disneynature engages audiences by films based on wildlife stories. The purpose behind these movies is to appeal to the audience to make a difference and conserve nature. The Walt Disney Music Group oversees the Walt Disney Records, Hollywood Records Labels and Disney Music Publishing. The Disney Theatrical Group looks after the live events business.

Famous movies released under its banner are Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Marvels’ the Avengers, Avengers: The Age of Ultron, Pirates of the Caribbean series, Iron Man, Captain America, The Jungle Book, Finding Nemo, The Lion King, The Guardians of the Galaxy, Sixth Sense, Ratatouille and Cars. Some movie to be released in the future are Pete’s Dragon, The Light Between Oceans, Doctor Strange, Moana, Born in China, Beauty and the Beast, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man Tells no Tales, Coco and Thor: Ragnarok.

Gross Earnings: $ 2280.2 million


1. Universal Studios

Universal Studios is an American film studio with one of the largest full service production facilities.


Image: Wikimedia

It was incorporated in 1912 in New York as Universal Film Manufacturing Company which was an alliance between Carl Laemmle’s Independent Moving Picture Company of America, The New York Motion Picture Company, Rex Motion Picture Company and Powers Motion Pictures. Currently the production studios are in California whereas the distribution and other corporate offices are in New York. Universal Studios is one amongst the Hollywood’s big six film studios and is a wholly owned subsidiary of NBCUniversal. Donna Langley is the Chairman Universal Pictures.

Movies and theme parks are the two main businesses of Universal Studios. It operates theme parks through the Universal Studios Hollywood, Universal Orlando Resort, Universal Studio Singapore and Universal Studio Japan. The Universal Pictures focusses on the mainstream moves whereas the Focus Features produces and distributes small films. It also provides DVD/Blu-Ray movies services and On Demand/Pay per view services. DVD/Blu-Ray Movies allows the audience to enjoy the movies in high picture quality print and Blu-Ray 3D allows to enjoy movies in 3D while sitting at home. On Demand/ Pay per view service allows the user to order films/events on a per view basis and includes the latest movie releases.

Movies well known under its banner include Jurassic World, Furious 7, Minions, Fifty Shades of Grey, Trainwreck, Insidious Chapter 3, The Visit, Unbroken, Everest, Jaws, Bruce Almighty, King Kong, The Mummy Returns, The Mummy and Hulk. Some of the movies to be released in the future are The Best Man Wedding, The Veil, Jason Bourne, Kicks, The Book of Henry, The Girl on the Train, A Monster Calls, Sing and Almost Christmas.

Gross Earnings: $ 2444.9 million

 

Ranking Methodology:

The leading film production houses of Hollywood were chosen for this ranking. The annual gross earnings for each company was taken, and the highest earner was ranked the highest & henceforth. And the final ranking was found.


Top 10 Smartphone Mobile Operating Systems (OS) in World 2016

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With the smartphone market growing by leaps and bounds every year, newer and advanced versions of smartphone operating systems are coming out. Here we present the list of the top smartphone operating systems in the world. The list includes Android, Windows Phone, iOS, Java ME, Symbian, Blackberry, Kindle, BADA, Samsung & LG. Here is the list of the top 10 smartphone operating systems in the world 2016. The list has been prepared according to the market share of the operating systems.


10. LG UX

Developed by LG electronics with its partners, LG UX is a touch interface.


Image: company website

The UX is internally being used by LG for providing advanced features on tablets and smartphones and the UX is not available to be licensed by third parties to use in their mobile phones. The UX is also formally known as the Optimus UI, and it is present on around 0.01% of all smartphones sold in the world. Optimus 4.1.2 is the latest version that has been released. It has been released on the Optimus Neo 3 and Optimus KII. Providing for voice shutter and quick memo, the new version features a more optimized and refined user interface.

In 2016, LG has announced the release of its LG UX 5.0 Marshmallow interface. The interface will be available for both all the upcoming LG smartphones also. The highlight of the new UI is the LG Friends Manager App. The app connects G5 to its friends’ modules and accessories. It first detects them automatically and downloads and installs the required apps from Play Store. The app displays a different control screen for every other LG friend. Upon pairing with the camera, the app displays the various shooting modes available on the smartphone. The app also lets the user easily manage the files and images through its interactive and user friendly app. Other advanced features like pinch based zooming, auto enhanced gesture selfie shots are the attractive additions in the UX. Another new feature of the interface is the combination of the app drawer and the home screen, which is being called the new LG Home. However, users who prefer the traditional style of the interface can also download the version of their choice and continue using it.

Market share = 0.01%


9. BADA

Bada is a smartphone operating system developed by Samsung electronics. The name Bada refers to the sea in the Korean language or the ocean.


Image: company website

The operating system is available for mid to high end smartphones, and the operating system reportedly has a 0.01% market share in the smartphone operating system market across the world. To enhance the installed user base of the operating system, Samsung has been pondering since 2011 to release the source code of the operating system and including devices like Smart TVs that support it. As Samsung’s Android based devices are branded under the name Galaxy, Bada based smartphones are branded as the Wave. However, Samsung has been reported to stop further development of the operating system and merge it with the Tizen project. According to Samsung, Bada is not an operating system but a kernel configurable platform architecture which can be used by a real time proprietary operating system or a Linux Kernel.

The beta version of the software was first released by Samsung in May 2010. It also started a developer challenge for a prize of $2700000 to attract talented developers and enhance the software. The version 1.0 of the SDK was released in August 2010. The first phone supporting the operating system was Samsung Wave S8500. Bada 2.0 version was released at the IFA Berlin in 2011 and had many features like WAC 2.0 compatibility, full HTML5 support, Adobe Flash Lite 4, Text to Speech, Smart wallpapers, new camera manager, new GUI and OpenAL.

The Samsung wave has a dedicated application store, Samsung Apps, which has over 2400 applications. This application store is also available for other Android based smartphones as well.

Market share = 0.01%


8. Kindle

Also known as Amazon Fire OS, Kindle is a mobile smartphone operating system based on Android.


Image: pixabay

It was developed by Amazon for use in its Kindle Fire tablets and Fire phones, and Fire OS is content driven with heavy advertising and content passing from Amazon’s website. In the beginning it was only a customized distribution of Android and Amazon later started referring to it as Kindle Fire with the release of third generation Fire tablets like the Fire HDX models and the Fire HD 2nd generation. The operating system commands a small market share of 0.01% in the world smartphone market. Kindle OS provides Amazon with a customized interface through which Amazon can advertise its content available through web services, Amazon Appstore, Amazon MP3 and Amazon Video.

The home screen of the OS displays the recently accessed apps and contents with the favorite apps pinned below it. Different types of apps for cooking, music, games, downloads are provided through Amazon’s contents. The users can search the Amazon store for related contents and products as well. Quick reading of notifications is facilitated by the sliding of the home screen from the top like in Android. GoogleReads, Facebook and other apps can be seamlessly integrated with the playback function of the operating system. The users can also look for supplemental information on the contents that they access. The OS system also features a parental advisory control with which parents can set restrictions for content access. Kindle Fire OS offers only authorized content from Amazon and do not offer services from Google Play Store. In lieu of Google’s applications like the Google Maps it offers services like Here Maps.

Market share = 0.01%


7. Tizen (Samsung)

The Samsung mobile operating system is also known as the Tizen. It is developed by Samsung along with Intel.


Image: flickr-photos/janitors/

Built on a Linux platform and Intel’s MeeGo, the operating system is open source like Android, and manufacturers can freely tinker and tweak it to enhance the interface and make the UI as unique as they might like. Samsung has also tried incorporating some of the better known features of Bada, its standalone operating system. The Tizen has a 0.03% market share as of 2016 in the world smartphone operating system market. Tizen is a good avenue for content creators as it is HTML5 based. It provides for shorter development life cycles, works seamlessly with the web and allows for creative development of applications.

For the users, it means lighter mobile applications and native support for video and in particular Youtube videos which can be run without downloading the plugins for the player. The Tizen is also dramatically similar to Android in terms of look and feel. Dynamic boxes and resize functionalities play a crucial role in the overall feel of the UI. Tizen also includes notifications that can be swiped down with a toggle bar and it supports integrated power saving, multitasking, firewall to keep out blocked sites and other features on contemporary Samsung phones. As for the apps, Tizen supports native and web applications and Bada apps were ported over into the Tizen app store when the two got merged. Samsung also started a Tizen app Challenge in 2013 in which it gave $4 million to some 60 odd developers who developed native apps for Tizen. This is one of the strategy that is employed by Samsung to keep the catalogue of apps full.

Market share = 0.03%


6. Blackberry OS

The Blackberry OS is the proprietary mobile operating system developed by Blackberry for its set of smartphones.


Image: flickr-photos/ulift/

The closed source code was initially released in 1999 for Blackberry pagers with the recent release in 2013. The unique feature of the operating system is the ability to multitask and supporting Blackberry unique hardware devices like the trackball, track wheel, touchscreen and trackpad. The Blackberry operating system is best known for its ability to synchronize seamlessly and wirelessly with mailing servers like Microsoft exchange server, Lotus. This ability has helped Blackberry to be the preferred brand amongst corporates when it comes to mobile devices. Black berry OS ceased to continue after the release of version 10 of the operating system but the support from Blackberry is still available. The operating system has a market share of 0.97% across the world mobile smartphone market.

Blackberry is also well known for its security and privacy standards with these features fortified by the anti-theft features which allows the device to be fully locked and frozen in case it gets stolen or lost. This feature ensures that the device cannot be activated or wiped by anybody else. Blackberry OS is also available on different devices like laptop, tablets etc. This enables the user to access their emails, notifications, messages across number of devices. It also provides access to both Android and Blackberry apps on Blackberry World and the Amazon Appstore. The Blackberry Personal Assistant is another popular feature of the operating system which is a voice based application that responds to user problems. The Blackberry Hub enables the users to quickly organize emails and messages without going inside them into different labels.

Market share = 0.97%


5. Symbian

Symbian is a smartphone operating system and platform for computing which was originally developed by Accenture on behalf of Nokia.


Image: Wikimedia

The operating platform was released in 1997 and was a result of the joint venture between Motorola, Ericsson and Nokia. Symbian reportedly reached a market share of 67% in the operating system market in 2006 when there were no real competitors, and even though it was a leader in the mobile OS market then, its complexity to code in Symbian C++ along with very high prices of APIs and SDKs rendered the operating system difficult to develop for. The operating system has been taken over by Google and its partners in 2010. The operating system is generally considered to be the pioneer in the smartphone market. The current market share of the smartphone operating system is around 0.97%.

AVKON was the native graphic toolkit in Symbian. It was designed like a keyboard mostly the 15 key keyboard and the QWERTY keyboard. The new Symbian had the Symbian^3 interface for advanced applications. Symbian^4 was scheduled to be released in 2010 but later it was cancelled by Nokia. Symbian was the first smartphone operating system to use the Web kit platform and had Opera as its default browser. Symbian was most noted for its localization of the phone language which allowed the application developers to customize applications according to the language of a given country or region. The latest version of Symbian supports around 48 languages. The applications for Symbian are mostly developed with Symbian C++ or Python.

Symbian is known among the users for its memory protection and pre-emptive multitasking. The strategy of developing the OS was threefold – concentrating on users’ security and privacy, not wasting the users’ time and make efficient use of scarce resources.

Market share = 0.97%


4. Java ME

The Java ME, also known as Java Micro Edition, is a platform designed by Sun Microsystems and was later acquired by Oracle in 2010.


Image: company website

Apart from mobile phones, it is used in industrial corridors and set-top boxes as well and the Java ME source code is under the GNU General Public Licensing and phoneme is the project name. The platforms of all Java ME versions are constrained to JRE 1.3 and are supposed to use class files up to that version only. The devices supporting Java ME implement a profile. A profile is a subset of configuration and there are two known configurations- Connected Device Configuration and the Connected Limited Device Configuration. The Java ME is popular with sub $200 handsets of Nokia and was also used in the Symbian and the Bada operating systems in the 2000s. The current market share of Java ME is around 2%.

Recently, Oracle has committed itself to make Java the backbone for Internet of Things. The new version of Java Me which is Java ME8, enhances the already existing lines of Java enabled technologies. Recently it has been combined with the Java SE 8 to optimize the platform for advanced mobile and computing platforms. The new features of Java ME are to improve developer productivity, create compact and space optimized virtual machines, an increase in performance from earlier Java versions by up to 50%, better looking GUI and applications and tools for monitoring the run-time performance of the system with incident failure reports.

The Java ME platform provides for a robust and flexible environment for developing applications on set-top boxes, blue ray players, M2M modules, disc players and printers as well.

Market share = 1.81%


3. Windows Phone

Initially released in 2010, Windows phone is a smartphone operating system designed by Microsoft Corporation as the successor to the Zune and Windows Mobile platforms.


Image: company website

A new interface derived from Metro design language is the new feature of the operating system. With the Windows Phone, Microsoft is planning to target the consumer market rather than the enterprise market and it has been succeeded by the Windows 10 Mobile platform which is one of the ways by which the company is enhancing the adoption of its Windows 10 operating system. It replaced Symbian as the primary mobile operating systems on Nokia phones when Microsoft and Nokia struck a deal in 2011. The deal was to rival the emergence of Android and iOS and its aim was to build a “global mobile ecosystem”. Following this, the deal was also integrating the use of Bing search on Nokia phones, integration of Bin Maps and Nokia Maps and merging of the Windows Store and Nokia store. After this, the first Windows Phone were the Nokia Lumia series that came out in the late 2011. The mobile operating system has around 3% of market share and is one of the most popular systems with Android and iOS.

The user interface in the Windows Phone is inspired by Zune. The Live Tiles make up the Start Screen and they are links to applications, functions, features and individual items. The tiles can be resized quite easily to suit the users’ choice. The operating system relies on multi touch technology and sorts a dark colored theme that supposedly enhances battery life because pixels emit less colors. The Internet Explorer is the default web browser for the Windows Phone with newer versions of the Phone using Microsoft Edge.

Market share = 3.26%


2. iOS (Apple)

Created and distribute exclusively by Apple Inc., iOS is the proprietary mobile operating system of Apple.


Image: pixabay

Released in 2007, the operating system presently has a 27.24% market share in the world smartphone operating system market and powers devices ranging from the iPhones, iPads, iPods to iTVs. The app store for iOS is known as the Apple Store and is the one of the most extensive app stores with over 1.4 million applications which have been collectively downloaded over 100 billion times. The interface for the iOS supported devices are based on direct manipulation with multi touch gesture controls. Sliders, controls, switches and buttons make up the interface control. The interface is controlled with tap, swipe, pinch and reverse pinch and these gestures have a specific context and definition within the iOS environment. Some applications also use the internal accelerometers to determine the shake speed of the device or the rotation of the device in the 3D environment. New versions of the software are released annually with the recent version being released in May 2016.

The features of the interface provided by iOS are quite popular among the users. The home scree shows a tile based view of applications with the dock below it where the users can pin their most frequent applications. The iOS interface layout can be customized as well and this process is termed as jailbreaking. The Spotlight feature was added in iOS 3.0 which allows the users to search apps, emails, contacts, videos. The famous Siri is a part of the Spotlight feature of the operating system. Multitasking was introduced in the iOS 4.0 version and is now available across all the devices of Apple. iOS provides for a multiplayer online gaming network as well, known as Game Center.

Market share = 27.24%


1. Android

The world leader in mobile and smartphone operating system in Android which is developed by Google and is built on a Linux kernel.


Image: flickr-photos/rbulmahn/

The operating system has mammoth market share of around 66% which is almost three times it nearest rival – iOS. The user interface is based on direct manipulation and uses real world gestures like tapping, swiping, pinching to interact with on-screen objects, and in addition to smartphones, Android is also developed for Android TV, Android Auto and Android Watch. Android leads other smartphone operating systems in any metric. The Android Play Store has over 1 million applications that have been downloaded over 50 billion times. It has a large developer base also with around 71% of developers around the world creating application for Android. As of 2015, Android has over 1.4 billion active monthly users.

Android was originally developed for Android Inc. which was bought by Google in 2005. Android is released by Google as open source. However, most of the devices based on Android come with proprietary software owned by Google for accessing Google’s services. The open source propagated by Android has resulted into a large developer community which delivers upgrades to older devices as well. One of the criticism for Android is that there is no centralized update server and system for Android and many phones fail to take advantage of upgrades. Android is also held up several patent wars between different companies due to its huge success.

Android based devices also use advanced mechanisms like gyroscope, accelerometers and proximity sensors. The home scree typically displays the applications and widgets and can be of several pages. Some smartphone manufacturers customize the look and feel of the interface to differentiate in the heavily contested smartphone market.

Market share = 65.58%


Ranking Methodology:

The rank wise list of the top 10 smartphone operating systems is made by ranking them on the basis of their market share.

Top 10 Banks in UK 2016

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Banking in the United Kingdom was emerged in the 16th century. Most of the top Banks in the UK were formed two decades ago. The Industrial Revolution and increasing international trade has been the primary reason for the burgeoned establishment of banks in the United Kingdom. Most of the banks provides retail and corporate banking services, Insurance and other financial services. The top banks in UK include Barclays, HSBC, Standard Chartered, Royal Bank of Scotland & Lloyds along with banking companies like HBOS, Bank of Scotland, Natwest, Santander & Nationwide. Here is the list of the top 10 banks in UK 2016.


10. Nationwide

Nationwide Bank was established in 1925, as The Ohio Farm Bureau Federation which was managed by Murray D. Lincoln, the longest served leader in the organization.


Image: flickr-photos/126066997@N07/

In 1955, the company changed its brand name to Nationwide Insurance, and in 1997, Nationwide went public. In 2009, Nationwide Corporation become the wholly owned subsidiary of Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company (Nationwide) purchase all the outstanding shares of Nationwide Financial Services. Nationwide is a Fortune 100 company that offers a wide range of Insurance and Financial services across United Kingdom. Nationwide is the United Kingdom’s second largest mortgage and savings provider. Nationwide’s common equity Tier 1 ratio and leverage ratio are the key measures of their financial strength. The cost income ratio is the key measure of their efficiency. Nationwide has been encouraging people across the country towards saving money.

In 2013, Nationwide became the first financial services provider to launch digital wallet facility to its customers in UK, which aims to offer better online shopping experience. Nationwide won the Gallup’s Great Workplace Award to the best performing workforces in the world consecutively for last 4 years. In 2016, The Nationwide was awarded the Mortgage and savings provider of the year. It was names in the top 50 employers for women’s list. Nationwide wins best Loyalty rewards for existing customers.

In 2015, Net interest income was 2861 mn Euro which is 458 mn Euro higher than the Net interst income of 2014. The increase in income was contributed by lower retail funding costs and growth in retail assets. The weighted average total assets increased by 2% as growth in retail assets is more than the offset by treasury assets and non-core commercial assets during the financial year.

Total Revenue: 2895 Mn Euro


9. Santander

In 2010, Abbey, Allliance & Leicester and Bradford & Bingley collaborated and rebranded as Santander UK.


Image: Wikimedia

In 2011, with their commitment to be the “Bank of Choice” for UK companies, Santander Bank introduced a breakthrough programme which brings funding, expertise and business support to high-growth SMEs. The purpose of the Santander’s group is to help people and prosper businesses. Their aim is to be the best retail and commercial bank. Santander bank has 121 million loyal customers, 1229 agreements with universities and academic institutions in 21 countries. Santander Bank offers various financial services which includes Personal banking, Corporate banking, Private Banking and Institutional Banking. Santander Bank strives hard to help their customers day by day through simple and tailor-made solutions that increase the customer loyalty to the bank. It also focus on fair and equal treatment of customers based on trust & excellent service by various financial services through its branches and digital channels. Santander Bank has a target of 18.6 million loyal customers by 2018 with specific programmes in all the countries the bank operates. It perceives that developing value propositions by customer type and having a long-term strategy is the way to increase customer loyalty in the bank’s core markets.

In 2015, Santander maintained an attributable profit of 5966 mn Euro with a market capitalization of 65.792 mn Euro. Santander Bank have helped UK home owners with mortgage gross lending of 7.1 bn Euro, of which 900 n Euro was provided to first-time buyers. In 2015, the customer loans has increased to 5.5 bn Euro which was driven by refinancing and origination activities related to syndicated loans, project and acquisition finance and transactional services.

Total Revenue: 3575 Mn Euro


8. NatWest

NatWest Bank was formed in 1968 by merger of National Provincial Bank and Westminster Bank, which was then named as National Westminster Bank.


Image: Wikimedia

In 2000, Royal Bank of Scotland group has completely acquired the Natwest for 21 bn Euro which was considered as the biggest acquisition in the British Banking Industry. In 1990s, financial service markets around the world has underwent massive change and started refocussing its activities, exiting from few markets. This refocus has made the bank to adopt the title NatWest. The NatWest group is consistently delivering on its plan to build a simple, strong and fair bank for both customers and shareholders. The operating segments are realigned to support the goal and reflect the progress. The activities of NatWest group are organized a Corporate Markets, Global Banking & Markets, UK Banking and Retail Markets. Global Banking is one of the leading banking partner to major corporations and financial institutions around the world, which provides wide range of debt financing, investment service and risk management to their customers. Retail arm of NatWest group provides a wide range of retail banking products and related financial services to individuals and corporates. UK banking focus provides banking, finance and risk management service to their UK customers.

In 2015, the total income of the Natwest Bank was 0.7 bn Euro less than the total income in 2014 which was due to the impact of reduced scale of Institutional and Corporate Banking business along with rundown of Capital Resolution. However, thebank observed improvement in deposit margins. The operating expenses in 2015 increased by 37% compared to the expenses in 2014. The group has exited substantially from the North American asset-backed products business.

Total Revenue: 6536 Mn Euro


7. Bank of Scotland

Bank of Scotland was founded in 1695 through an enactment by the Scottish parliament, which makes it first and the oldest bank of Scotland.


Image: geograph

In its journey of nearly three decades, Bank of Scotland acquired many companies which later consolidated to become the present Bank of Scotland. Bank of Scotland is a direct subsidiary of Llyods bank plc, which was set up mainly to help develop trade in Scotland with United Kingdom and other Low countries. The Bank of Scotland’s original shares were held by 172 Scotland’s political and merchant elite. The Bank of Scotland provides a wide range of financial products which includes saving and current accounts, loans, credit cards and mortgages in retail market, private banking, loans and capital products to commercial and business customers. The group and the bank established two types of hedge accounting relationships with their customers for interest rate risk namely fair value hedges and cash flow hedges. The bank exposed to fair value interest rate risk on its fixed rate customer loans.

In 2015, the Bank has identified an error in its accounting for an intra-group hedging transaction which the bank has been correcting retrospectively. The effect on this on the bank financials has been to decrease the total assets by 51 mn Euro. In 2015, The Bank of Scotland has earned a net interest income of 6,668 mn Euro and 465 mn Euro of net fee and commission income. It has incurred a loss of 22 mn Euro in Securities and other income and earned 93 mn Euro in net trading income.

Total Revenue: 7263 Mn Euro


6. HBOS

HBOS plc is a wholly owned indirect subsidiary of Lloyds Banking Group plc and also a direct subsidiary of Lloyds Bank plc.


Image: company website

The HBOS group provide a wide range of banking and financial services through its offices and branches in United Kingdom and countries all over the world. The revenue of the group is maily earned through interest and fees on a wide range of financial products which includes saving and current accounts, loans, credit cards and mortgages in retail market, loans and capital products to commercial and business customers and private banking. The most important risk associated with the group, which may create a huge impact over the group’s long-term strategic objectives are credit risk, regulatory risk, operational and people risk. HBOS group has been taking actions to mitigate these risks associated with the group’s success. In order to build a culture in which employees are empowered and inspired, the group assess progress of the employees and incentivize them for their commitment and contribution towards achieving the strategic goals of the group.

During the financial year 2015, the group has recorded a profit before tax of 2740 million Euro compared to 3550 mn Euro in the last financial year. Total income has decreased by 3 per cent compared to total income in 2014. Net interest income in 2015 was 6706 mn Euro, an increase of 172 mn Euro compared to 2014. The total assets of the groups were 41,777 mn Euro at the end of financial year 2015 which was 11 per cent lower compared to the total assets at the end of 2014.

Total Revenue: 7419 Mn Euro


5. Lloyds

Llyods bank was founded in 1765 by John Taylor and Sampson Llyod in Birmingham, United Kingdom.


Image: flickr-photos/126066997@N07/

For last 250 years, Llyods bank has been serving household, business and communities in Britain, and it offers range of financial products and services which included current accounts, loans, mortgages, savings and credit cards. In 1995, Llyods acquired Cheltenham and Gloucester building society which become the first ever association between a bank and a building society. In 2009, amidst of global recession, Llyods TSB acquired HBOS forming Llyods Banking Group. In 2013, Llyods Banking Group once again become two separate banks. The strength of the group is its rich and diverse heritage. To achieve its strategic vision to become Britain’s best bank for customers, the Llyods remain committed to serving customers and help to prosper Britain. Museum on the Mound was established in 2006 at Edinburgh, in the Scottish Headquarters of Lloyds Banking Group charts the history of banking in Scotland and display the theme of money in Art & design, trade, technology, crime, and security. Llyod Bank recognize the importance of engaging employees motivate them to deliver consistent and better results to achieve the strategic goals. With strong focus of women empowerment and improving the gender diversity in organization, Llyod bank employs 31% women in their senior management role.

The Retail banking segment of Llyod Bank provides current accounts, savings, loans and mortgages to small business customers in United Kingdom. The Retail banking function earns a 3514 mn Euro profit in the financial year 2015 which constitutes 44% of group profit. Commercial banking earns 2431 mn Euro profit which constitutes 31% of group profit. The Consumer Finance and Insurance contributes the remaining profit.

Total Revenue: 11482 Mn Euro


4. Royal Bank of Scotland

Royal Bank of Scotland was founded in 1727 in Edinburgh. Later, it went on to become one of the largest bank in Scotland.


Image: flickr-photos/ell-r-brown/

Royal Bank of Scotland is centred in United Kingdom and Ireland, focusing on providing their customers the best possible service, and it serves customers in Africa, Asia, Middle East and North America apart from European market. Royal Bank of Scotland believes its success of customers and communities makes them succeed in their business. In order to provide the service to the customers, Royal Bank of Scotland wants to become Stronger which is underpinned by resilient technology platform and capital strength, Simpler by reducing costs and improving efficiency and Fairer with an ambition to grow small business and become a bank with clear and upfront. Royal Bank of Scotland has opened four Entrepreneur Hubs across United Kingdom to enable entrepreneurs and small businesses to access free office space, mentoring and financial support. It has also planned to open five more hubs in 2016. The commercial bank has issued 12,500 statements of appetite letters to their customers which offers new borrowing facilities of up to 8 bn Euro.

Royal Bank of Scotland has been consistently striving to strengthen and reshape the balance sheet and building on a strong track record of delivery. It has reduced 32% Risk-weighted assets (RWAs) which includes the disposal of citizen’s Financial group and accelerated run-down of capital resolution. Commercial banking adjusted operating profit was declined by 6% at 1384 mn Euro which was primarily driven by marginal fall in income reflecting margin pressure and a Q4 loss of 34 mn Euro on the sale of non-strategic asset portfolios. Royal Bank of Scotland has planned a 3.5 bn Euro IT investment during the period of 2015 to 2017.

Total Revenue: 12151 Mn Euro


3. Standard Chartered

Standard Chartered Bank was established in 1969 by merging two separate banks, the Standard Bank of British South Africa and the Chartered Bank of India, Australia and China.


Image: Wikimedia

These banks had capitalized on the expanding trade among Europe, Africa and Asia. The Chartered Bank was founded by James Wilson in 1853, opened in Mumbai, Kolkata and Shanghai in 18588, followed by Singapore and Hong Kong, and the bank played a significant role in the development of trade with eastern nations. The standard Bank was founded in London by John Paterson, which was predominantly in financing the development of the diamond fields of Kimberley. Standard Chartered offers banking services which includes Retail banking, Corporate and Institutional banking across the world. Corporate and Institutional banking supports the British firms which operates significant level of trade abroad, opening the foreign markets to British firms and providing access to financial networks of Africa, Asia and Middle east nations. Standard Chartered UK, being a global financial centre and a key hub for the organization, provides a wide range of services to clients across the product groups of Transaction banking.

In 2015, the group has announced comprehensive changes to its strategies, leadership and structure with a vision to position the group for sustainable growth across geographies. The performance of the group in 2015 was poor in the aspects of key financial metrics and has seen a considerable material decline in share price along with decline in dividend. Standard chartered has received Excellent Service Award (EXSA) 2015 which recognize its commitment towards delivering quality service. Standard chartered Bank has received Global Finance World’s Best Internet Banks Award in 2013 and 2014. It has also received The Asian Banker Excellence in Retail Financial Services Awards in 2013.

Total Revenue: 13912 Mn Euro


2. HSBC

HSBC group operating model consists of 5 geographical regions, 4 global businesses and 11 global functions.


Image: flickr-photos/ell-r-brown/

The global businesses frame consistent business strategies across geographies and fuctions, and they also manage financial products and business propositions offered to all the customers around the world. The diversified business model of HSBC lays the foundation for their future progress and position the company well to deal with the challenging economic and financial conditions. In 2015, HSBC celebrated its 150th anniversary by recognizing staff and customers for their commitment and loyalty. HSBC also recognized its responsibilities to serve the community and to make the anniversary special, HSBC committed $150 mn of funding to the community projects across the geographies over three years. HSBC has contributed $25 mn to Cancer Research UK to support the scientists towards the development and construction of Francis Crick Institute. HSBC board had decided to remain headquartered at London, UK considering all the factors such as strategic focus on Asia and of careful analysis and assessment of economic, geopolitical, financial and regulatory factors across all the geographies it operates.

HSBC is standing in a better place with balanced portfolio which earn high return. The Universal banking model is generating higher income in collaboration between businesses along with operating expenses and capital ratio heading in the right path. In 2015, HSBC reported profit before tax as $18.9 bn up by 1% from 2014. The favourable movement in the growth includes lower fines, settlements, UK customer redress and a gain on the partial disposal of Industrial bank. In order to provide better return to the shareholders, HSBC has taken steps to reduce expenses and to reduce risk-weighted assets (RWA). Much of this saving have come from Global banking and markets along with commercial banking.

Total Revenue: 14918 Mn Euro


1. Barclays

Barclays is one of the biggest transatlantic corporate, consumer and investment bank.


Image: flickr-photos/dahlstroms/

Barclays has many portfolio in the banking market which produce significant returns to the company, and personal & Corporate banking and Barclaycard together generates significant share of the profit the organization yields. The company’s strategic actions bring the complete restructuring and emerge out as a simple and profitable company. The strategy of Barclay is to strength out as a transatlantic consumer, corporate & investment bank which will focus on two biggest financial centers of the world, London & New York. This strategy clearly defines the two divisions of the organization, Barclays UK and Barclays Corporate and International. Barclays UK include UK retail bank, customer credit card business and other traditional banking business. These businesses play a role of committed service provider to the people and business in UK. The business has 22 million retail customers and a million business banking credits. It is second largest wealth manager in UK and biggest card issuer in England. Barclays has almost 11 million card holding customers in UK.

The total assets of the company has decreased 238 bn Euro to 1,120 bn Euro. The cash and balances has increased to 51 bn Euro. During this financial year, the reverse repurchase agreements has been designated at fair value to align better to the way business manages functions. This has resulted in increase of 44 bn Euro in the account. The profit after tax of the group reduced 2% in the financial year 2015 to 5403 Mn Euro and the total operating expenses decreased by 6% to 16998 Mn Euro as a result of huge savings from strategic cost programmes implemented during the period.

Total Revenue: 24528 Mn Euro

 

Methodology:

In order to find the top 10 Banks in the United Kingdom, top 16 banks were chosen and its total revenue for each bank was calculated. The revenue will be income by interest and other such sources. The revenue was converted into million Euro to facilitate comparison.

The banks are sorted as per these total revenue in the financial year 2015 and found the Top 10 Banks in the United Kingdom.

Top 10 Tyre Companies in India 2016

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Tyre manufacturing industry is a key component of the auto sector. Currently there are 39 companies producing tyres with a combined annual turnover of Rs 53,000 crores and exports worth Rs 10,500 crores. It produces a wide variety of tyres ranging from 1.5 kg tyres used in Mopeds to giant 1.5 ton tyres used in Giant Earthmovers. These are used not just in passenger vehicles and commercial vehicles but fighter aircrafts of India Air Force as well. The top tyre brands include MRF, Apollo Tyres, Balkrishna, JK Tyre, Ceat & TVS Tyres along with companies like Goodyear, PTL Enterprises, Dunlop and Govind Rubber. Here is the list of the top 10 tyre companies in India 2016.


10. Govind Rubber Limited (GRL)

Established in 1964 by Late Mr. M.P.Poddar, this tyre manufacturer is headquartered in Mumbai.


Image: company website

It is a part of the USD 500 million Siyaram Poddar Group, famous as the manufacturer of Siyaram’s suiting and shirting brand. It manufactures tyres and tubes mainly for bicycle and auto to renowned Indian bicycle manufacturers such as Avon, Hero, and Atlas, and is a leading player in the segment. It is ISO 9001:2008 certifies and exports mainly to the European markets. Revenues from the export markets constituted approximately one-quarter of its total revenue.

Other companies in the group include GRL Tires Private Limited that will be used to develop and sell specialty tyres for agricultural, mining and industrial tyres. It has also entered into a jpin venture with a South Korean company to manufacture highly specialized rubber used in the rubber industry. It also established Laxmi Cement Udyog Private Limited to enter into the infrastructure business in Nepal. It even has a entertainment and media wing, PY Films Private Limited that is involved in film making and ad making.

Market Capitalization: Rs 35.82cr

Net Sales: 338.71 cr

Profit: Rs 0.35 Cr

Monthly Production: 3 million pieces (tires)/ 3.6 million (tubes)


9. Dunlop (Falcon Tyres)

Incorporated in 1973 and heaquarters in Mysore, this tyre manufacturer is now a part of the Ruia Group since 2005.


Image: Wikimedia

Tyres manufactured are marketed under the brand name Dunlop in India (Dunlop is an international brand operated by Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company). It produces tyres for passenger cars and two wheelers and its clients include Hero Moto Corp, Mahindra, Honda Motors, Scooters India etc. It is also holds certificates such as ISO 9001:2000, ISO/TS 16949:2002, ISO 14001:2004 and 18001:1999. It entered into an agrrement with the Japanes company, Sumitomo Rubber Industries Ltd to provide company access to latest international technology.

Most of the revenue earned by the company comes from sales to OEM manufacturers and sales in the replacement markets. Exports currently form only a small portion of the total revenue. As a result it is affected by changes in the cost of raw input material such as rubber and crude prices. For companies risk associated with exchange rate movement and changes in raw material is limted because export products tend to provide risk protection. Also since margins from exports are higher than the tyres sold in the domestic market, exports increase the profit of the company.

Market Capitalization: Rs 51.91 cr

Net Sales: Rs. 1208 cr

Profit: Rs 3.97 Cr

Monthly Production: more than 1 million tyres


8. PTL Enterprises Ltd

Incorporated in 1959, this tyre manufacturer is headquartered in Gurgaon.


Image: company website

It used to manufacture tyres under the Premier Tyres brand from its manufacturing facility in Kalamassery, Kerala. In 1995, it became an associate of Apollo Tyres ltd when its manufacturing facility was acquired by Apollo, and currently all production is carried out by Apollo Tyres using the manufacturing facility leased on long term basis. The fixed income from the lease has allowed it to expand in other business areas. This company diversified into the healthcare sector with wholly owned subsidiaries Artemis Health Sciences and Artemis Medical Services. As of now it is involved in tyre manufacturing only indirectly through Apollo tyres.

Risks to its future growth include the relatively old tyre manufacturing unit that uses old machinery. Therefore the rise of radial tyres in the commercial vehicle segment possess a business threat to the company. The company is building its healthcare division. However due to the long gestation period in this business it is yet to realize the fruits of its investment.

Market Capitalization: Rs 820 cr

Net Sales: Rs. 40 cr

Profit: Rs 15.05 Cr


7. GoodYear

Founded by Frank Seilberg in 1898, this American multinational company is headquartered in Akron, Ohio.


Image: Wikimedia

Its presence in India is more than 90 years old, with two plants operating in India – Balagarh and Aurangabad. It supplies tyres to many OEMs in the passenger car segment, and also it has been a pioneer in introducing tubeless radial tyres in India, with a strong presence in the tyre market. It also supplies to all major tractor companies. As a result it expects its revenue to increase as tractor usage in India matches with the global average and the increasing mechanization of agriculture.

Its recent financial performance was affected by the slow growth in the agricultural sector as a result of poor monsoon which resulted in poor growth in tractor sales. However this was somewhat compensated by the increase in the growth of passenger car segment. Also to improve the financial performance the focus was kept on decreasing costs by improving efficiency, using the strong brand image to drive sales in the replacement market, and expansion marketing and distribution channels.

It benefitted from fall in the commodity prices that led to decrease in the cost of key input materials and also lower inflation that increased the demand for its products. The company benefits from the research and development carried out by the parent company in USA and the adoption of other technologies developed by its sister subsidiaries in other countries. It adopted technical innovations made at Goodyear’s Innovation centers in Luxembourg and Akron. This helped it to launch new products in the Indian market. Currently it has imported the technology to make radial farm tyres and bias farm tubeless tyre.

Market Capitalization: Rs 1780.95cr

Net Sales: Rs. 1611 cr

Profit: Rs 101.24 Cr


6. TVS Tyres

This company is a part of the TVS Auto ancillary Group, USD 6 billion turn over group founded by T.V. Sundaram Iyengar in 1911.


Image: company website

Headquartered in Chennai, it has state-of-the-art manufacturing facilities in Madurai (Tamil Nadu) and Rudrapur (Uttarakhand), and has a prominent name in the tyre industry. It manufactures a variety of products such as two and three wheeler tyres, farm equipment tyres, floatation tyres. It is a leading supplier to many Original Equipment Manufacturers such as Bajaj Auto, Hero Motocorp, Yahama India, Mahindra two wheelers and its own TVS Motors. The recent growth in the sales of two wheelers has allowed it to expand its business and add more production capacity. It is facing increasing competitive pressure from the interest of large tyre manufacturers into the two wheeler tyres category as well as import of cheap tyre products from China.

Its sales growth in the domestic market is primarily driven by its increase share of business with the major tyre manufacturers and its increased penetration in the two wheelers premium segment tyre market. For increasing the sales it also focused on the tyre replacement market. This was done by increasing the brand visibility and top of the mind brand recall. To achieve this it participated in various international shows and increased spending on marketing efforts. It also hired skilled professionals to manage its sales promotions.

The operations of this company were adversely affected by the recent power situation in Tamil Nadu. Although the situation has improved it remains a cause of concern for the company.

It exports mainly to USA, Europe, South America, Africa and Australia. The company expects to use the export opportunities to improve the bottom line (net profit).

Market Capitalization: Rs 1780.95 cr

Net Sales: Rs. 1899 cr

Production: 11 million tyres annually

Profit: Rs 103.79 Cr


5. CEAT

Established in 1958 and headquartered in Mumbai, it is the flagship company of the RPG Enterprises which acquired CEAT in 1981.


Image: company website

Apart from being one of the leading players in the Indian tyre industry with a market share of 12%, it exports to more than 110 countries across all continents, Middle East and South Asia being two key markets, and it manufactures more than 95,000 tyres per day for all types of vehicles – Cars, motorcycles, autos, trucks and tractors. It earns 50% of its revenue from the truck and bus and specialty/farm tyre vehicles. It combined manufacturing capacity is 800 MT/day across plants in Halol, Nashik, Bhandup (Mumbai) and other outsources capacities. It also has a research and development facility in Halol that allows it to develop new products for the markets.

It has a focus on market share expansion and expand into more profitable segments and create a strong brand name in domestic as well as international markets. It was ranked among Asia’s Top 100 marketing brands by World Consulting and Research Corporation (WCRC). It sponsored the MTV Chase the Monsoon season 3. It collaborated with Party Hard Drivers to promote safe driving. It is also associated with cricket through the CEAT cricket ratings.

Also it focusing on new products to differentiate itself. In the Italy market, it launched CEAT Ecodrive and CEAT SecuraDrive. While the former is designed for low rolling tyre resistance required during city driving the latter is developed for higher wet grip to enhance safety during highway driving. Also the new low rolling resistance patterns on tyres for hatch backs and entry level sedans claim to save as much as 7% on the fuel consumption. It developed a special tyre product, Milaze, for Toyota Innova that can last upto 100,000 kms. It has developed its Pro Gripp line of tyres that aim to enhance the stability and grip of scooters.

Market Capitalization: Rs 3540 Cr

Net Sales: Rs. 5591.66 Cr

Production: 800 MT/day

Net Profit: Rs 299 Cr


4. JK Tyre

JK Tyres and Industries, a part of the J.K. Group of companies, was established in 1974.


Image: company website

It started manufacturing tyres in 1977 starting with 0.5 million tyres produced per year, and currently it has a capacity of more than 16.6 million tyres per annum across its manufacturing facilities in India and Mexico. It has six manufacturing units in India – 3 in Mysore (Karnataka), 1 in Banmore (Madhya Pradesh), 1 in Kankroli (rajasthan) and 1 in Chennai (Tamil Nadu). It acquired Mexican tyre major Tornel in 2008 that has 3 manufacturing plants in Mexico with a combined capacity of 6.6 million tyres per year. Its total production capacity stands at more than 20 million tyres per annum. It allows it to acquire additional manufacturing at low cost. Also it allows it to easily access the US and Canadian markets along with other emerging Latin American markets as a result of the NAFTA agreement (North Atlantic Free Trade Agreement).

It also acquired Cavendish Industries Limited (CIL) in Apr, 2016 that gives JK Tyres entry into the two and three wheeler category. It earns 80% of its revenue from the Truck segment (Truck – 67%, Light Truck – 12%).

Its customer include all the Original Equipment Manufacturers in India along with replacement market for vehicles. It exports to over 100 countries across the world. It has a constant focus on product quality and R&D. It was the first tyre company in Asia to receive ISO 50001 (for energy management system) and second in the world. It multiple collaborations with universities including IITs. Its own R&D center, called HASETRI for Elastomer & Tyre R&D, is the Asia’s first and India’s biggest research centre.

Market Capitalization: Rs 2067 Cr

Net Sales: Rs. 5895 Cr

Production: 1770 MT/day (plus 340 MT/day in Mexico)

Net Profit: Rs 401 Cr


3. Balkrishna Industries

This Indian tyre manufacturer is a leader in the specialty tyre segment which includes off the road (OTR) vehicles such construction vehicles and agricultural vehicles.


Image: company website

It supplies tyres to all heavy vehicle manufacturers such as John Deere, JCB and CNH Industrial. It earns 90% of its revenues from exports it caters to mostly the replacement tyre market in Europe and North America (Europe accounts for 53% of all geographical sales). It earns 62% of its total sales from agriculture sector and 34% from the Off the road (OTR) segment. It was founded in 1987 and it is headquartered in Mumbai. It has 4 manufacturing sites located in Aurangabad, Dombivali (Mumbai), Bhiwadi and Chopanki. A 5th unit is coming up in Bhuj, Gujarat which will increase the total capacity to 300,000 MT per year. It is located to port and it has a captive power plant that will lead to cost savings and higher operating efficiencies as a result of easy access to raw material and markets. It will also manufacture tyres for large mining equipment to improve profit margins.

It will also optimize its product mix of agricultural tyres and industrial and OTR tyres to penetrate the larger OTR tyre market. Also the current market trend is towards the radial tyres, the Bhuj plant will allow it take advantage of this trend.

Its competitive advantage compared to global players relies on the availability of low cost of labor in India and in-house mould facility that increases the conversion cycle of tyres. Future growth is expected to result from entering into new markets and better utilization of manufacturing plants. Export markets are very important for the company. It generated more than 85% of its revenue through exports.

Market Capitalization: Rs 6492 Cr

Net Sales: Rs. 3778 Cr

Net Profit: Rs 488 Cr


2. Apollo Tyres

This Gurgaon (now Gurugram) based tyre company was founded by Mathew T Marattukalam in 1972.


Image: company website

It is the world’ 17th biggest tyre manufacturer with a turnover of $ 2 billion in FY 2014-15, and its products are available in over 100 countries. It has manufacturing facilities in India (Gujarat, Kerala, Tamilnadu), Africa (Zimbabwe and South Africa) and Europe (The Netherlands). It has invested in a new production facility in Hungary. It currently owns five key brands – Apollo, Vrendestein, Kaizen, Maloya, and Regal. While the first two comprise of tyres for passenger and commercial vehicles, the remaining 3 brands are category specific. Kaizen and Regal are manufactured for truck-bus segment while Maloya is manufactured only for passenger vehicle category. Apollo doesn’t manufacture tyres for the 2 or 3 wheeler vehicle segment.

It has a very strong distribution network in India and Europe, with approx. 5,000 retailers in India and over 9,000 sale points in Europe. It has a target of earning 60% revenue from international operations and remaining 40% from India. It is targeting key emerging markets around the world such as the ASEAN region, Latin America, Middle East and others.

It launched the “Go the distance” challenge in 2014 with Manchester United in which fans and players showcase their football skills and get season tickets or a signed match-worm shirt from one of the Manchester United team players.

It is facing competition from the cheap Chinese tyres in India. Therefore it is relying on better product mix and improvements in operational efficiencies to bring down cost. As a result although it reported loss in sales growth it was able to increase its net profit by 12% this year. It is also planning to launch tyres for 2 wheelers to become a full range player.

Market Capitalization: Rs 7686 Cr

Net Sales: Rs.12,726 Cr

Production: 1640 MT/day

Net Profit: Rs 978 Cr


1. MRF

Topping this list is the Chennai based tyre company Madras Rubber Factory commonly known as MRF.


Image: company website

It was started as a toy balloon manufacturing unit in 1946 by KM Mammen Mappilai at Tiruvottiyur, Madras (Chennai). Later it ventured into manufacturing of tread rubber leading it to become the undisputed leader in the Indian Tyre industry with a strong brand presence and excellent marketing. It started to export tyres to international market way back in the 60’s. At present it has presence across 65 different countries and it operates 6 interdependent production facilities.

MRF holds record for the most expensive stock price. In Aug 2015 it crossed the price of Rs 45,000 per share. Even today its current stock price is near Rs 32,000 per share. MRF has manufacturing facilities in Kottayam (Kerala), Medak (Telangana), Arakonam and Perambalur (Tamil Nadu). Apart from this it manufactures toys in Goa and paints and coats at two facilities in Chennai (Tamil Nadu). It has products for Heavy Duty trucks/buses, passenger cars, farm services, military services, fork list and others.

Apart from products it is also moving towards services related to tyres. It operates MRF Tyredrome that provides services like robotic wheel alignment, nitrogen filling and others. It also operates a NGO named MRF Institute of Driver Development that has trained drivers to drive safety. Till now over 2000 LCV and 700 HCV drivers has been trained.

MRF is commonly known for its multiple endorsements in Cricket. It has been the bat sponsor of famous batsmen including Brian Lara, Steve Waugh and the legendary Sachin Tendulkar. Currently it sponsors Virat Kohli, Shikhar Dhawan. It was the Global sponsor for ICC Cricket World Cup 2015. Apart from cricket, MRF is involved in Formula One and other motorsport events such as racing, karting, rallying. It also manufactures toys under the Funskool brand name with collaboration from Hasbro.

Market Capitalization: Rs 13554 Cr

Net Sales: Rs.13, 197 Cr

Production: 1640 MT/day

Net Profit: Rs 898 Cr

 

Ranking Methodology:

The major tyre manufacturing companies in India have been ranked according to their market capitalization.

Top 10 Automobile Companies in USA 2016

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The Automotive industry has some of the heritage companies, automobiles of which people world over follow. The leading car brands in USA include not only American brands but also global car manufacturers which have an excellent market across the country. The top automobile brands in USA include General Motors, Toyota, Ford, Fiat Chrysler & Honda Motors along with car companies like Nissan, Daimler (Mercedes-Benz), Hyundai, Subaru and BMW. Here is the list of the top 10 automobiles companies in USA 2016.


10. BMW

BMW of North America, LLC is a subsidiary of iconic German luxury carmaker BMW.


Image: pixabay

Set up in 1975 as the importer of BMW luxury/ performance vehicles, BMW of North America started the business with BMW motorcycles in 1980, and has become a popular luxury car brand across America. Likewise, the company also began its operation in distributing light weight trucks in 1999. BMW of North America‘s corporate headquarter is situated in Woodcliff Lake, New Jersey. The Vehicle Preparation Center of BMW NA is located in Port Jersey, NJ and Regional Distribution Center is situated in Nazareth, PA. The company’s Eastern Regional Headquarters and Technical Training Center is in Woodcliff Lake, New Jersey

A key subsidiary of BMW, BMW of North America provides marketing, sales, and financial services through just about 900 dealerships and motorcycle retailers. The organization imports and produces BMW brands, for example, the 1, 3, 5, 6, 7 Series; the X5, X6, and M Series models; and the MINI and Rolls-Royce brands. Styles include coupes, convertibles, sedans, roadsters, sports activity, and luxury vehicles. The company has a distribution network of almost 340 BMW passenger car and sports activity vehicle centers, 120 MINI passenger car dealers, more than 30 Rolls Royce dealers and about 140 motorcycle retailers.

BMW is pushing forward with a few tasks that will advance toward the US throughout the following couple of years. Electric models, known as Project i vehicles, are being sold in the US, following a 2013 market release. The new cars are advertised under the electric i3 and i8 model names.

Revenue (in bill $)= 3.045

Profit (in bill $)= 0.221

Unit Sold (in million units) = 0.4776


9. Subaru

Established in 1968, Subaru of America, Inc. (SOA) is the U.S. Sales and Marketing auxiliary of Fuji Heavy Industries (FHI) of Japan.


Image: Wikimedia

It is responsible for the marketing, sales, distribution and administration of Subaru vehicles in the United States. Equipped with one of a kind SUBARU BOXER motor on all models and Symmetrical All-Wheel Drive on most, the Subaru product line is famous for strength, dependability, footing and "active security,". As a result, in United States market, the company has one of the highest repurchase-loyalty ratings. Today, the Subaru product line includes Impreza, Legacy, Outback, Forester, and Crosstrek.

Subaru of America, Inc. moved to its present Cherry Hill, NJ, office in 1986. The $18 million, 115,000 square-foot, seven-story structure serves as the organization's national central location lodging around 300 individuals in Finance, IT, Marketing, Sales and Product Planning. The organization markets Subaru vehicles, parts and accessories through a system of around 600 retailers over the United States.

Subaru’s operation center is situated in Pennsauken, NJ. This 59,000 square foot building houses about 200 representatives from Customer Loyalty, Parts, Service, Government Relations, Training and Financial Services Departments. SOA has three regional and 12 zone offices that support local sales, supplier and retailer relations activities. Subaru operates 5 distribution centers all through the United States supporting Subaru retailer parts and accessories needs in the US and western Canada. The distribution centers are situated in Florence, NJ; Douglasville GA (close Atlanta); Whitestown IN (close Indianapolis); Aurora CO (close Denver); and Portland OR. The company employs more than 100 individuals utilized at our distribution centers.

Revenue (in bill $)= 4.234

Profit (in bill $)= 1.7484

Unit Sold (in million units) = 0.57


8. Hyundai

Headquartered in Fountain Valley, CA, Hyundai Motor America is a subsidiary of Hyundai Motor Co., Korea.


Image: flickr-photos/nrmadriversseat/

Started in 1968, Hyundai's automotive history began when they trained with Ford Motor Company, and have ever since become a leading player in the American car industry. Initially, Hyundai set up its US headquarters in Garden Grove, California, while the Hyundai American Technical Center, Inc was set up in Chino, California in 1985. Hyundai Excel was the first car to be exported to the United States. Hyundai Motor America is responsible for distribution of Hyundai vehicles all through the United States. The vehicles are sold and overhauled through more than 800 dealerships across the country. Designed in California, engineered in Michigan and manufactured in Alabama, more than a half portion of the vehicles offered domestically are built in the United States.

The company has a mechanically advanced assembling office in Montgomery, Alabama, building offices in Michigan, in addition to outline, research, and testing grounds in California. In all, Hyundai Motor America employs around 5,000 employments to American car laborers. Add to that total, the company employs more than 32,000 representatives at Hyundai dealerships and 6,000 specialist workers are utilized by their different vendors.

Hyundai Motor America (HMA) manufactures, sales and services the Elantra, Sonata, and other Hyundai vehicles for the US market. Its Hyundai Motor Manufacturing office, a standout amongst the most developed in North America, is in charge of delivering more than half of the Hyundai cars sold in the US. The organization likewise operates research facilities, engineering and design. HMA distributes Hyundai vehicles across the nation, which are sold and serviced through a system of more than 820 dealerships. The organization represents almost 30% of its South Korean parent’s sales.

Revenue (in bill $)= 21.70

Profit (in bill $)= 1.35

Unit Sold (in million units) = 1.4256


7. Daimler (Mercedes-Benz)

Mercedes-Benz USA, LLC is a subsidiary of Daimler AG, which is engaged in the marketing and distribution of Mercedes-Benz, smart as well as Sprinter vehicles in the United States.


Image: pixabay

It offers SUVs and wagons, sedans, coupes, convertibles and roadsters, and hybrids and electric vehicles. Mercedes-Benz USA, LLC was once in the past known as Mercedes-Benz of North America, Inc, and the organization was established in 1965 and is headquartered in Montvale, New Jersey with an extra office in Long Beach, California. In 2015, MBUSA accomplished the most astounding yearly deals volume in its history with 400 thousand units sold for the Mercedes-Benz brand, representing a 3.8% rise over 2014 sales. Sprinter Vans accomplished a yearly deals aggregate of 29,889 increasing 16.1%. Including 7,484 units from smart, Mercedes Benz USA's year-end-sales hit an untouched record of 468,461 vehicles, expanding 3.8% from the previous year.

By 1957, Mercedes-Benz was in a position to extend its range in the United States and went into a distribution agreement with Studebaker-Packard Corporation. After eight years, the organization struck restructured, forming Mercedes-Benz USA.

Mercedes Benz USA has developed into a nation-wide organization, now employing more than 1,600 individuals. The organization also has 368 related dealerships that utilize more than 22,000 individuals themselves.

Revenue (in bill $)= 40.461

Profit (in bill $)= 3.43

Unit Sold (in million units) = 0.468


6. Nissan

Nissan North America, Inc. works as a subsidiary of Nissan Motor Co. Ltd.


Image: pixabay

Nissan started to sell automobile vehicles in 1958 in USA and started bringing in Datsun cars in USA under the name of Nissan Motor Corporation, USA (NMC), in 1960. In 1990, Nissan North America Inc (NNA) was made to facilitate the majority of Nissan's different exercises in North America to improve the design, manufacturing, development, and sales & marketing of Nissan vehicles. In 1998, the two companies merged operations under the name of Nissan North America, Inc. Nissan North America is headquartered in Franklin, Tenn and it’s operations incorporate automotive styling, engineering, Sales and Marketing, consumer and corporate financing as well as distribution and manufacturing for the United States, Mexico and Canada.

The company offers different cars, for example, electric cars, sedans, sports cars, hybrids and SUVs, crossovers, minivans and vans, trucks and commercial vehicles, and different accessories. With production plants in Smyrna and Decherd, Tennessee; and Canton, Mississippi, the company has subsidiaries in San Diego, California.

Nissan has been recognized every year by the U.S Environmental Protection Agency as an ENERGY STAR Partner of the Year since 2010 for their commitment to enhance the earth through the Nissan Green Program.

Nissan North America designs, engineers and produces vehicles through its plant in the US. It manufactures popular models such as Altima, Maxima, Pathfinder, Quest, Frontier, Murano, Sentra, Titan, and Xterra. The organization distributes and sells Nissan's electric and fuel controlled forklifts through Nissan Forklift.

Revenue (in bill $)= 45.41

Profit (in bill $)= 1.130

Unit Sold (in million units) = 1.6716


5. Honda

The American Honda Motor Company, Inc. (AHM) is a North American subsidiary of the Honda Motor Company, Ltd. It was established in 1959.


Image: flickr-photos/30474136@N07/

The organization is situated in Torrance, California, and essentially, the organization combines product sales and services functions of Honda in North America, and sells of Honda and Acura cars, bikes, scooters and all-terrain vehicles. American Honda Motor manufactures cars, trucks, bikes, planes and power equipment in the US. Around 1.8 million vehicles are produced every year through 16 manufacturing plants in North America. American Honda also operates 14 innovative R&D work offices and design centers. In addition to that, it also builds motors, transmissions, gear sets, and ATVs. The company also administers the export of 15 unique models of US-made Honda and Acura items to more than 100 nations.

The organization provides customized/ personalized services, for example, support plans, maintenance schedules and online payments to its members; and finance options. It offers its items through vehicles, motorcycles, and power-equipment dealerships in the United States.

The models included in the Honda-brand automobile are: Accord, Civic, CR-V, Element, Odyssey, FCX Clarity, and Pilot. Honda claims to be firsts for a Japanese car maker in the United States in several segments: Claims to be first to create a subsidiary in the US market and sell its vehicles in the country, and the first to design and manufacture automobiles in North America.

Revenue (in bill $)= 48.71

Profit (in bill $)= 1.29

Unit Sold (in million units) = 1.812


4. Fiat Chrysler LLC

Fiat Chrysler was established in 2014 through the merger of Fiat (established in 1899) and Chrysler (established in 1925).


Image: Wikimedia

The Group's car brands are: Abarth, Alfa Romeo, Chrysler, Dodge, Fiat, Lancia, Jeep, SRT and Maserati, as well as Mopar, the parts and service brand. Comau (production systems) and Magneti Marelli (components) are group’s other businesses. FCA US designs, engineers, produces, and sells vehicles under the Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep, Ram and FIAT brands, and SRT performance vehicle designation. The organization is also involved in distribution of Alfa Romeo 4C model and Mopar items. FCA US is expanding upon the notable establishments of Chrysler, the creative American automaker first established by Walter P. Chrysler in 1925; and Fiat, established in Italy in 1899 by spearheading business visionaries, including Giovanni Agnelli.

Based on total annual sales, FCA is the seventh-biggest automaker in the world. FCAU is the listed symbol of FCA on the New York Stock Exchange.

Chief Executive Officer and administrator – Sergio Marchionne.FCA US: Is overseen by a Board of Directors that gives oversight to the Company. Fiat Chrysler LLC has 2.7 Million FCA-NAFTA vehicle shipments from US. It has 37 manufacturing facilities, 12 regional centers and 22 parts distribution centers. In all, the company has 81,685 employees and 8 training & test facilities.

Revenue (in bill $)= 80.61

Profit (in bill $)= 4.8

Unit Sold (in million units) = 2.628


3. Ford Motor Company

The Ford Motor Company (ordinarily called just as Ford) is an American multinational automaker. It is headquartered in Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit.


Image: Wikimedia

It was established by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903, and the organization offered cars and commercial vehicles under the Ford brand while most of the luxury cars were under the Lincoln brand. The Company's chief business includes designing, engineering, manufacturing, Financing and marketing a line of Ford cars, trucks, sports utility vehicles (SUVs), and electrified vehicles. The Company works in two divisions: Automotive and Financial Services. The Company has more than 70 plants over the world. Through its entirely owned subsidiary Ford Motor Credit Company LLC (Ford Credit), it gives car financing products to and through car dealers all through the world.

The Company's North America section includes the offer of Ford and Lincoln vehicles, administration parts, and accessories in North America (the United States, Canada, and Mexico). The majority of its vehicles, parts and accessories are sold through dealers and wholesalers, which are independently owned. The Company also sells vehicles to its dealerships available to be purchased by fleet customers, including commercial clients, government and daily rental car organizations. The company also sells parts and accessories, basically to its dealerships (which in turn sell these products to retail customers) and to authorized parts dealers (which then sell these products to retailers). Additionally, the firm also sells extended service contracts.

The Company contends with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, Honda Motor Company, PSA Peugeot Citroen, Hyundai-Kia Group, General Motors Company, Toyota Motor Corporation, Renault-Nissan B.V., and Volkswagen AG Group.

Revenue (in bill $)= 91.9

Profit (in bill $)= 7.6

Unit Sold (in million units) = 2.856


2. Toyota Motors USA

Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A., Inc. (TMS) is a North American subsidiary of the Toyota Motors Company.


Image: Wikimedia

Established in 1957 in California, TMS right now utilizes more than 6,500 individuals and has a strong brand presence not only in USA but also a leading global player. Headquartered in Torrance, California, the company headquarter supervises 14 regional offices, and the company plans to move its headquarters to suburban Dallas, Texas in the coming few years. The subsidiary is the sales, marketing and distribution arm for Toyota Motor's Toyota, Lexus, and Scion brands. A larger part of Toyotas sold in the US are also manufactured in the US. Those models include Avalon, Camry (the US's top-offering vehicle), Sequoia, Highlander, Sienna, Tacoma, Venza and Tundra. Toyota Motors USA is responsible for sales, marketing, and service of its cars, SUVs, light trucks and cross breeds in 49 states. The distribution is channeled through 1,500 dealerships all in the US. The organization's TRD (Toyota Racing Development) U.S.A. division design, engineers and assembles engines, manufactures chassis and develops other technology for Toyota-sponsored race cars.

The sports utility vehicles that the company sells in North America include the Sequoia, the FJ Cruiser, Land cruiser, the 4Runner, the RAV4 and the Highlander as well as the Tundra and Tacoma. In the United States, Toyota offers the Scion tC, which is a sports model for young drivers. Toyota offers the LFA model under the Lexus brand as the sports model. Additionally, the company also sells the 86 (called Scion FR-S in the United States) which is a compact sports car with a back wheel drive and a front-mounted motor. Toyota offers the RC Coupe which is similar to Lexus, thereby connecting with drivers at emotional level.

Revenue (in bill $)= 109.159

Profit (in bill $)= 2.14

Unit Sold (in million units) = 2.869


1. General Motors Company

Founded in 1908 by 3 people – William Durant, Charles Stewart and Frederic Smith, the company has 396 manufacturing facilities world-wide.


Image: flickr-photos/joeross/

It is headquartered in Detroit, Michigan in US and the Chairman and CEO of the company is Mary Barra. The company operates manufacturing and assembly plants as well as distribution centres throughout the United States, and mostly, GM sells automobiles and trucks, automotive components, and engines. In 1919, it founded its subsidiary General Motors Acceptance Corporation (GMAC) to finance and insure the installment sales of GM products. The organization entered the mortgage business in 1985 and in 1999 it expanded into commercial finance.

General Motors Corporation (GM) is the world's largest full-line vehicle manufacturer as well as marketer. The different models and brands included are: GMC, Chevrolet, Buick, Pontiac, Cadillac, Saturn, Saab and Hummer. GM’s international nameplates comprises of Opel, Vauxhall, and Holden. GM The company holds stakes in Isuzu Motors Ltd., Suzuki Motor Corp, Fuji Heavy Industries Ltd., Fiat Auto, and GM Daewoo Auto & Technology through its system of global alliances.

In the early 2000s, GM sought to shed some of its less profitable facilities, models and brands due to the escalating healthcare and pension costs. Toward that end the company phased out production of the Oldsmobile, as well as discontinued the Chevrolet Camero and Pontiac Firebird. Even with tough economic climate and periods of rough patches, GM has nevertheless been able to retain its position as the world's leading automaker.

Revenue (in bill $)= 106.62

Profit (in bill $)= 11.2

Unit Sold (in million units) = 3.558

 

Ranking Methodology:

Step 1: An initial list of companies were shortlisted based on revenue, profits or number of vehicles sold

Step 2: Top 12 companies were shortlisted based on the above 3 parameters.

Step 3: A weighted average score based on the 3 parameters Revenues, Profits and Number of vehicles sold were used to develop ranks. Where 40% is given to profits and vehicles and 20% given to revenues.

Top 10 Hotels in India 2016

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India’s tourism and hospitality sector has been booming like never before. India, the land of several mysteries has always been a favourite among leisure travellers. With the relaxed tourist visa norms and the strategic push to turn India into a country that means business, the country has been attracting both holiday as well as business travellers. The sector has also been witnessing a growth in domestic demand due to increasing purchasing power of the country’s citizens and because of their approach towards vacationing is coming of age. The top hotels in India include EIH Limited (Oberoi), Indian Hotels Company (Taj), Mahindra Holidays, ITC Hotels, Ashoka Hotels, EIH Associated Hotels Limited, Speciality Restaurants, Mac Charles, Asian Hotels (East) & Taj GVK Hotels. Here is the list of the top 10 hotels in India 2016.


10. Taj GVK Hotels

Taj GVK Hotels and Resorts (TAJGVK) is a joint venture strategically leveraging on the competitive advantages of two multi-million dollar firms with their expertise in the luxury and hospitality sectors.


Image: company website

It is an alliance between the Hyderabad based conglomerate GVK Group and the TATA owned Indian Hotels Company Limited (IHCL). The joint venture came into existence in 1999 – 2000, and currently services its customers by owning and managing five star hotels in prime locations in India. It operates five star hotels in Hyderabad (four in number), and one each in Chandigarh and Chennai. With Taj Krishna, Taj Banjara, Taj Deccan, Vivanta by Taj in Hyderabad, and Taj Chandigardh in Chandigarh, and Taj Club House in Chennai, TAJGVK has a total room base of over 1080 across its six properties. Another of TAJGVK’s 5-star deluxe property is coming up near Mumbai’s Santacruz Airport near Terminal 1C in collaboration with Greenridge Hotels and Resorts, and with its construction set to complete, will soon start its operations. Set in prime locations in the city, each of the six properties are epitomes of remarkable architecture, with a view to blend the historical past of the city with its modernization, and luxury with business. The hotels offer a wide variety of rooms, suited for both leisure travellers as well as for business purposes. The Taj Krishna in fact is a proud member of The Leading Hotels of the World. TAJGVK also illustrates exemplary corporate governance and is particular about code of conduct and corporate policies.

TAJGVK is listed on both the BSE and NSE stock exchanges in India and is one of the companies with a high market capitalization in the hotels sector.

Market Cap (Rs. cr): 865

Net Sales (Rs. cr): 272

Net Profit (Rs. cr): 8.42


9. Asian Hotels (East)

Asian Hotels (East) is a company operating in the hospitality sector and it is a leading hotel company.


Image: company website

It has been through stages of merging and de-merging, and private to public holding, before its current form and name came into existence. Previously known as Vardhman Hotels Private Limited, and incorporated under the same name, this hotel company came into being on January 8, 2007. The same year it was converted to a Public Limited Company, and starting 28th July 2007, the company began to be known by the name Vardhman Hotels Limited. With Asian Hotels Limited as the Transferor Company, and Chillwinds Hotels Limited and Vardhman Hotels Limited as the Transferee Companies, the then company entered into a Scheme of Arrangement and De-merger. The resultant company after completing the due legalities and formalities associated with transfer, vesting, demerger, and retention of the hotel’s liabilities and assets began to be known as Asian Hotels (East) Limited. This final change of name came about on February 11th 2010. Among its prized possessions are the hotels Hyatt Regency in Chennai and Kolkata. The hotel chain functions under the able and professional guidance of its key people – notably Mr.Radhe Shyam Saraf heading as the Chairman and Mr.Umesh Saraf and Mr. Arun Kumar Saraf as the Joint Managing Directors. As reflected by online surveys, Asian Hotels (East) has been showing an upward trend with respect to customer satisfaction, which has been achieved by the apt combination of leadership, vision and focus on customer engagement. With its intensive marketing and branding efforts showing fruitful results, the company has also shown a positive trend with respect to the business it h been attracting in the last couple of years.

It is listed on both the BSE and NSE stock exchanges of India. The number of its outstanding shares now stand at 11,440,585 as of March 31st 2016.

Market Cap (Rs. cr): 246

Net Sales (Rs. cr): 98

Net Profit (Rs. cr): 8.19


8. Mac Charles (Le Meridien)

Mac Charles (India) Ltd. is a hospitality company that was founded on September 28 in the year 1979 and has its headquarters in Bangalore (now called Bengaluru).


Image: company website

Owning and operating hotels, it also provides banquet hall and travel services besides accommodation at its units, and the key hotel property to Mac Charles’ (India) name is the Le Meridien Hotel in Bangalore. Situated amidst the lush green of the garden city that Bangalore is, Le Meridien is indeed a remarkable example of luxury meets culture. Given that the hotel is situated close to both the commercial and business areas, it becomes the top choice for the leisure traveller as well as the business traveller. The Certificate of Excellence by the American Travel website TripAdvisor is a testimony to the grandeur and outstanding customer experience of the hotel Le Meridien. Under the strong leadership of Mr. C B Pardhanani, who is the Chairman, Mr. P B Appiah, Mr. Suresh Vaswani, Mr. M R B Punja, and Ms. Tanya Girdhar John, who each work in the capacity of Directors, Mac Charles (India) has secured for itself a comfortable position when it comes to the key performance indicators such as market capitalization, total revenues and net profits. It has been doing considerably well compared to its peers and has a positive outlook towards the future. In fact, in the last quarter that ended on March 31st 2016, the company reported sales (consolidated) of INR 32.27 cr, which is a staggering increment of nearly 50% on its sales numbers for the last quarter.

Mac Charles (India) is listed only on the BSE stock exchange. The number of its outstanding shares as of 31st March 2016 is 13,101,052.

Market Cap (Rs. cr): 532

Net Sales (Rs. cr): 88

Net Profit (Rs. cr): 32


7. Speciality Restaurants

Speciality Restaurants Limited is a restaurant company in India which is a leader in the hospitality industry.


Image: company website

It was founded in 1992 in Mumbai by its founder Anjan Chatterjee, who currently works in the capacity of the Managing Director of the company, and while its head office is in the city of its founding Mumbai itself, it is registered in Kolkata. The company not only owns and operates its chain of multiple fine and casual dining restaurants in twenty five cities across the three countries (India, Tanzania and Bangladesh), it has also diversified its business by owning and managing confectionery stores. The company’s tryst with the hotel and restaurant business started when its founder Anjan Chatterjee launched its first restaurant “Only Fish” in Mumbai back in 1992. Riding on the success of its maiden venture, the company went to launch two more brands by the names "Oh! Calcutta" and "Mainland China". These two new brands were also launched first in Mumbai in the year 1994. The reason that the brands went on to create ripples was that even though the country was beginning to witness a higher purchasing power, the market potential for authentic and tasty fine dining experience was untapped. While moving from the conventional over-crowded dining experiences to fine dining was a bold one, in the end it was what did the trick.

Specialty Restaurants has not only managed to please the Indian taste buds, it has also managed to attract investors through its IPO in 2012. With listings in both BSE and NSE stock exchanges, the company became the first fine dining restaurant in the stand-alone category to become a publically listed company. While rave reviews from their satisfied customers should alone be enough, they also have several awards to add to their credit – most awarded cuisine, Sweet Bengal among others. They soon plan to go more global than ever before.

Market Cap (Rs. cr): 439

Net Sales (Rs. cr): 321

Net Profit (Rs. cr): 0.26


6. EIH Associated Hotels Limited

Initially incorporated under the name Pleasant Hotels Limited, the company came into existence on 21st March 1983.


Image: company website

The company went through two more rounds of name changes, first being referred to as Oberoi Associated Hotels Limited in 1989, and then eventually being renamed to EIH Associated Hotels Limited, with this name being legally adopted on November 1st 1996. EIH Associated Hotels Limited is a major holding company of The Oberoi Group, which is one of the most prominent Groups active in the hospitality business in India. Rai Bahadur Mohan Singh Oberoi is credited to be the founder chairman of the company. EIH Associated Hotels Limited owns, manages and operates five star hotels in prime tourist locations in India. These include The Oberoi Rajvilas in Jaipur, The Oberoi Cecil in Shimla, and the hotels operating under the brand name Trident at Agra, Bhubaneshwar, Cochin, Chennai, Jaipur and Udaipur. The able management of the company includes the likes of Ms.Indrani Ray, Mr.Akshay Raheja, Mr.P R S Oberoi, Mr.Rajesh Kapadia, Mr. SS Mukherjee and Mr.Vikram Oberoi. While the Oberoi Group or its associated companies need no certification, the hotels managed by the EIH Associated Hotels Limited have bagged several awards in the past – notably “India’s leading resort”, “Top 15 resorts in India”, “Best Hotels in India” by World Travel awards, World’s Best Awards and Conde Nast Traveler, USA, respectively.

Listed on both the BSE and NSE stock exchange in India, EIH Associated Hotels Limited has 30,468,147 outstanding shares (as of 31st December, 2015). The abbreviation EIH actually stands for East India Hotels. The company follows the corporate governance model called as “The Oberoi Dharma” and stays committed to its mission of not just meeting but in fact exceeding the expectation of its guests, and of creating extraordinary value for all its stakeholders.

Market Cap (Rs. cr): 1069

Net Sales (Rs. cr): 249

Net Profit (Rs. cr): 38.37


5. ITDC – Ashoka Hotels

The only PSU (Public Sector Undertaking – owned by the Union or State/Territory governments of India) to feature on this list is The India Tourism Development Corporation Limited (ITDC).


Image: company website

Headquartered in New Delhi, ITDC has business ventures not only in hospitality sector, but also in retail and education sectors. Founded in October 1966, ITDC is owned by the Government of India and falls under the Ministry of Tourism, and the key services provided by ITDC include transportation facilities, restaurants and hotels. At several places, tourists can also avail of duty free shopping and other entertainment sources. Besides this, ITDC also partakes in producing, distributing and selling publicity literature for tourists. Of the over 17 properties that ITDC owns, several of them are under the Ashok Group of Hotels (Jammu, Delhi, Jaipur, Patna, Itanagar, Puducherry, Bhopal, Ranchi, Bhubaneshwar, Guwahati), some under the Samrat and Janpath brand names (eg: Delhi) and some under strategic joint ventures. They also own and operate transportation units, duty free shops at both airports and seaports, and sound and light shows. On the behalf of Department of Tourism, ITDC also manages a restaurant at Kosi and the Bharatpur Ashok Hotel. Being a PSU, it also offers packages for serving Government employees, veterans, students and the differently-abled. At the 7th Dalal Street Investment Journal Annual Awards (2015), ITDC bagged the ‘Fastest growing Miniratna Award’ which testifies its commitment to customer service and business growth. ITDC’s Commercial and Marketing Director Dr. Piyush Tiwari was also felicitated with Best Professional in Business Development award at the PATWA International award 2016 for the Tourism industry, which further fortifies its business approach. The other key people ITDC Includes are Mr. Umang Narula (IAS) who functions in the capacity of its Chairman and Managing Director. ITDC is listed only on the BSE.

Market Cap (Rs. cr): 1914

Net Sales (Rs. cr): 435

Net Profit (Rs. cr): 22.55


4. ITC Hotels

ITC Limited) is a business conglomerate that is known for its presence in nearly every business sector and its dedication to responsible and sustainable business practices, ITC has carved a niche for itself.


Image: company website

A prime example of that and furthering its’ triple bottom line philosophy is its hotel chain ITC Hotels, which is touted as the Greenest Luxury Hotel Chain in the World. Founded in 1975, ITC Hotels started its operations with Hotel Chola in Chennai, and with over 100 properties to its name, ITC Hotels are now the second largest hotel chain in India. They also boast of the most extensive art collection in the country, housing works by over 50 artists, the likes of M F Hussein and Tyeb Mehta. Justifying its tagline of “Responsible Luxury”, ITC Hotels became the first of its kind to have all its luxury hotels certified with the LEED Platinum by the US Green Building Council– attesting its dedication to energy and environmental design. The Hotel chain achieves this feat by being energy efficient – 55% of its energy needs are met through renewable sources, water efficient – reduction of water usage, and recycling waste water, and with waste reduction – reducing and recycling solid waste to reduce its carbon footprint.

To be able to service and cater to a wider audience, the hotel chain functions under four separate brands (ITC Hotels – Luxury Collection, Sheraton, Fortune and WelcomHeritage). With the unique ‘Namaste’ logo symbolizing its dedication to hospitality and service, ITC Hotels has indeed redefined the concept of luxury and comfort, and has established India and itself as a benchmark in the hospitality sector globally. The hotel chain also its own line of ready to eat food products called Kitchens of India, available in India, US, Canada and Germany.

Market Cap (rs. Cr): 2206 

Net Sales (Rs. Cr): 1286.17

Net Profit (Rs. Cr): 52


3. Mahindra Holidays and Resorts India

Mahindra Holidays & Resorts India Limited (MHRIL) is one of the leading companies in the leisure hospitality industry.


Image: company website

The company is in the business of providing holiday facilities and selling vacation ownership and the brands Club Mahindra Holidays, Zest and Club Mahindra Fundays are also associated with it. MHRIL is a part of the Mahindra Group which is known for its extensive brand diversification and its reliable brand image. Mahindra Group started MHRIL in 1996 and the company has now completed 20 years of operations in 2016, emerging as India’s successful holiday company in the organized vacation ownership market. Although starting off with just one resort to its name (which is in Munnar, Kerala), by 2006 MHRIL had forayed into new territories like Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Uttaranchal. In fact, they currently operate a total of 46 resorts in India as well as overseas locations. Not one to rest on its laurels, MHRIL is rumoured to be planning and working towards establishing its resorts all over the world. MHRIL is also an affiliate of the prestigious Resorts Condominium International (RCI) group.

The company’s positioning strategy revolved on the statement “A Holiday you Own”, making themselves flexible and exclusive for each and every Mahindra Holiday member. They came up with the idea of dividing a year into colour coded seasons through which every customer could match it with his or her holiday pattern. This helped them gained the trust of the consumers and made the latter feel special by having “Something for everyone”. The company provides holiday entitlements to its members via its vacation ownership products over the life of the product and boasts of over 170000 satisfied members in India and abroad. MHRIL is listed on both BSE and NSE.

Market Cap (Rs. cr): 3703

Net Sales (Rs. cr): 951

Net Profit (Rs. cr): 117.35


2. IHCL (Taj Hotels)

The only company to feature on this list that has been into the hospitality business for over a century, The Indian Hotels Company Limited (IHCL) is a company that needs no introduction.


Image: company website

Along with its subsidiaries, IHCL is better known as The Taj Group, and its parent company, the TATA Group is a name Indians and the world alike respect and trust. Incorporated as long back as 1903 by Jamsetji Tata, the founder of the Tata Group, IHCL has its headquarters in Mumbai, where it all started from with its very first property the Taj Mahal Palace. It has now grown to 100 hotels at 62 strategically chosen locations in India that serve not only business or leisure travellers, but also pilgrims at remote destinations. Not limited to just India, IHCL has its presence felt in international locations as well, owning and operating 13 hotels in the UK, USA, sub-continent and beyond (Bhutan, Sri Lanka, the Maldives, Malaysia), Africa (Zambia and South Africa) and the Middle East. IHCL recently also announced that it will soon be focussing on South-East Asia and Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) countries as well. In an attempt to maximize revenues, IHCL has also been making strategic divestment decisions (such as selling off Taj Boston, USA and a property in Morocco), but at the same time has also decided to increase close to a thousand rooms in its properties across the other luxury brands owned by it, namely Vivanta, Gateway and Taj Luxury. Travel website TripAdvisor recently named IHCL’s Umaid Bhawan Palace at Jodhpur as the Best Hotel in the world, which bears testimony to the company’s dedication and commitment to hospitality and customer service. IHCL also imparts skill-based training to the underprivileged youth to help them land jobs in the hospitality sector. The company is listed on both BSE and NSE.

Market Cap (Rs. cr): 13097

Net Sales (Rs. cr): 2273

Net Profit (Rs. cr): 201.04


1. EIH Limited (Oberoi Hotels)

EIH Limited, a member of The Oberoi Group, is a publically listed company in the hospitality sector that was incorporated in the year 1949.


Image: company website

EIH Limited’s operations are extended to 5 countries, and the properties that it manages fall either under the Trident brand, which are five star hotels, or under the Oberoi brand, which are luxury hotels. Oberoi Hotels and resorts are famous all over the world for their luxury and service quotient, and have consistently bagged awards and recognition as a testament to that. In India, the Oberoi Hotels are present in all corners of the country, be it North (Delhi, Gurgaon, Jaipur, Udaipur, Agra), West (Mumbai, Ranthambhore), East (Kolkata) or South (Bangalore). Its presence can be felt in the Himalayas (Shimla) and even in the Kerala backwaters on the Oberoi Motor Vessel Vrinda. Overseas, the hotels are present in Asia (Bali and Lombok in Indonesia, and in Mauritius) and the Middle East (Dubai, Saudi Arabia and Egypt). To leverage and build on its hotel network, EIH Limited has properties coming up in UAE, Morocco and Chandigarh. Under the five star brand Trident, EIH Limited has properties in Agra, Gurgaon, Jaipur, Udaipur, Mumbai, Cochin, Chennai and Bhubaneshwar. Other than Trident and Oberoi, the company also operates the heritage Madiens Hotel in Delhi, which was built in 1903. To ensure world class service and luxury, the company recently closed down one of its oldest hotels The Oberoi Delhi for renovation purposes for the next two years. While Mr. P R S Oberoi heads the company as the Executive Chairman, Mr. S S Mukherji function in the capacity of Vice Chairman. It is notable that the conglomerate ITC and Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Investment arm hold 14.99 and 18.54 percent stake in EIH Limited respectively. The company is listed on both BSE and NSE.

Market Cap (Rs. cr): 6495

Net Sales (Rs. cr): 1416

Net Profit (Rs. cr): 101.48


Ranking Methodology:

The leading hotel chains and brands are considered and are ranked on the basis of their market cap, net sales and net profits.

Top 10 Tourist Attractions in the World 2016

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Tourist attractions are often associated with inherent or exhibited cultural or natural value, historical significance, built or natural beauty, recreation and amusement, adventure places. This article also showcases 10 such Tourist Attractions with highest footfall of tourists. The top tourist attractions in the world include Grand Bazaar, Zocalo, Times Square, Las Vegas, Union Station along with Central Park, Sensoji Temple, Grand Central Terminal, Disney World’s Magic Kingdom and Disneyland CA. Here is the list of the top 10 tourist attractions in the world 2016.


10. Disney Land, Anaheim, CA

The Tourist Attraction that ranks 10th in our list of Top 10 Tourist Attractions of the world is Disney Land located in Anaheim, California.


Image: flickr-photos/fortherock/

Disneyland was opened on July 17th 1955 and is first of the two theme parks constructed at Disneyland Resort, Anaheim, and this was the only theme park that was directly supervised by Walt Disney himself. With 8 “themed lands” and various concealed backstage areas, Disneyland occupies an area of approximately 85 acres. In 1955 Disneyland had 5 different lands namely Main Street, U.S.A., Frontierland, Adventureland, Tomorrowland and Fantasyland. After its opening Disneyland has undergone several expansions and has since added 3 different lands viz. New Orleans Square (1966), Bear Country or Critter Country (1972), and Mickey's Toontown (1993). A land named Holiday land was opened to public in 1957 but was closed in 1961, often this land is referred to as Lost Land of Disneyland. A new 14 acre land based on the theme of Star wars is announced and is to be constructed and is named as Star wars Land.

When compared to any other theme park, Disneyland with over 650 million guests since its inception ranks one in terms of cumulative attendance. Being the first ever Disneyland and the only Disneyland being supervised by Walt Disney himself makes this Disneyland a special one. A reported 65700 employee work at the Disneyland Resort.

Number of visitors: 18278000


9. Disney World’s – The Magic Kingdom, Orlando, FL

The Tourist Attraction that ranks 9th in our list of Top 10 Tourist Attractions of the world is Disney World’s - The Magic Kingdom located in Orlando Florida.


Image: pixabay

The Magic Kingdom Park which is simply known as “The Magic Kingdom” is the first among the four theme parks constructed at the Walt Disney World Resort in Bay Lake, Florida. The Magic Kingdom opened its gates on October 1, 1971 and is inspired from Disneyland Park, Anaheim, California and that is the reason why its attractions and layout are similar to Disneyland Park. The Magic Kingdom is dedicated to the Disney characters and fairy tales. Consecutively for the 10th year, the Magic Kingdom is the world’s most visited theme park, having attracted approximately 20.49 million visitors in 2015.

The Magic Kingdom has 6 themed lands designed like a wheel, Cinderella Castle being the hub and the pathways spiking out across 107 acres leading to these six lands. The entire perimeter of the the Magic Kingdom is covered by a 3ft narrow gauge Railroad (Walt Disney World Railroad) with stops at Frontierland, Main Street, U.S.A., and Fantasyland. The Walt Disney Railroad is steam-powered and is one of the busiest railroads which transports approx. 3.7 million passengers per year.

Inspired by the castle of Cinderella in the 1950 film, the Magic Kingdom is symbolized by Cinderella Castle.

Number of visitors: 20492000


8. Grand Central Terminal

The Tourist Attraction that ranks 8th in our list of Top 10 Tourist Attractions of the world is Grand Central Terminal.


Image: pixabay

Grand Central Terminal with its intricate designs both on its outside and inside and a vast interior main concourse is one of the world's most visited tourist attractions. Grand Central Terminal (GCT) is also referred to as Grand Central is a rapid transit (and former intercity), commuter railroad terminal situated at 42nd Street and Park Avenue in New York City, United States. Grand Central Terminal covers 48 acres is one of the busiest railroad station of United States and is the station with the highest number of platforms (44 platforms - more than any other station in the world). These platforms which are all below ground, support 26 tracks on the lower level and 41 on the upper level.

GCT is owned by a private company known as Midtown TDR Ventures unlike other Metro stations, which are owned by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). GCT’s basements are among the largest in the New York City which also includes M42, a secret sub-station which does not appear on maps and is a closely guarded secret.

Major Attraction of GCT is the Main Concourse which is at the center of Grand Central. The main concourse is at 275X120X125 Cubic feet, which is often used as a meeting place and is filled with bustling crowds. At the center of the concourse is the main information booth on top of which is the four-faced brass clock which is the most identifiable icon of Grand Central.

Number of visitors: 21600000


7. Sensō-ji Temple

The Tourist Attraction that ranks 7th in our list of Top 10 Tourist Attractions of the world is Sensō-ji Temple.


Image: Wikimedia

Sensō-ji (Asakusa Kannon Temple) is a famous ancient Buddhist temple situated in Asakusa, Tokyo, Japan, and it is one of Tokyo's oldest temple, and one of its most significant. It was earlier associated with the Tendai sect of Buddhism and it became independent after World War II. Sensoji Temple is also one among Tokyo's most colorful and popular shrines. According to the history, in the year 628, two brothers while fishing, found a statue of Kannon (the goddess of mercy) in the Sumida River. The statue kept retuning to them always, despite them putting the statue back into the river. Therefore, Sensoji was built nearby for the goddess of Kannon. The construction of the temple was completed in 645AD, making it Tokyo's oldest temple.

Tourists entering the temple have to enter through the Outer Thunder Gate (Kaminarimon). This outer gate is regarded as a symbol of the entire city of Tokyo and Asakusa. The outer gate lead to Nakamise, a shopping street of over 200 meters, which further leads to the temple's second gate (The Hozomon). A five storied pagoda and temple’s mail hall lie beyond the Hozomon Gate.

The shopping street is very famous among visitors of the shrine and has a history of several centuries. A tourist can very easily get folding fans, Japanese souvenirs such as yukata and various local traditional snacks from the shopping street (Nakamise).

Various events such as Annual fest of Asakusa Shrine (Sanja Matsuri), Asakusa Samba Carnival, and Hagoita Market (Hagoita-ichi) are conducted throughout the year in the Sensoji Temple area.

Number of visitors: 30000000


6. Central Park

The Tourist Attraction that ranks 6th in our list of Top 10 Tourist Attractions of the world is Central Park.


Image: Wikimedia

In the middle of the New York City lie Central Park, an urban park which is the most filmed location in the world with over 40 million visitors per annum. Central park was established in 1857 on 778 acres of city-owned land which later went under renovation and re-design by landscape architects Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux. This expansion was carried out till 1873 and the park was expanded to its current size of 843 acres. Central Park was given a National Historic Landmark status by the U.S. Department of the Interior in 1962. Central park is currently managed by the Central Park Conservancy, a public-private partnership with the Municipal government.

Central Park is one of the most famous Tourist attractions of New York. It is so famous that its North, South and West borders are named after it (Central Park South is the name of the avenue along its south border). Only the East border – Fifth Avenue retains its name. The real estate valuation of Central Park was estimated to be about $528.8 billion in 2005.

Central Park's cultural position and size, similar to Munich's Englischer Garten and London's Hyde Park, has served as a model for many urban parks, including Vancouver's Stanley Park, Tokyo's Ueno Park, and San Francisco's Golden Gate Park.

Number of visitors: 40000000


5. Union Station

The Tourist Attraction that ranks 5th in our list of Top 10 Tourist Attractions of the world is Union Station.


Image: flickr-photos/fischerfotos/

A Major tourist attraction, transportation hub, major train station and a leisure destination, Union Station Washington DC was opened in 1907. Union Station is the railroad's second-busiest station and Amtrak's headquarters, with over 5 million annual riders, an average of more than 13000 passengers. Around 200000 people used to pass though the Union Station on a single day during the World War II. In 1988, the original station was renovated and a new headhouse wing was added. Renovated station was used as a shopping mall. Today Union Station is one of the busiest shopping destinations and Rail facilities in USA and is visited by over 40 million people per annum and has many cafes, shops and Restaurants.

The entire track area of the station is divided into lower and upper levels. Tracks 1-6 of the station no longer exists. Tracks 7-20 are located in the upper-level and are served by high level bay platforms at the door level of most trains. Lower level consists tracks 22 to 29 and these tracks are served by low level platforms at the track level.

Columbus Circle has been renovated to address severely damaged roadbed, streamline the taxi stand, realign the passenger dropoff/ pickup locations, and to better house the popular tour bus attractions.

Number of visitors: 40000000


4. Las Vegas

The Tourist Attraction that ranks 4th in our list of Top 10 Tourist Attractions of the world is Las Vegas.


Image: pixabay

The City of Las Vegas (Spanish for "The Meadows"), often known as simply Vegas, is the most populous city in the state of Nevada, United States. Las Vegas is a globally prominent major resort city known predominantly for shopping, gambling, nightlife, and fine dining and is the principal commercial, financial, and cultural center for Nevada. It is well-known for its mega hotels, casinos and associated entertainment and is often referred to as the Sin City or The Entertainment Capital of the World. Las Vegas is one of the top 3 leading destinations in the US for business, conventions, and meetings. Also Las Vegas is a home for more number of AAA Five Diamond Hotels and is an international leader in the hospitality industry.

Apart from the hotels and Casinos, Las Vegas also houses several parks, golf courses, playgrounds, football fields, Soccer fields, dog parks, community centers, swimming pools and more. Las Vegas is a widely held setting for television programs, films and music videos.

Las Vegas Strip, the area beyond the city limits, is a 4.2 mi stretch of South Las Vegas Boulevard. It houses various resorts especially the ones in the resort areas on and near the Las Vegas Strip—and the Las Vegas Valley. The biggest and most notable buildings and Casinos are located there.

Number of visitors: 42000000


3. Times Square

The Tourist Attraction that ranks 3rd in our list of Top 10 Tourist Attractions of the world is Times Square, New York.


Image: pixabay

At the junction of Seventh Avenue and Broadway, stretching from West 42nd to West 47th Streets lie a major commercial intersection known as Times Square. Brilliantly decorated with advertisements and billboards, Times Square is also referred to as “The Center of the Universe”, “The Crossroads of the World”, “the heart of the world" and “the heart of The Great White Way”. Times Square was earlier named as Longacre Square which then got renamed to Times Square in 1904 as The New York Times shifted its headquarters to the Times Building. Times Square is a major center of the world's entertainment industry and one of the world’s busiest intersections. Times Square which is the center of the Broadway Theater District is one of the world’s most visited tourist attractions with an estimated 50 million visitors visiting annually.

Times Square is well-known for the site of New Year's Eve ball drop. First ball drop signifying the New Year’s Eve happened on December 31st 1907. Since then approximately one million people gather at Times Square during New Year celebrations every year. For the Millennium celebration held on December 31st 1999, around 2 million people reveled at the Times Square making it the largest gathering in the Times Square since end of World War II.

Number of visitors: 50000000


2. The Zócalo

The Tourist Attraction that ranks 2nd in our list of Top 10 Tourist Attractions of the world is The Zócalo situated in Mexico.


Image: Wikimedia

One more square/Intersection to adorn our list The Zócalo, the main square in central Mexico City. It was the chief ceremonial center during pre-colonial times in the Aztec city of Tenochtitlan and it was known as "Arms Square" or "Main Square" and currently its official name is Plaza de la Constitución. The Plaza de la Constitución derives its name from the Cádiz Constitution that was signed in the year 1812 in Spain. Construction of a column as a monument was planned in the location where Zocalo exists now, but only base (Plinth) was constructed which later was destroyed. Zócalo which means "plinth" or “Base” gets its name because of this. Many other Mexican cities have adopted the name Zocalo for naming their main plazas.

The Zocalo has been a congregation place since ages and has been the venue for many events such as the royal proclamations, swearing in of viceroys, Independence ceremonies military parades, and religious events such as the Corpus Christi and festivals of Holy Week. It has received several foreign heads of state and is the primary site for both national protest and national celebration. This plaza also hosts many impromptu shows of Aztec dancers wearing anklets made of concha shells and feathered headdresses.

Zocalo has also played an important role in planning of the city for almost 700 years. The Zocalo is situated just one block away from Templo Mayor which is regarded as the center of the Universe according to Aztec legend.

Number of visitors: 85000000


1. Grand Bazaar

The Tourist Attraction that ranks 1st in our list of Top 10 Tourist Attractions of the world is Grand Bazaar of Turkey.


Image: pixabay

The first shopping mall of the world which houses over 4000 shops in 61 covered streets, Grand Bazaar, Istanbul is one of the oldest and largest coveted markets in the world. Grand Bazaar attracts a footfall of 0.25 – 0.4 million visitors daily because of which it is consistently ranked as the Top Tourist Attraction of the world. Grand Bazaar began its construction in 1455, shortly after the conquest of Constantinople by Ottomans. The Grand Bazaar achieved its final shape by the beginning of 17th century and the enormous extent of the Ottoman Empire helped Grand Bazaar gain its status as hub of the Mediterranean trade. According to many European travelers, Grand Bazaar was unrivalled in Europe in terms of the variety, abundance, and quality of the goods on sale.

Today, the Grand Bazaar is a booming complex, employing 26,000 people gaining advantage from its beauty and fascination, which helps in competing with other modern shopping malls of Istanbul. Grand Bazaar is well known for its hand-painted ceramics, jewellery, embroideries, carpets, spices and antique shops. Many of the stores in the bazaar are clustered by type of goods they sell, such as leather goods, Leather and casual clothes, Carpets, Furniture, Gold Bracelets and jewellery.

Grand Bazaar completed its 550th birthday in 2011 and is the most visited monument in the world.

Number of visitors: 91000000

 

Ranking Methodology

Step 1: Different Tourist Attractions across the world are selected.

Step 2: Visitor information is gathered for each location using the Tourism information of the country or any such sources or any articles indicating the visitor information.

Step 3: Once we get the visitor numbers for each attraction, sort the list to get the Top 10 tourist attractions of the world

Top 10 Hotels in USA 2016

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The US Hotel industry has been growing each year since its ebb in 2008-09 in the aftermaths of the economic slowdown. US has been a primary travel destination for both the business and the leisure traveller and the revenues from the major Hotel chains are indeed a testament to this. The revenues from the industry bettered its 2014 annual collection of $176.7 billion to $189.5 billion in 2015. The US Hotel industry boasts of some of the well-known and celebrated hotel chains, of which the top 10 are being listed below. The top hotels in USA include Marriott, Hilton, Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express, Starwood along with other American hotel brands like Wyndham, Hyatt, Crowne Plaza, Best Western and La Quinta Inns & Suites. Here is the list of the top 10 hotels in USA 2016.


10. La Quinta Inns & Suites

La Quinta Inns & Suites is a limited services hotel chain with its presence in over 800 locations in the United States, Canada, Mexico and the Central American nation Honduras.


Image: company website

Headquartered in Irving, Texas, La Quinta, which means “The Villas” in Spanish holds true to its name for its guests. La Quinta was founded in San Antonio, Texas way back in 1968 by Real Estate entrepreneur brothers Sam Barshop and Phil. Until 2014, all properties of La Quinta were owned by its subsidiary La Quinta Properties Inc, which is a Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT). However, in 2014, the company went public and offered approximately 44 million shares by getting itself listed on the New York Stock Exchange. With its presence in over 880 locations, La Quinta aims and strives to makes the life easier of both leisure as well as business travellers. Some of its prime locations in the US include San Antonio, New York, Miami, Dallas, Las Vegas, San Diego, Chicago and Albuquerque. International locations include Richmond in Canada, Juarez and Cancun in Mexico and Tegucigalpa in Honduras.

The hotel chain offers their own loyalty rewards program, called the La Quinta Returns, which helps its members earn discounts, redeemable points, free nights and other attractive offers that they can avail of such as redeeming points with partner resorts, dining and entertainment and other shopping experience. With “Wake up on the bright side” as its slogan, La Quinta truly is committed to making travel and stay a memorable experience for its guests. Its key people include Keith A. Cline as the President and CEO, James H. Forson as the Executive Vice President and CFO, and Rajiv K. Trivedi as the Executive Vice President and CDO.

Net Revenue ($ Million)= 1029


9. Best Western

Best Western International Inc. is a hotels and resorts brand based in the US which started its operations in the years following the World War Second.


Image: company website

It was founded in 1946 by M K Guertin and operates over 4100 properties in over 100 countries worldwide, of which close to 2200 are in the North America. Headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona, the Best Western operates under its brands in a three tiered structure – Best Western, Best Western Plus and Best Western Premier. Some of its notable properties outside the US are present in the UK, Mexico, New Zealand and Australia. The hotel chain entered India in 1994 and expanding to Thailand, and China in the early 2000, it now also has plans to expand to Burma. Operating as a marketing cooperative and with a franchisee model, Best Western ensured that the partner and affiliate hotels adhere to set standards. This is reflected in its slogan “World’s Best Hotel Family”. The hotel chain has also been a recipient of several travel awards and accolades, some of which include being mentioned as the Best Business Hotel, winning Dynatrace Best of the Web gold awards, AAA/CAA Hotel Partner of the year, as well as several certificates and accolades from the famous travel website TripAdvisor itself. It was also ranked as the number 1 mid-scale hotel in the 2014 Business Travel News Chain Survey.

The hotel chain also strives towards a better, greener world by ensuring that its properties operate in compliance with at least a national or international eco-labelling programme, such as LEED, Green Seal, Green Key, Green Leaf, etc as appropriately applicable. While David Kong is the President and CEO, Terry Porter heads as the Board Chairman of the Best Western group.

Net Revenue ($ Million)= 4000


8. Crowne Plaza

With over 400 properties to its name and an international presence in more than 50 countries, Crowne Plaza Hotels and Resorts is an upscale hotel chain that caters primarily to the needs of business travellers.


Image: Wikimedia

It also provides perfect ambience and service for hosting conventions and official meetings. Founded in 1983, this hotel chain was initially branded as “Holiday Inn Crowne Plaza” as it was owned by the Holiday Inn hotel group, but had a spin off and started operating independently within two years of its founding. The very first hotel of this hotel chain was opened in Rockville, Maryland in the founding year 1983, while its first resort was opened close to two decades later in Portugal in 1999. With the sale of the Holiday Inn hotel group chain in 1990 to InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), which is a famous British multinational hotel company, the Crowne Plaza also became a part of the IHG hotel chain. Needless to say, Crowne Plaza comes with the famous IHG rewards and loyalty programme, benefitting and luring its members with exciting offers and discounts. With another 81 hotels in the offing, this hotel chain has leveraged on its success with strategic expansions, opening up at prime locations such as important coastal towns, in city centres or close to key airports. Some of its famous locations include London, Paris, Xian, Beijing, Bangkok, Prague, Singapore and Dubai.

Crowne Plaza sponsors a PGA Tour Golf tournament which is held each year in Texas. They are also the sponsors of Rickie Fowler the famous golfer, as well as Andy Priaulx, the FIA World Touring Car Championship driver. Aptly titled “Travel for Success”, the hotel chain’s slogan conveys their commitment to servicing their customers.

Net Revenue ($ Million)= 4200


7. Hyatt

Hyatt was founded in 1957 with the purchase of Hyatt House motel situated next to the LA International airport by the founder Jay Pritzker.


Image: Wikimedia

The Pritzker brothers Jay and Donald worked together to grow the company into a hotel ownership and management company in North America. The Hyatt had then become the fastest growing hotel chain in the United States and is a leading global brand name. Hyatt offers several types of lodging options with its brands strategically placed in different locations to reap maximum benefits as well as cater to as many guests as possible. Park Hyatt, Andaz, Grand Hyatt, Hyatt Regency, and Hyatt Centric are majorly luxury hotels while Hyatt Zilara and Ziva are all inclusive resorts. To cater to families and for extended stays, Hyatt offers the Hyatt Place and Hyatt House brands. The Hyatt Gold Passport is their signature membership and rewards programme which offers promotions and discounts to its members. Beijing, Tokyo, Jakarta, Mumbai, Colombo, Kathmandu and Seoul are some of its notable properties outside of the US. The Hyatt Regency Hong Kong was in fact the first property of this hotel chain to open outside of the US.

Their commitment to service can be gauged by their slogan “We care for people so they can be their best”. No wonder the Hyatt was ranked as the 47th best US company to work for by the Fortune magazine in 2016. They were awarded 100% in HRC Equality Index by the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) for 8 years consecutively, adding another feather to their cap. The current Executive Chairman of the company is Thomas J. Pritzker, son of the founder Jay Pritzker. It is a publically listed company and trades on the NYSE.

Net Revenue ($ Million)= 4328


6. Wyndham

Wyndham Worldwide Corporation, which is a 2006 spin off from the Cendant corporations, is a US based holding company for the hotel and lodging brands Wyndham Hotels and Resorts, among several others.


Image: company website

While the holding company was founded in 2006 (through the spin off), the hotel and resort chain was founded in 1981 in Dallas, Texas by Trammel Crow. While the company saw rapid growth in the 1990s, it burned a lot of cash on the way and amidst a financial crunch was forced to sell off several of its properties in the early 2000s. In 2005, the firm was acquired by Blackstone group, and then subsequently sold off to Cendant, later becoming part of the Wyndham Worldwide group. The headquarters of the holding company are in Parsippany Troy Hills, New Jersey in US, with Stephen Holmes as the Chairman and CEO.

With close to 7400 properties under its name, the Wyndham group tops the list of having the maximum number of hotels. Boasting of properties listed under 15 brands across 66 countries in the six continents, Wyndham offers lodging services in segments ranging from economy to upscale. Among its famous brands are the Baymont Inn and Suites, Dolce, Days Inn, Knights Inn, Hawthorn Suites, Super 8, Travelodge as well as the famous Ramada Worldwide. The group also acquired the TRYP brand from Spain’s Sol Melia Resorts and Hotels in 2010 giving it exposure to business and leisure travellers in several destinations in Europe and Latin America. Its vacation ownership programme is currently the largest in the world and is headquartered in Orlando, Florida.

It is a publically listed company and trades on NYSE and S&P 500.

Net Revenue ($ Million)= 5536


5. Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide

Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide Inc. was founded in 1969 as a REIT (Real Estate Investment Trust) and was later incorporated in 1980.


Image: company website

It is a US based hotel and leisure company with its headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut. Undoubtedly figuring as one of the world’s largest hotel companies, Starwood owns, manages, operates as well as franchises hotels, spas, residences, resorts and vacation ownership properties under the 11 brands that it owns. It currently has over 1300 properties in around 100 countries and employs about 188000 employees worldwide. It is a publically listed company. With its November 2015 announcement of purchasing the Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide for $13.6 billion, the Marriott International hotel chain took the world by storm. While the acquisition is pending, it would create the world’s largest hotel chain with the combined assets and synergy of the two, once the deal comes into effect. As of now, stockholders from both Marriott and Starwood have voted and given their nod to this marriage, and the legal and customary formalities are being completed.

The global brands affiliated to the Starwood Hotels include St. Regis, The Luxury Collection, W, Westin, Le Meridien, and Sheraton (all of which are majorly luxury and upscale hotels and resorts). While Aloft and Four Points are select-service hotels, the Element brand are meant for extended stay hotels. The group also includes several independent hotels, listed under the brands Design Hotels as well as under its latest offering the Tribute Portfolio. The company is also committed to a better, greener tomorrow and is striving towards a 30% decrease in energy consumption and emissions and 20% reduction in water consumption at all its globally managed properties by 2020.

It is a publically listed company and trades on the NYSE.

Net Revenue ($ Million)= 5763


4. Holiday Inn Express

Founded in 1991, Holiday Inn Express started off modestly with the opening of just three hotels in the United States.


Image: Wikimedia

The hotel chain was ambitious even back then with plans of covering 250 locations within 5 years of its launch. With its first European hotel opening in Scotland in 1996, the hotel chain has since then never looked back, and has currently expanded to 2438 locations worldwide. As the name suggests, this is an “Express” hotel chain, which aims to provide limited but affordable range of services to its guests. The hotel chain has thus targeted to cater to the “upper economy” segment of the market, with reasonably priced services suitable to both business and short-term leisure travellers. They were one of the pioneers in hospitality sector advertising, where in their “Stay Smart” series of commercials garnered positive reviews and acclaims, helping them become a known name. Committed to servicing well its target market segment, the hotel chain comes with a “Best Price Guarantee” or “first night free” assurance. Apart from the US, Holiday Inn Express is present in major locations in Canada, Mexico, Central and South America, Europe, Africa, Middle East as well as Asia Pacific, some of which include Toronto, London, Singapore, New Delhi and Dubai.

While the Holiday Inn hotel chains are the parent of Holiday Inn Express hotel chain, they are now collectively owned by the InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), which is a British multinational hotels company headquartered in Denham, UK. The sought after and famous IHG Rewards membership holds for all its member hotel chains, Holiday Inn Express being one of them and offers several discounts and other packages to its guests.

Net Revenue ($ Million)= 6100


3. Holiday Inn

Not to be confused with the 1942 Hollywood movie with the same name, although the name is indeed borrowed from the very movie itself, Holiday Inn is a US based hotel chain that was founded on August 1st 1952 in Memphis, Tennessee by Kemmons Wilson.


Image: Wikimedia

The inspiration for what initially began as a motel chain came after a disappointing stint with the accommodation scene during a road trip the founder did with his family to Washington DC. Headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, Holiday Inn has come a long way from being a motel chain to one of the world’s largest hotel chain with over 3600 properties to its name. The hotel chain is not just limited to the Americas, in fact, it serves in all major destinations across Europe, Asia – Pacific, Middle East and Africa. Providing not just food and lodging services, but also meetings, conventions and timeshares, Holiday Inn is a subsidiary of the renowned British multinational hotel company the InterContinental Hotels Group and perfectly lives up to the brand name.

Famously branded as “The World’s Innkeeper”, Holiday Inn had pioneered roadside advertising with the catchy and iconic “The Great Sign”, which was later phased out during the 1980s. The hotel chain operates several brands and corresponding services to be able to cater to a wider audience, namely, Holiday Inn Hotel and Suites, Resort, Club Vacations which operate on the time share manner, Garden Court – which operate to reflect national culture and operate in South Africa and Europe, and the Holiday Inn Express brand which operate with fewer amenities and services and appeal to middle class customers. Their commitment to service and hospitality is reflected in their saying “Under our green sign, everyone is welcome”.

Net Revenue ($ Million)= 6200


2. Hilton Hotels & Resorts

The Hilton Hotels & Resorts group dates back to 1919, when it was founded by Conrad N. Hilton.


Image: company website

If the name Hilton rings a bell, it mustn’t come as a surprise that the famous actress and model Paris Hilton is related to the hotel chain, as the great-granddaughter of its founder. Formerly known as Hilton Hotels, the group has its headquarters at McLean, Virginia in USA. Boasting of over 570 properties, this hotel group serves in over 80 countries across six continents. The group functions by owning, managing as well as franchising properties under the flagship brand of Hilton Worldwide. Among its famous properties are included the Waldorf-Astoria, Double Tree, Conrad, Hampton and Homewood Suites. The hotel group also has to its name the tallest hotel in Canada, situated at the Niagara Falls. The brand caters to both business and luxury travellers, and has recently also forayed into the midscale category in the US and Canada with the launch of its new brand Tru by Hilton. The hotel chain has also shown its commitment to sustainable energy usage by upgrading to intelligent energy saving controls for heating, etc. at several of its properties in the UK. The discussion about this hotel chain is incomplete without the mention of its famous rewards and loyalty programme HHonors. The HHonors loyalty programme lets the guests avail of the various amenities and services provided at its properties such as free Wi-Fi, selection of room, electronic check-in, among other discounts and rewards only exclusive to its members. Known for its stylish and innovative approach to services, the hotel chain claims that travellers all over the world have been saying “Take me to the Hilton”, and rightly so, as the travellers themselves vouch for it.

Net Revenue ($ Million)= 11272


1. Marriott

Marriott International was founded in 1993 as a consequence of Marriott Corporation splitting into two firms – Marriott International (the hotel chain) and Host Marriott Corporation (which is into real estate investment – the financial arm).


Image: company website

The history of Marriott itself dates back to 1927 with the opening of a beer place (a root beer stand with the seating capacity of 9, to be precise) by John Willard Marriott. With its first hotel opening in Virginia in 1957, the company has since then grown by leaps and bounds, expanding into a chain of restaurants and hotels and has close to 4500 properties in over 80 countries, and has several others properties in the development phase. Headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland in US, the company functions under the able guidance of its founder’s son Bill Marriott, who works in the capacity of the Executive Chairman.

The Marriott Hotels own and operate several brands which include Courtyard, Residence Inn, Fairfield, Renaissance, as well as the recently acquired Delta Hotels. The hotel chain also has a stake in the historic and widely acclaimed Ritz-Carlton hotels. It also owned the Ramada International Hotels and Resorts, but sold it off to the real estate giant Cendant in 2004, and which now operate under the Wyndham Worldwide brand. The hotel chain also gets a mention in the Guinness Book of World Records, with its Dubai Hotel (JW Marriott Marquis) crowned as the tallest hotel in the world. Unfortunately, it was during the September 2001 attacks that the iconic Marriott World Trade Centre got destroyed. The company believes in and upholds ethical and responsible business and even partners with the UN for several awareness campaigns. It is a publically listed company and trades on the NASDAQ and S&P 500.

Net Revenue ($ Million)= 14486


Ranking Methodology:

The leading hotels of USA are considered for this list and top 10 hotels are found on the basis of net revenues.


Top 10 Media & Broadcasting Companies in the World 2016

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Media and broadcasting companies have impacted the lives of every individual across the world. From news to TV shows to movies to events to other areas of mass media, media and broadcasting companies have established themselves as leading businesses globally. The top media & broadcasting companies include Comcast, Walt Disney, Time Warner Inc, Time Warner Cable, 21st Century Fox along with brands like WPP, Viacom, Vivendi, CBS Corporation and Sky. Here is the list of the top 10 media and broadcasting companies in the world 2016.


10. Sky plc

Sky plc, formerly known as British sky broadcasting (BSkyB), is Europe’s biggest and leading media company.


Image: company website

The company was founded in 1990 by the equal merger of British satellite broadcasting and Sky television. The company has a wide base of viewers around 17million and is the top-paid television provider in United Kingdom. Company’s cutting-edge service enables the customers to access more than 350 channels related to sports, news, movies and entertainment. The latest technology of direct satellite broadcasting was thought by Murdoch, CEO of BSkyB in mid-1980s. The company’s mission is to grow the subscriber base through high quality service.

The company also owned broadcast rights of Premier League from 1992 to 2007 until their monopoly was ended by European commission. BSkyB launched digital service in 1998 which gained a huge success and within a month, company sold over 100,000 digiboxes. In early 2000s, company initiated the first interactive advertising campaign and rolled out Sky Active.

Revenue: USD 12550 million

Net income: USD 1646 million


9. CBS Corporation

CBS Corporation is American mass media company operates in commercial broadcasting, television production and publishing etc.


Image: company website

The business of the company is mainly focused at United States, and CBS is headquartered at Manhattan, New-York city. The very interesting fact about CBS Corporation is in 1970 Viacom was created as by spun off of parent company formerly known as Westinghouse electric. Around 1999, Viacom acquired CBS Corporation and in 2005 CBS Corporation was again spun off from Viacom. After the spun-off, CBS received the rights of Paramount Pictures for promotion and distribution of Star Trek films. The brand ‘Eye’ created by CBS has become one of the most recognised brands.

CBS is world’s second oldest broadcasting network and pioneered the broadcast of colour television in 1940. CBS business portfolio includes CBS television network, The CW which is JV of CBS and Warner Bros., CBS home entertainment, CBS sports network, CBS distribution group, CBS Ecomedia, showtime networks, CBS films, CBS Radio, Simon and Schuster, CBS scene etc. Recognising media industry’s impact on society, CBS Corporation has been the vanguard of creating diversity through a wide array of initiatives intended towards on and off screen talent. Recently CW network and Fox television stations declared new affiliation agreement for WP-WV TV in Chicago.

Revenue: USD 14235 million

Net income: USD 1492 million


8. Vivendi

Vivendi is a French conglomerate focused at media and content creation.


Image: company website

The company is headquartered in Paris, France, and formerly, it was known as Vivendi Universal when it had alliance with Universal studios. The company does the business through its main subsidiaries viz, Canal+ Group and Universal Music Group. Canal+group is foremost pay-TV operator in France and also has presence in Africa, Vietnam and Poland. Business operations portfolio of Canal+ comprises of sales & distribution of movies and TV series and Studiocanal.

Universal Music group is one of the prominent players in recorded music segment and also the most preferred group for publishing and merchandising music CDs and DVDs etc. Dailymotion, one more popular brand under company’s umbrella, is the biggest aggregation and distribution platforms in the world. Today Vivendi is developing its business in digital arena.

Vivendi Village, one of the subsidiaries of company, brings together various creative and innovative business ideas such as Vivendi Ticketing, MyBestPro, Watchever and Radionomy etc.

Revenue: USD 10761 million

Net income: USD 2761 million


7. Viacom

Viacom Inc., short for ‘Video and Audio Communications’ is USA based multinational mass media company primarily focussed at cinema and cable television.


Image: company website

CBS corporation held the major voting rights in Viacom, and the company was created in 2005 through the spin-off of CBS corporation. Viacom owns BET network Viacom Media Networks, and Paramount Pictures and operates 170 television channels to serve 700 million subscribers across the world. Viacom Inc runs a number of subsidiaries in six segments such as cable networks; television; radio; outdoor; entertainment; and video.

Very popular among cable viewers are MTV, Nick at Night, Nickelodeon, VH1, and Showtime. Flagship channel of the company, MTV, focuses on younger viewers and continues to attract one of the largest television audiences in the 18-34 age groups. Nickelodeon, meanwhile, has become a popular destination for children's programming. Comedy Central attracts young adults with programs such as The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, while BET dominates the important urban demographic with music, entertainment and special interest programming.

The entertainment segment comprises of Paramount Pictures, venerable publisher Simon & Schuster; and Paramount Parks' theme attractions. The company is a leader in the creation, promotion, and distribution of entertainment, news, music, sports and comedy.

Revenue: USD 13001 million

Net income: USD 2227 million


6. WPP

Wire and Plastic products plc (WPP) is British public relations and advertising MNC headquartered at London, England.


Image: company website

The company is one of the largest advertising companies in the world by revenue generation. The company has presence in variety of businesses such as advertising, media investment businesses, data investment management, public relations and public affairs, branding and identity, WPP digital and healthcare communications. It has very vast portfolio of advertising firms such as IMRB Millward Brown, Grey, Burson-Marsteller, Hill & Knowlton, JWT, Ogilvy & Mather, TNS, Young & Rubicam and Cohn & Wolfe. The company was founded in 1971 to manufacture wire shopping baskets. In 2000, WPP acquired Young & Rubicam for $5.7 billion which made it the largest advertising firm in the world.

Group’s digital business is operated by WPP Digital incorporated in 2007. WPP’s advertising agency has stake in Ogilvy & Mather, the Grey Group, Young & Rubicam Brands, and JWT whereas media investment management company holdings include Mindshare, MEC, Maxus, MediaCom and Essence and is operated by GroupM. Company has employed around 194,000 employees across 3000 offices worldwide. WPP has many awards and recognitions in its hall of fame which includes ‘Most Effective Holding Company, Globally, in the 2016 Effie Effectiveness Index’, ‘Warc’s most effective Holding Company 2015’ and named Holding Company of the Year at the 2015 Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.

Revenue: USD 18033 million

Net income: USD 1835 million


5. 21st Century Fox

21st Century Fox is an American mass media multinational, headquartered at New York.


Image: Wikimedia

It was formed as a result of a splitting of the assets of News Corporation in 2013, and is one of the most recognized brand names in the media industry. News Corporation was split into 21st Century Fox, which retains its media and broadcasting assets, and a new News Corporation, which retains the publishing assets. However, it does not retain News Corporation’s broadcasting rights in Australia, which are still retained by the newly formed News Corporation. It was renamed carefully to denote its connection to the rich heritage of 20th Century Fox, which is housed along with other entertainment brands under the parent company brand of 21st Century Fox.

The company deals in the film and television industries. Its operations span across 6 continents, and are categorized into four major segments: television, filmed entertainment, cable network programming and direct broadcast satellite television. James Murdoch is the CEO of the company. The assets of 21st Century Fox include the Fox Entertainment Group (which owns the 20th Century Fox film studio and Fox Television Network), STAR TV and a 39.14% stake in Sky plc. In 2015, it announced a joint venture with the National Geographic Society. This joint venture will be called National Geographic Partners, and 21st Century Fox will hold a 73% stake in the venture, which will take ownership of all National Geographic media, including its magazine and television networks. It also owns the 20th Century Fox Film, which is the world’s largest producer and distributor of motion pictures. Star India is a fully owned subsidiary of 21st Century Fox, and broadcasts over 40 channels in 7 languages, reaching over 720 million every week across 100 countries. Fox Television Studio has produced some of the most popular TV shows of all time, which include Modern Family, How I Met Your Mother, Glee, 24, The Simpsons, Family Guy and Homeland.

Revenue: USD 26885 million

Net income: USD 2275 million


4. Time Warner Cable

Time Warner Cable (TWC) is the leading American cable company and second largest after Comcast in USA.


Image: company website

Recently it was acquired by Charter communications in May’16, and the company was formed through the merger of Time Inc’s cable television company and Warner cable. It was previously operating under Time warner brand only but in 2009 Time Warner spun off their cable division and TWC was formed. It is headquartered in Midtown Manhattan, New-York city. The company provides high speed data, voice and video services in 29 states of USA. TWC serves around 16 million business and residential customers. It also offers cell tower backhaul services, enterprise-class, cloud-enabled hosting, managed applications and services etc.

TWC has very superior technology and 9 Emmy awards for outstanding achievement in technological development bolster it. Recently Charter communications has completed its purchase of Time Warner cable and intends to phase out TWC and markets it under brand name Spectrum.

The acquisition was opposed by industry players with a concern that the merger would not be benevolent for competition. So, hopefully we will hear more about Spectrum brand.

Revenue: USD 24111 million

Net income: USD 4300 million


3. Time Warner Inc

With leading film & television brands such as HBO, Warner Bros and Turner, Time Warner is third largest Media and Entertainment Company in the world.


Image: company website

Headquartered in New York, Time Warner was formed after a merger of Time Inc and Warner Bros in the 1990. With a strategy to become the world’s leading video content company and after a series of further M&A and consolidation activities, Time Warner now consists of three divisions - Home Box Office Inc (HBO), Turner Broadcasting System, Inc, and Warner Bros. These divisions together encompass a range of businesses in Television networks & broadcasting, feature films and television entertainment, worldwide distribution to home video, digital distribution, animation, comic books, videogames, licensing and international cinemas. The company’s full-year revenues and Adjusted Operating Income increased 3% and 19% from 2014 to $28.1 billion and $6.9 billion as on 31st Dec 2015, respectively, due to growth across all operating divisions.

Through their "Content Everywhere" initiatives, Time Warner looks to capitalize on the shift to on-demand viewing and growing worldwide demand for the very best video content and gives consumers access to its high-quality content across platforms and devices and on demand. Among Time Warner's digital products and services are: HBO and Cinemax services that offer the pay-television industry's leading SVOD services, as well as live streaming of content on mobile devices through its various apps, digital sites, bestselling online games and home video distribution through various formats such as VOD and EST.

The company invests in all forms of entertainment ranging from films, TV, sports, Video on Demand, video games, comics etc. Each of its 3 brands churn out hits year after year and propel the growth of the company. 2015 has been the best year ever in video games for Warner Bros and it also remained the number one supplier of broadcast television programming, including the biggest new hit of the TV season in Blindspot. Mad Max: Fury Road and Creed received a combined 11 nominations for the 88th Academy Awards.” CNN was the fastest-growing top 40 cable network in its key demographic in the U.S. for the year.

Revenue: USD 28299 million

Net income: USD 4074 million


2. Walt Disney

The Walt Disney Company, popularly known as Disney, is mass media and entertainment MNC in USA.


Image: company website

The company was established in 1923 by Walt Disney and Roy O Disney as Disney Brothers Cartoon studio and became the leader in animation industry soon. The company then diversified into live-action film production, television and theme parks, and around 1986, Disney diversified its business to focus on radio, music, theatre, publishing and online media. The company is headquartered in Burbank, California. The very popular creation of Disney, Mickey Mouse, was chosen as logo of a company. Today the business of a company is mainly divided into four segments viz, Studio entertainment, parks and resorts, media networks and Disney consumer products and Interactive media. The company’s well known ‘The Walt Disney studios’ is one of the largest and most admired studios in USA film industry.

In parks and resorts segment, the company also owns 14 theme parks worldwide. Walt Disney has a wide television network which includes Disney Channel, ESPN, A+E Networks, and ABC Family. Disney consumer products division produces toys, clothing, computer games and other merchandising based upon Disney owned properties. The Walt Disney has become an empire that is ruled by many cartoon characters such as Mickey Mouse, Snow-white, Cinderella, Donald-duck, Timon & Pumbaa, Simba, Toy Story and many more. Walt Disney once said “if you dream it, you can do it” and his story continuously restates it.

Revenue: USD 54826 million

Net income: USD 9115 million


1. Comcast

Comcast, formerly known as ‘Comcast holdings’ is an American MNC operating in broadcasting and cable network business.


Image: company website

Company is headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and Comcast is portmanteau of two words ‘Communication’ and ‘Broadcast’. It is sometimes described as a family business as the Brian Roberts, Chairman and CEO of Comcast is son of co-founder Ralph Roberts. Comcast is the biggest broadcasting company in the world by revenue and provides services to residential as well as commercial customers in 40 states and districts of Columbia. Company operates cable channels such as Golf channel and NBCSN. It owns world’s one of the largest production house ‘Universal’. Comcast provides cable services to residential customers in US under brand name ‘XFINITY’. NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast, operates a portfolio of news and entertainment television channels, popular theme parks, a premier motion picture company.

Comcast’s other subsidiary Comcast Spectacor operates in sports management segment, offering high quality sports and entertainment channels across 48 states of USA. Comcast also invests in innovative start-ups through its venture capital affiliate Comcast Venture. Recently Comcast invests in one such newbie Liveninja that help people get the assistance they need through communication tools. Recently Comcast is in talks to acquire DreamWorks animation valued at $3 billion to combine it with its own animation house ‘Illumination entertainment’. This year Comcast is going to broadcast Rio Olympics to American fans and viewers will be excited to experience the blend of storytelling of NBCUniversal and technology of Comcast.

Revenue: USD 75447 million

Net income: USD 8238 million

 

Ranking Methodology:

The leading media and broadcasting companies of the world were considered. The revenues and profits for these companies were found, and a cumulative score was calculated. Based on these score the final rankings were done.

Top 10 Travel Websites in World 2016

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Over the years travelling has become an important aspect of life, be it travel for business or for a vacation with family & friends. And due to the increase in consumer internet, travel bookings have become extremely easy through websites and apps. The top travel websites are Booking.com, TripAdvisor, Expedia, AirBnB, Hotels.com alongwith brands like Kayak, Priceline, Orbitz, LonelyPlanet and Travelocity. Here is the list of the top 10 travel websites in the world 2016.


10. Travelocity

Originally founded and owned by Sabre Corporation, it is now wholly owned by Expedia Inc.


Image: company website

It acts as an online travel agency and offers the customers a reservation system for hotels, and it has its headquarters in Dallas, Texas. Incorporated in 1966 as a subsidiary of Sabre Holdings, a subsidiary of American Airlines, it pioneered into reservation system where customers can themselves reserve and book air flights, hotels, cars and vacation packages. After AOL’s association with Travelocity, the website gained popularity leveraging on AOL brand value. Its advertising with “The Roaming Gnome” had been successful with the customers. In order to expand its operations it acquired many companies like lastminute.com, site59.com, etc.

Travelocity has been the first website to offer the users to book and reserve their own hotels and flights thereby eliminating the need of a broker. As of today, it is a very popular travel website especially in North America offering 20 million users over thousands of destinations to travel. Due to high competition in this industry, Travelocity was fumbling in recent years and hence was sold to Expedia in 2015 at $280 million and is now a travel website in the portfolio of Expedia Inc. which is leveraging on its high popularity to compete with the other travel and tourism competitors such as The Priceline Group, Kayak, etc.

Unique Website Visitors (millions) - 6months = 13.9


9. Lonely Planet

Originally owned by BBC Worldwide, it was bought by Brad Kelley’s NC2 Media for $77million in 2013.


Image: company website

It is the world’s largest travel guide book publisher with 120 mn books in 11 different languages. Founded by the married couple Tony and Maureen Wheeler, they wrote their first book that consisted of only 94 pages, and within a week, it sold 1500 copies. After the success of their first booklet, they decided to write a travel guide for the Asia subcontinent. Originally known as Lonely Planet Publications, they changed their name to Lonely Planet in July 2009 to show its broad coverage of the travel and tourism industry.

The guide book series first publication was the India Travel guide that was published in 1981 and started expanding its roots in Asia and soon it was known worldwide. Lonely Planet, as of today, has presence in written media through magazines, internet through its website lonelyplanet.com and ‘the Thorn Tree’ community but the community was closed in 2012 as the reviews did not adhere to Lonely Planet’s values and television through its various travel TV series in various countries. After its acquisition, Houghton (present CEO) restructured the company and wanted to get the latest information about locations in real time and termed it as “new content model”. Lonely Planet is still developing this model which will help users with real time information.

Unique Website Visitors (millions) - 6months = 15.2


8. Orbitz

Orbitz Worldwide, Inc. is a part of Expedia and is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois.


Image: company website

Previously a separate company, it was purchased by Expedia in a $1.3 billion deal that was announced in February 2015 and closed in September 2015. Orbitz Worldwide Inc was a separate company earlier and it was then acquired by Expedia in a deal that was announced in Feb 2015 and was finally closed in September 2015. The deal was valued at $1.3 billion. The company is currently headquartered in Citigroup Center, Chicago, Illinois.

Orbitz.com is a part of the flagship brand Orbitz Worldwide and has been operational since 2001. It can be said that Orbitz was founded by the airline industry in response to the boom of various online travel companies like Expedia and Travelocity and was also a feasible way to reduce airline distribution costs.

Various airlines like Continental Airlines, Northwest Airlines, Delta Airlines and United Airlines invested close to $145 million in this project. It was initially called T2, meaning ‘Travelocity.Terminator’, which was later changed to Orbitz in February 2000. The company started beta testing and in June 2001, Orbitz.com was officially launched.

Orbitz operates on a mixed Red Hat Linux and Solaris powered platform and adopted Sun Microsystems’ Jini platform early in a Java environment which was clustered. It has released some parts of its CEP (Complex Event Processing) infrastructure as Open Source. Orbitz filed for an IPO in August 2003 and lost close to $5.3 million in the first half of 2003 based on a revenue of $107 million.

Unique Website Visitors (millions) - 6months = 15.2


7. Priceline

Known for its Name your price system, Priceline.com started with an online platform where users can quote their price for vacation homes, air flight tickets, car rentals and hotels.


Image: company website

The identity of the service provider to the purchaser was only revealed when the transaction would have been made which was nonrefundable. The difference between the price quoted by the user and the service provided by the provider would be the source of revenue for priceline. It has also ventured into many product offerings such as gasoline and home loans through its Name your price system but all these offerings were terminated in 2002 except for home loans. It was founded in 2000 by Jay S Walker. It has its headquarters in Connecticut, United States.

To tap the Chinese market as it’s a huge potential for travel and tourism industry, it has plans to invest $250 million through its Chinese website Ctrip. Recently, because of the heightened competition in the industry, Priceline has having a mediocre year with its CEO Paul J Hennessy resigning and another company Vroom as a CEO and till then the COO and CMO of priceline Brett Keller becoming the interim CEO.

It is one of the most widely used travel websites in the world. With the growing tourism across the world, the business of the company also seems to be picking up pace.

Unique Website Visitors (millions) - 6months = 31.8


6. Kayak

Recently acquired by The Priceline Group in 2013, it works as an independent subsidiary of the group.


Image: company website

It has presence in over thirty countries and eighteen languages and it has its headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut, United States. It helps the consumers to find hotels, flights, vacation packages and rental cars, and is a leading travel website across the world with a high brand recall and strong presence. Founded in 2004 by Steve Hafnar and Paul M. English, it was originally incorporated as Travel Search Company Inc. In 2011, the name was changed to Kayak Software Corporation. To expand its operations internationally, it acquired two companies, one was Swoodoo, a leading travel website based out Germany and the second was checkfelix of JaBo Software, based out of Austria.

In 2010, it listed itself on NASDAQ and went public to raise 50 million. Its share price opened up at $26 per share which was higher than expected and closed at $33.18 showcasing a successful IPO. Its mobile app Kayak also have received various awards for “Best Apps for Business Travelers” as well as “the Best Apps and Websites for Travelers”. In 2009, Time magazine named Kayak as one the best 50 websites and has received many accolades. Though its core business is metasearch booking, it has also started taking direct bookings through other travel websites such Travelocity and orbitz.com.

Unique Website Visitors (millions) - 6months = 36.9


5. Hotels.com

Now a part of Expedia Inc., it boasts over 325,000 properties in 19000 locations.


Image: company website

It has 85 websites in its portfolio which are available in 34 languages and it provides bookings of hotels to the customers through its telephone call centres and localized websites. It aims to offer the customers one-stop point for them to find hotel pricing and availability. It has its headquarters in Bellevue, Washington. Launched in 1991 by David Litman and Robert Deiner, it was initially named as Hotel Reservations Network and used to provide booking through telephone. It was acquired by USA Networks Inc and then it changed its name to Hotels.com whose domain name cost was $11 million in 2002. After this there was a series of rapid expansion both in the domestic and international market.

It also has one unique feature known as Hotels Price Index in which the website publishes twice-yearly review of hotels located both in domestic and international locations based on the number of rooms sold in the hotel’s respective market. It is aimed at media, journalists and the hoteliers. Recently, hotels.com has partnered with Uber to offer the customers a seamless experience while travelling and on a vacation by providing Uber feature in their mobile app. Uber feature will automatically access hotel’s location and current location and the consumers can book their rides easily.

Unique Website Visitors (millions) - 6months = 51.6


4. AirBnB

AirBnB is an online marketplace that connects people who want to rent their property for vacations rentals to people who are looking for rental property by charging a fee.


Image: company website

Started in 2008 by Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia, and after the joining of third co-founder Nathan Blecharczyk, the site airbednbreakfast.com was launched officially which was later shortened to Airbnb.com. It is headquarted in San Francisco, California and it has presence in 191 countries and over 34000 cities with its international offices in 19 countries. The business model followed by Airbnb is peer to peer accommodation with not owning even a single property. It’s a platform for vendors and customers to attract and make transactions. It cuts a service fee from the users and this is the primary source of income for Airbnb.

Recently, Airbnb made its valuation at $24 billion and its looking forward to warn upto $900 milion in revenue this year. In addition to the website,mobile applications for iOS, android and Apple watch are available for the customers so that they can book on the go. Since 2011, it has acquired a lot of travel companies with first acquisition being Accoleo, based in Hamburg. Airbnb has been one of a kind travel website and its creative idea is owed to the founders.

Unique Website Visitors (millions) - 6months = 57.1


3. Expedia

Expedia was established on October 22, 1996 as an online travel company.


Image: company website

It was the property of Microsoft and in 2001 the property was spun off to become a public property, and Rich Barton then became the CEO and Lloyd Frink joined the new independent company. Expedia is headquartered at Bellevue in Washington, and it has a strong global appeal and excellent marketing and brand visibility. It also has localised sites for many countries including Canada, China, Australia, Malaysia and others. It is a very effective website that offers extensive options of hotels to choose from, books online travel tickets, cruises as well as vacation packages at competitive rates for everyone. The site uses Amadeus or the Sabre’s reservation systems for booking flights and uses Pegasus and Worldspan along with its own reservation systems for booking hotels.

It is one of the fastest growing travel portals in Asia and is maintained by AAE Travel Pte Limited which is a Singapore entity. AAE Travel is a joint venture between Expedia Inc. which is the leading internet booking engine and Air Asia which is the best low cost airline in the world.

AAE is headquartered in Singapore and it operates business of Expedia across Asia including china. Expedia also started accepting bitcoins in 2014 and also partnered with Citigroup to create Expedia+ card where bonus points are earned by members and helps members in priority service.

Unique Website Visitors (millions) - 6months = 58.4


2. TripAdvisor

TripAdvisor is a leading name in the world of travel and it claims to be the largest travel site in the world.


Image: company website

It has presence in 48 countries in 28 languages, and has 6.5 million properties and over 170 million user reviews, and it is headquarted in Needam, Massuhusetts. Founded in 2000 by Stephen Kaufer, Langley Steinert, and several others Tripadvisor was started with the idea of professional reviews from travel guides and magazines and not user generated social media. But soon the consumer reviews exceeded the professional ones and they became the travel website as we know today. It works as a aggregator of user reviews and opinion sabout places, destinations, activities, attractions and restaurants of the world and provide a comprehensive information to the consumer so that they can make an informed decision. It has a huge portfolio of websites under Tripadvisor Inc. with 24 travel websites being managed them. They started acquiring these websites from the year 2007.

Tripadvisor has a rich user generated content, a strong travel community, global reach and technological innovations. Leveraging these tools they are able to provide a consumer plan and book their perfect trip. The majority percentage of revenue generated by this travel website is through advertisements- mostly by click based advertising and display based advertising. The other portion comes from transaction based and subscription based offerings.

Unique Website Visitors (millions) - 6months = 144.7


1. Booking.com

Booking.com was founded when the two websites booking.nl and booking.org decided to merge and form one travel website.


Image: company website

Stef Noorden served as the first CEO of the company, and it started as a small startup in 1996 in Enschede, Amsterdam, Netherlands. As of today it boasts 934,835 properties worldwide with 93,820,000 verified reviews, and it has the highest number of unique website visitors. It is headquarted in Amsterdam. In July 2015, The Priceline Group acquired booking.com for $133million. The integration of Active Hotels Limited and booking.com helped The Priceline Group from a financial crisis by improving its financial position from loss in 2002 to profit in 2011. It was touted as the “best acquisition in the Internet History”.

For adveritising, it is the biggest spender on google adwords and has received the award for the same in Travel & Tourism category in 2011. It has also launched many apps such as Booking.com Tonight which helped the customers to book the hotels last minute, i.e., by offering them same night hotels at the discounted prices. Also, to make bookings hassle free for customers they launched an app on native Kindle fire app so that the customers can access their bookings anytime, anywhere. It has received criticism due to its dominant presence in the travel and tourism industry. Competitive authorities in the Czech Republic, United Kingdom, France, Italy, Germany, Hungary, Switzerland, Austria and Sweden are investigating Booking.com and in 2015, Booking.com dropped its ”rate-parity” clause.

Unique Website Visitors (millions) - 6months = 298.6


Ranking Methodology:

The leading travel websites were considered and based on their unique visitors in a period of 6 months, they were ranked

Top 10 Information Technology (IT) Companies in UK 2016

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UK is the home to some of the biggest industries in the world. The main industries are banking, automobile, services etc. But some of the leading IT companies are also based in United Kingdom. The top IT companies in UK include Phoenix IT, Telecity (Equinix), Micro Focus, Computacenter, Fidessa Group along with Attenda, Avecto, Aveva, Sage Group and RM Plc. Here is a list of the top 10 IT (Information Technology) companies in UK 2016.


10. RM Plc

RM is a British organization that works in giving Information Technology items and administrations to instructive associations and foundations.


Image: company website

Its key business sector is UK training including schools, universities, colleges, government instruction offices and instructive offices. RM utilizes around 1,600 individuals, the dominant part situated in the organization's central station situated on Milton Park, close Didcot, Oxfordshire. RM likewise has workplaces over the UK and a product improvement office in India. The organization glided on the London Stock Exchange in November 1994 under the name RM plc. In 2003 the organization won the agreement to convey online tests for Key Stage 3 ICT. Regardless of a pilot stage in 2005 including 45,500 understudies that was judged a win by the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority the legislature scratched off the agreement in 2007, without further ado before their booked introduction.

Cuts in the financial plans of UK instructive foundations in 2011 harmed RM's incomes, driving it to shed several workers and offer less beneficial parts of its business.

RM already offered items from other classroom assets firms it had procured:

• SpaceKraft Ltd – designer and producer of a scope of tactile items. Obtained in 2007, sold back to unique proprietors in 2016.

• DACTA Ltd – wholesaler of instructive items from LEGO, TOLO and BRIO. Procured in 2007[20] and sold in 2012.

• ISIS Concepts Ltd – a UK furniture producer. Gained in 2009 and sold in 2012.

The organization offers a scope of instructive programming including the Kaleidos Virtual learning environment, MathsAlive, DiscoverAlive, Living Library and SuccessMaker. They additionally bundle programming titles from different organizations to permit simple unified establishment on RM networks.In 2005 RM was recompensed the agreement for Glow (formally known as Scottish Schools Digital Network (SSDN) National Intranet venture).

Revenue=178.23m Euros

Profit=14.96m euros

Number of employees=1600


9. Sage Group

The Sage Group plc, usually known as Sage, is a British multinational venture programming organization headquartered in Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom.


Image: company website

It is the world's third-biggest supplier of big business asset arranging programming (behind Oracle and SAP), the biggest supplier to little organizations, and has 6.1 million clients worldwide. It has workplaces in 24 countries. The organization is the benefactor of The Sage Gateshead music venue in Gateshead. On 19 April 2010, Sage declared that its CEO, Paul Walker, had shown an enthusiasm for venturing down from his position, which he had held for 16 years. The Financial Times reported that his flight would prompt hypothesis over Sage's mergers and acquisitions, which have been a key part to the gathering's development in the previous 20 years. In a meeting with The Times, the CEO of Sage's UK business expressed that: "Acquisitions are a piece of our DNA".

Walker was one of the longest serving CEOs of a FTSE100 organization, just surpassed by Sir Martin Sorrell at WPP and Tullow Oil's Aidan Heavey. According to the Daily Mail, Walker is prone to have left Sage with as much as £21 million given his shares, reward arrangement and salary.[18] Walker left the organization on 1 December 2010.

In August 2014, Sage declared that Guy Berruyer was to resign; Stephen Kelly, the UK government's previous head working officer, got to be Group CEO in November 2014. In 2015 the Sage logo was revived. Established and headquartered in Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom, the organization at first became naturally, yet all the more as of late has become essentially through acquisitions.

Sage has 6.1 million clients and 13,400 workers over the world. Key industry center incorporates: Healthcare; HR and Payroll; Construction/Real-Estate; Transport/Distribution; Payment Processing; Accountancy; Not-revenue driven; Manufacturing; Retail; Automotive Distribution.

Revenue=1435.5m Euros

Profit=268.2m Euros

Number of employees=13271


8. Aveva Group

AVEVA Group plc is a British multinational data innovation organization headquartered in Cambridge, United Kingdom.


Image: company website

It gives building outline, data administration arrangements, and CAD/CAM programming, including specific innovation counseling administrations for the plant, force and marine commercial ventures. AVEVA became out of the administration supported Computer-Aided Design Center which was built up in 1967. The inceptions of AVEVA begin in 1967 in Cambridge, UK, with the foundation of the Computer-Aided Design Center or CAD Centre as it was all the more generally alluded to, and later formally got to be. It was an administration subsidized exploration foundation made by the UK Ministry of Technology, with a mission to create PC helped outline strategies, and advance their take-up by British industry. Its first chief was Arthur Llewelyn, who at first contracted out the enrollment and administration of pro staff to ICL.

On 23 May 2012, AVEVA declared the procurement of the Belgium and Germany-based Bocad gathering of organizations, a supplier of building data modeling programming for GBP14 million. The securing fortified AVEVA's 3D basic itemizing abilities for the plant, marine and development markets.

On 17 December 2012, AVEVA declared the securing of all advantages identifying with the propelled representation and reenactment programming of Huntsville, Alabama-based Global Majic Software, Inc.

On 5 January 2015, AVEVA declared the securing of Derry-based 8over8 Limited for GBP26.9 million. 8over8 gives contract hazard administration programming - ProCon - for the oil, gas and mining, and other framework industries. AVEVA has around 55 workplaces in more than 37 countries.

Revenue=201.5m euros

Profit=20m euros

Number of employees=1620


7. Avecto

Avecto is a spearheading security programming organization with a dream to change business societies, liberating all clients to be innovative, beneficial and productive.


Image: company website

Avecto is headquartered in Manchester (UK) with a system of worldwide accomplices and workplaces in Boston (US), and Melbourne (Australia). Achievements through the years: In 2012, Avecto places in the Red Herring Top 100 rundown which showcases rising European brands. Benefit Guard variant 3.0/3.5 and 3.6 hit the business sector with McAfee ePO release expanding on the first Group Policy version of Privilege Guard. Built in 2008 by UK business people Paul Kenyon and Mark Austin. Venture reporting is created as a discretionary extra after client request. Initially server contract sees Privilege Guard conveyed on more than 33,000 servers at a worldwide bank

In 2013, Deloitte crowns Avecto as the UK's quickest developing programming organization with 4731% development more than five years. Benefit Guard 3.8 version is discharged, putting up another 14 new components for sale to the public. McAfee names Avecto as its Most Innovative Partner, in acknowledgment of our nearby coordinated effort and mix Avecto stretches out nearness to Melbourne, Australia with a satellite office.

In 2014, expanding on their minimum benefit legacy and the accomplishment of Privilege Guard, they dispatch three unmistakable modules to frame a remarkable security suite; Defendpoint. Boston office migrates from Andover to Cambridge, MA to provide food for our developing US group. 100th associate joins the group and the product is conveyed on more than 4 million endpoints, crosswise over 600+ worldwide brands.

Revenue=14.6m euros

Profit=3.5m euros

Number of employees=119


6. Attenda

Attenda Limited gives IT counseling benefits, and oversaw administrations and cloud stage for business basic applications.


Image: company website

It offers cloud administrations, for example, oversaw private cloud, oversaw AWS open cloud, test and improvement cloud, and cross breed processing administrations for organizations to indicate, plan, construct, test, convey, and oversee applications, stages, and supporting foundation. It also gives basic applications, which incorporate venture applications, computerized business arrangements, and customer particular applications; and end client registering, including desktop change, and efficiency and joint effort. The organization additionally gives facilitating framework arrangements, for example, foundation administration and advancement, remote checking and administration, colocation, and fiasco recuperation arrangements; and counseling administrations. It has key associations with Microsoft, SAP, Citrix, Mimecast, Akamai, Oracle, HP, VMware, Amazon Web administrations, Datum, and RedHat. Attenda Limited was consolidated in 1996 and is situated in Staines, United Kingdom.

Also, the organization is pleased to have held a Three Star Extraordinary Best Companies Accreditation. Attenda's positioning at twentieth in the Top 100 Mid Companies, demonstrates enduring change on a year ago's position at 23rd spot, and with proceeded with year on year change in the Top 100 in the course of the most recent six years.

With more than 40 new staff selected amid 2014, large portions of whom based at its Caerphilly office which opened in June 2012, the organization has put resources into building up its group coordinated effort abilities to guarantee that land detachment does not restrain Team work and expert improvement. The organization keeps on putting resources into selecting graduates and students into the business, as an individual from The 5% Club, to manufacture a workforce for the future; and to make a society that keeps on empowering, perceive and remunerate development, imagination and uncommon execution.

Revenue-40.728m Euros

Profit=1.041m euros

Number of employees=283


5. Fidessa

Fidessa Group plc is a British-headquartered organization which gives programming and administrations, for example, exchanging frameworks to customers in the monetary administrations part.


Image: company website

The firm additionally gives market information and related administrations to purchase side and offer side money related administrations clients. The Company was initially established in 1981 as Intercom Data Systems (IDS): after which it was called Royalblue Group plc, and comprised of two separate working divisions, Royalblue Financial and Royalblue Technologies. Royalblue Financial focused on the money related exchanging stage that has ended up Fidessa today, and Royalblue Technologies fixated on two separate items - rostrvm, a call focus innovation stage, and HelpDesk for Windows. It has been recorded on the London Stock Exchange subsequent to 1997.

With the gathering's center exchanging stage, Fidessa, being better known in the commercial center, the Royalblue Group plc changed its name to Fidessa Group plc taking after shareholder endorsement at the AGM held in April 2007.

An offer side suite giving exchanging, market information, request administration and execution capacities which is utilized by 85% of the level one worldwide value brokers. A purchase side suite involving three principle items: Minerva, Sentinel, and Tesseract. Sentinel is utilized by 8 out of 10 of the biggest worldwide resource chiefs for pre-exchange and post-exchange consistence checks. It was named Buy-Side Product Of The Year in 2008 and 2009.

Revenue=295.5m euros

Profit=29.522m euros

Number of employees=1700


4. Computacenter

Computacenter plc is European association that give PC organizations to open and private-portion customers.


Image: company website

It is a UK association arranged in Hatfield, Hertfordshire, and the association is recorded on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. Computacenter was built up in the UK by Hulme and Ogden, and in 1990, it opened Europe's greatest PC outlet; in 1991, it was recorded by The Independent every day paper as one of the fastest growing free associations in the UK and, by 1994, it had created to wind up the greatest elite IT association in the UK. Computacenter was floated on the London Stock Exchange in 1998. In 2006 the association extended its organization workplaces to consolidate another International Service Center in Barcelona, Spain, and a customer work territory and remote organization office in Cape Town, South Africa.

Because of the association's directed organizations/outsourcing business, a heavy partition of these people manage customers' destinations. Computacenter uses specific counsels, wander executives, field engineers, bargains head and record boss and Service Desk staff.

Computacenter is focal business accessory and title benefactor of the Professional Rugby Players' Association's ("PRA") Rugby Players' Awards Dinner, held at the Grosvenor House Hotel.

It underpins Hertfordshire Fire and Rescue Service's fire examination canine, one of seventeen such puppies used as a piece of England to reinforce reviving specialist area in unlawful blaze examinations, which is a dim Labrador Retriever named "CeeCee"

Revenue=3,058m euros

Profit=103m Euros

Number of employees=12,993


3. Micro Focus

Micro Focus International plc is a multinational programming and data innovation business situated in Newbury, Berkshire, England.


Image: company website

The firm gives programming and consultancy administrations to customers redesigning legacy frameworks to more present day stages. The organization is recorded on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index, and the organization was established in 1976, and in its initial years, focused on COBOL items. In 1981, it turned into the main organization to win the Queen's Award for Industry only to develop a product item. The item was CIS COBOL, a standard-consistent COBOL execution for microcomputers.

In December 2013, Micro Focus obtained the Orbix, Orbacus and Artix programming product offerings from Progress Software. These business sector driving executions of the CORBA standard were initially created by IONA Technologies.

On 15 September 2014, Micro Focus reported that it would secure The Attachmate Group for US$1.2 billion in shares, which will give it responsibility for Attachmate, NetIQ, Novell, and SUSE product offerings.

On 22 March 2016, Micro Focus reported its purpose to get Serena Software, then esteemed at $540 million. The organization asserted police and different offices were utilizing 16,500 duplicates of its product on different PCs when police were just ever qualified for 6,500 licenses. The gathering at first asserted A$10 million in harms however later expanded this to A$12 million subsequent to checking on the consequences of a court-requested, A$120,000 KPMG review of the NSW Police Force's PC frameworks.

Revenue=1230.7m Euros

Profit=138.465m Euros

Number of employees=4500


2. Telecity Group

Telecity Group plc (in the past TelecityRedbus and before that Telecity), is a European bearer unbiased datacentre and colocation focus supplier.


Image: company website

It represents considerable authority in the configuration, assemble and administration of exceedingly associated, strong and secure situations in which clients can house their telecoms, web and IT framework. It was recorded on the London Stock Exchange until it was procured by Equinix in January 2016. TelecityGroup plc is the consequence of the joining of three separate organizations – TeleCity Limited, Redbus Interhouse Limited and Globix Holdings (UK) Limited. Around then 3i Group made a venture of £24m in the Company.

In August 2012, TelecityGroup gained Tenue Oy, a supplier of bearer nonpartisan server farms in Helsinki, Finland. In November 2012 TelecityGroup obtained Academica, a server farm and IT administrations administrator, likewise in Finland, giving the developed TelecityGroup Finland a sum of three server farms and 2MW of operational limit; 7MW of extra limit will be opened in two new offices in due course.

In May 2013 TelecityGroup gained SadeceHosting, a supplier of server farm and facilitated administrations in Istanbul, Turkey and in November 2013, TelecityGroup procured 3DC, a free server farm supplier in Sofia, Bulgaria. In May 2015, US information organization Equinix declared it would get TelecityGroup for £2.35 billion. On 13 November 2015, the European Commission conceded leeway for the Equinix offer to secure Telecity. On 15 January 2016 Equinix reported that it has finished the obtaining of Telecity.

The organization works 37 server farms, midway situated in the key European urban areas

TelecityGroup server farms host telecoms systems, including settled line systems, portable administrators, Internet administration suppliers and substance circulation systems. These organizations use TelecityGroup server farms to interface with Internet trade focuses, each other and their end clients, for example, Internet content organizations

Revenue/employee=0.4641

Profit/employee=0.034


1. Phoenix IT

Bringing Phoenix into the Daisy Group has made something that is really extraordinary.


Image: company website

Phoenix's family in IT framework administrations, facilitating and business coherence and Daisy's history in business bound together interchanges and systems, join to give our clients access to a more extensive arrangement of complete end-to-end arrangements and business sector driving administrations. It is one of the leading IT companies in UK. The Daisy Group is a main UK supplier of a scope of brought together interchanges and IT Services, including availability, voice, upkeep, and also cloud and facilitating arrangements serving 65,000 clients across the country.

Phoenix deliberately supplements Daisy's own becoming corporate and accomplice organizations serving mid-market clients and its offering to framework integrator accomplices. The biggest specialty unit at the organization, Partner Services, posted incomes of £49.8m, a drop of 12 for each penny. This territory was additionally spooky by the loss of the Cisco establishment where it gives support to integrators/affiliates that don't have limit or craving to do it without anyone's help.

Phoenix attempted to plug the Cisco hole by increasing top level accreditations from HP and Huawei to benefit their system unit for exchange clients, yet consequent contracts wins couldn't veil the general decrease.

The organization is taking a gander at making interests in an administration work area to accept responsibility for so specialists can choose if an issue can be settled remotely or on the off chance that it requires nearby backing. Ian Spence, portrayed the main half year for Phoenix as "soaked", highlighting the absence of money era at net level. He noticed early today that "financial specialists will search for enhanced requests in the second 50% of this current year to support monetary 2016 desires".

Revenue=685m Euros

Profit=249m euros

Number of employees=300

 

Ranking Methodology:

The leading IT companies in UK were considered for this analysis and parameters like revenues, profits and employees were found. After this a consolidated score was calculated based on revenue per employee and profit per employee with 0.7 and 0.3 weightages respectively, and final ranking was done.

Top 10 Telecom Companies in Australia 2016

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Australia is the home to one of the biggest industries and companies from the banking sector, services industry, FMCG, retail etc. However, some of the leading telecom companies are also present in Australia. The top telecom companies in Australia include brands like Vodafone Hutchison, Telstra, Singapore Teleco, Macquaire Communications, TPG Telecom along with M2, Vocus, My Net Fone, Netcomm Wireless and Queste Communications. Here is the list of the top 10 telecom companies in Australia 2016.


10. Queste Communications

Queste Communications Limited, a telecommunications company, headquartered in Subiaco, Australia.


Image: company website

Queste’s research and development facility is located in North Carolina, USA, and the company is listed in Australian Securities Exchange (ASE) since November 1998. Queste Communications owns a majority shares in Orion Equities Limited which is a listed investment company and with the help of this company, Queste is being involved in the production and sale of olive oil. The company is involved in the following activities:

• Investing in securities of many listed and unlisted companies

• Involved in the development activities, rent and resale of real estate properties based in Australia

• Operates an olive grove in the Dandaragan estate for the olive oil production

Currently, Queste focuses on commercialization of its voice over internet protocol (VoIP) technology. In support of ShareGift Australia, the company has implemented a scheme called Share Donation scheme. This is all about giving opportunity to shareholders to sell and donate shares or parcels of shares to some charity. This also requires no stockbroker or paying any brokerage fees. The company’s Board is committed to maintaining the highest standards of Corporate Governance. Quest Communications has a controlling interest of 58.9 percent in ASX Listed Investment Company.

Revenue: $0.328312 million

Profit: $-1.055911 million


9. Netcomm Wireless

NetComm Wireless, a leading developer of innovative products for telecommunications carriers and ISPs across world, is a one of the top developers and suppliers of high performing communication devices.


Image: company website

NetComm is headquartered in Sydney, Australia and operates offices in the USA, Canada, UK, New Zealand, Japan and Middle East. With the experience of over 33 years, the company has come up with many engineered products that are able to deliver the performance capabilities of ADSL and has become a leader in M2M devices. With its expertise in fixed and mobile broadband technologies, the company is able to customize products successfully and can promise the delivery of performance capabilities for business and industrial applications. NetComm has also got experience in Customer Premises Equipment (CPE) and Edge technologies.

The product offerings of NetComm are as follows:

• M2M wireless products

• 3G/4G cellular gateways

• Broadband Products

• Wi-Fi products

• Powerline products

NetComm Wireless' customers include Telecommunications carriers, Internet Service Providers, System Integrators, Channel partners and Enterprise customers.

Awards and recognition:

• It has been awarded with Compass Intelligence - M2M Innovation Product / Solution of the Year for two consecutive years 2015 and 2016

• Awarded with new ACOMM Award category - IoT Innovator for its Smart Home Gateway (NTC-70) in the year 2016

• The company received Australian Business Award for Innovation for three consecutive years 2013 to 2015

• The company received Australian Business Award for Product Innovation for four consecutive years 2012 to 2015

Revenue: $74 million

Profit: $0.2464257 million


8. MyNetFone

MyNetFone Limited, one of the Australia’s largest VoIP network, was founded in 2004 and headquartered in Sydney, Australia. MyNetFone is a part of the MNF Group.


Image: company website

The company provides various services like broadband internet, cloud-based communications, and its client base includes residential customers, business and government sectors as well. Today, the company provides a full suite of corporate voice, fax and data services which includes the proprietary Virtual PBX phone system. The company is committed to:

• Best possible customer experience

• Value for money

• Quality services

Product offerings include residential VoIP phone plans, Business Voice, Communications, Residential DSL Internet Plans, Business Broadband, Phone Hardware etc

Solutions offered:

• Residential: With MyNetFone you can save up to 60% off your phone bills with our VoIP phone service or great-value DSL internet for your home.

• Business: MyNetFone communication solutions are specifically designed to simplify operations for your business. Our services include Hosted Phone Systems, internet, 1300 numbers, Virtual Fax and number porting.

• Enterprise: MyNetFone is Australia's leading provider of enterprise-grade IP-based telecommunications and the only SIP Trunking provider officially certified to interoperate with Microsoft Lync Server in Australia.

Awards:

• Awarded Forbes ‘Asia’s Best Under a Billion’ in the year 2014

• For the Business Review Weekly Fast 100 2014, the company was awarded as the Australia’s fastest growing ASX-listed telco

• Awarded with Deloitte Technology Fast 50 Australia Awards for five years (2008, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2013)

• Received Money Magazine Best of the Best Awards 2007 - Gold Winner - Best VoIP Plan, Business User

Revenue: $85.675 million

Profit: $7.184 million


7. Vocus Communications

Vocus Communications, a national telecommunications company, was founded in 2008 and headquartered in Sydney, Australia.


Image: company website

The company initially was established as a business telecommunications provider. Currently, Vocus communications owns and operates (about 18 data centres) a significant part in Australia’s and New Zealand’s fibre network. The company’s network experts are redefining what’s possible in our industry every day. The company has the following offerings to mid, large and corporate businesses:

• Internet

• Ethernet

• Dark Fibre

• IP WAN

• Cloud

Vocus's customers wanted more from their network, so that’s what they’ve given them. The company now has over

• 11,000 km of fibre optic cable laid and operational throughout Australia,

• 3000 on-net buildings connected to their network and

• 20,000 buildings classed as near-net.

Highly skilled technicians and network engineers run the operations teams at Vocus. They take pride in their extensive experience designing and building superior carrier-grade networks. In fact, most of them have worked for the other guys in that industry and have come to Vocus because they wanted to make more of a difference for their customers.

Subsidiaries of Vocus Communications include Eftel, Club Telco, iPrimus, Dodo Services, Amnet, aaNet, Macquarie Telecom, Planet Netcom etc. The company is quite known for providing high performance, availability and scalable solutions.

Awards and Recognitions:

• For years 2015, 2014, 2013 and 2012, Vocus was placed in the fast 100 list of BRW.

• Vocus had attained a sixth position in 2011 for BRW fast starters list.

Revenue: $149.799 million

Profit: $19.85 million


6. M2 Group

M2 Group Limited, an Australian Telecommunications company, was established in 1999.


Image: company website

It is headquartered in Melbourne, Australia and M2 Group Ltd is a retailer and wholesaler of full suite of traditional telecommunications services, in addition to utility services. Its other products include power, gas and insurance, and is a leading brand name in Australia. M2 Group’s flexibly packaged telecomm products are provided to Australian and New Zealand’s customers and while that of power and gas have been sold to selected states in Australia. The company’s name changed from M2 Telecommunications Group Ltd to M2 Group Ltd in 2013. The company is operational in Australia, New Zealand and the Philippines with an employee base of about 3300. In 2004, the company was listed on the Australian securities Exchange and it entered into the S&P/ASX200 in the year 2012. The company’s business segment brands like the Commander and Engin manages voice and data services.

The company’s product offerings are as follows:

• Wholesale and retail telecommunications

• Power and gas

• Insurance

With its brands of Dodo and iPrimus, the company's consumer segment offers Australian consumers telecommunications services, energy and insurance. With the help of its Wholesale division, the company provides services to small to medium sized telecommunications service providers that include

• wholesale fixed line,

• mobile and data telecommunications services

Revenue: $1115.689 million

Profit: $74 million


5. TPG Telecom

TPG Telecom limited, an Australian telecommunications and IT company, was established in 1986 as Total Peripherals Group.


Image: company website

TPG is headquartered in NSW, Australia and specialises in business and consumer internet services and mobile telephone services as well. TPG is considered to be the largest mobile virtual network operator as of 2015 and has an employee strength of over 1400 employees. Attributes of TPG’s success are its people, products, innovation and network assets which enabled them in providing customers with services that are reliable, fast and cost effective.

TPG’s services are provided to residential users, small to medium enterprises, government and corporate enterprises and its offerings include:

• Internet Service Provider

• Online television

• Mobile telephony

• Fibre Optic and Ethernet broadband access

• Mobile Broadband and various business networking solutions

• SIM Only Mobile plans

As the company operates and manages their own network infrastructure, they take end-to-end responsibility in all service offerings.

There are eight divisions in which the company operates and they are as follows:

• TPG Internet

• Unlimited broadband

• IPTV

• TPG Systems

• TPG Software

• TPG Boomerang TV

• TPG Mobile

• AAPT

Revenue: $1270.6 million

Profit: $224.1 million


4. Macquarie Telecom

Macquarie Telecom Group Limited, established in 1992, is a managed hosting and telecommunications company and headquartered in Sydney, Australia.


Image: company website

In 1999, the company was listed on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX), which shows its strong financial position in the telecom business in Australia. The company’s offices are in Sydney, Canberra, Brisbane, Melbourne, Adelaide, Hobart and Perth, and has its presence spread across the entire country. Macquarie Telecom owns and operates several data centres that provide:

• Telecommunications connectivity

• Air conditioning

• Electricity supply

• Uninterruptible power supply

• Diesel generators

The company provides an end-to-end business communications platform which is helpful for the customers in making faster decisions for running and growing their businesses. The company’s services are more collaborative, resilient, secure and ready for the cloud. Macquarie Telecom’s focus is on delivering a superior experience that range from high performance networks, to secure hosting and business class cloud, right through to business-grade telecommunications and multi-carrier mobility. The company offers the customers with best-in-class online tools to monitor and manage their entire environment, local account managers and technical consultants.

Awards:

• Awarded the Frost and Sullivan Data Centre Service Provider of the Year 2013 GOLD in Enterprise Customer Service Excellence by the Customer Service Council

• For Personal Accountable service, Macquarie Telecom in 2008, won the ‘Best Customer Care’ award at the World Communication Awards in London

Revenue: $1058.679 million

Profit: $953.978 million


3. Singtel

Singapore Telecommunications Limited, also known as Singtel, is a Singaporean telecommunications company.


Image: company website

Singtel is one of the Asia’s leading communications group and is headquartered in Singapore., and till 1995, the company was known as Telecommunications Equipment. The company is the largest listed company on Singapore exchange by market capitalisation. Singtel’s main operations are in Singapore and Australia. Singtel has expanded outside its home market and has owned many shares across many regional operators like:

- 100 percent shares of one of the Australian telecommunications company Optus

- 32.15 percent shares of Bharti Airtel

With operating experience of more than 130 years, Singtel has played a vital role in the country’s development and has become a major communications hub. Currently, the Singtel Group employees over 22,000 people across world.

The product portfolio of Singtel include:

• Fixed-line and mobile telephony

• Broadband and fixed-line internet services

• Digital television

• IT and network services

Singtel controls a significant market share in Singapore, with 82 percent of the fixed-line market, 47 percent of the mobile market and 43 percent of the broadband market in Singapore. Now, the company continues to lead and shape the local consumers as well as enterprise market. Optus, Singtel Group’s Australian arm, is considered to be leader in integrated telecommunications constantly moving into innovation side and coming up with innovative products and services.

The Group has become a major player in Asia and Africa because of its strategic investments in the following regional mobile operators:

• Telkomsel (Indonesia)

• Globe Telecom (the Philippines)

• Advanced Info Service (Thailand)

• PBTL (Bangladesh)

Revenue: $12774.24 million

Profit: $2806.97 million


2. Telstra

Telstra Corporation Limited, one of the Australia’s largest telecommunications and Media Company, was established in 1975.


Image: company website

Telstra is headquartered in Melbourne, Australia, and initially the company originated together with Australia Post as a government department which is the Postmaster-General’s Department. Now, Telstra has become fully privatised through various change programs and is expected to increase the focus on growth in international market. Telstra’s product and service portfolio includes:

• Fixed line and mobile telephony

• Internet and data services

• network services

• digital television

• Retail internet (Bigpond)

• Cable internet

• ADSL internet

• Mobile broadband

• Subscription television

In Australia, the company provides 16.9 million Mobile services, 7.2 million Fixed voice services and 3.3 million Retail fixed broadband services

The company’s focus is on Customer & revenue growth, network superiority and driving productivity through simplifying businesses.

Telstra is quite known for helping its customers in improving the ways in which they live and work through connection.

Revenue: $26607 million

Profit: $4286 million


1. Vodafone Hutchison Australia (VHA)

Vodafone Hutchison Australia (VHA), leading Telecommunications Company in Australia, was established in 2009 and headquartered in North Sydney, NSW in Australia.


Image: company website

Currently it operates the Vodafone and Crazy John’s brands in Australia. The merger formed between Vodafone Australia and Hutchison 3G Australia on 10 June 2009 resulted in making it Australia’s one of the largest mobile telecommunications provider with a subscriber base of 7 million. This joint venture is owned by Hutchison Telecommunications Australia and Vodafone Group plc on a 50-50 basis.

The product offerings of Vodafone Hutchison Telecommunications Limited are as follows:

• Prepaid and post-paid mobile phones

• wireless broadband

Vodafone, one of the largest mobile providers in Australia, currently has more than 5.3 million customers. The company also has many retail stores around the country, and quite famous for its state-of-the-art customer care centre in Tasmania. Vodafone wants to try to make things work differently for their customers, from simple plans, to $5 roaming, to ending ‘bill shock’. The company’s mission is to change how the mobile industry works. The merger of Vodafone Hutchison Australia announced that it would buy out its Vodafone branded stores, previously run by the retail management groups Digicall, First Mobile, Inside Mobile and GSM. The new retail structure may add about 170 stores to its current stores.

Revenue: $21380 million

Profit: $16010 million

 

Ranking Methodology;

The leading telecom companies in Australia were considered and based on their revenues and profits, a consolidated score was calculated, based on which they were ranked.

Top 10 Companies in Canada 2016

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Canada has produced some of the top companies in the world – Few of the companies are ranked in Forbes global 1000 ranking – Signifying the global presence and impact that these companies have on the world. The top companies in Canada include George Weston, Royal Bank of Canada, Power Corp. of Canada, Toronto-Dominion Bank, Manulife Financial Corp, Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc, Magna International along with companies like Enbridge, The Bank of Nova Scotia and Imperial Oil Ltd. Here is the list of the top 10 Companies in Canada in 2016.


10. Imperial Oil Ltd

The organization was established in 1978. Headquartered in Calgary, Alberta, Imperial Oil was situated in Toronto, Ontario, until 2005.


Image: company website

Imperial Oil Ltd has a subsidiary named Imperial Oil Resources Limited, and the Company is occupied with the exploration, production, generation and sale of natural gas and crude oil. The Company's operations are broadly 3 operational segments: Upstream, Downstream and Chemical. Upstream operations incorporate the exploration and production of crude oil and natural gas. As far as the downstream operation is concerned, it comprises of the transportation and refining of crude oil, mixing of refined items and the conveyance and marketing of those items. Chemical operations comprise of the production and sale of various final end product petrochemicals.

Imperial Oil Limited is one of the largest petroleum Company in Canada. The largest stakeholder in the company is by Exxon Mobil Corp. who holds more than 69% possession stake in the company. Imperial Oil is a Canada's major petroleum refiner, a key petrochemical producer and a noteworthy maker of diluted bitumen, crude oil and natural gas. The company has vast retail operations that include Esso-brand service stations The company also holds stakes in the Alberta Oil Sands. Syncrude, which is one of the world's biggest oil sands operation company, is believed to be held by Imperial with claims of 25 percent stakes. In Kearl Oil sands, Imperial is believed to be in a joint endeavor oil sands mining operation with ExxonMobil Corp.

The majority of Imperial's generation is from its vast oil wells and natural resource holdings in the Alberta Oil sands. It also holds large Norman Wells oil field in the Northwest Territories.

Imperial Oil Limited’s sales turnover in Canada was 26.7 Billion Canadian dollars in 2015. The company earned 1.22 Billion Canadian dollars profit.

Revenues (in Bill C$)= 26.756

Profit (in Bill C$)= 1.122


9. The Bank of Nova Scotia

The bank of Nova Scotia is situated in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and caters to more than 23 million customers.


Image: Wikimedia

It is one of the largest banks in Canada by deposits and market capitalization after Royal bank of Canada. The bank was established in Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1832 by William Lawson, and currently, Mr Brian J.Porter is the president of the bank and Mr Gerald W Owen is the Managing Director. Along with Royal Bank of Canada, TD bank, Bank of Montreal and CIBC; the bank of Nova Scotia is one of Canada’s Big five banks. The bank number or Institution Number of Royal Bank of Canada is 002.

Scotia bank has more than 1,700 offices in more than 50 countries. The company has around 1,000 domestic branches. Apart from Canada, the bank has presence in Caribbean, Central and South America. The bank provides a portfolio of financial product services that include deposit accounts, loans, asset management, mutual funds etc. With assets under management exceeding more than 895 bn CAD, the company trades on the New York and Toronto Exchanges.

A diversified financial services sector company, Bank of Nova Scotia offers variety of services. The company is into 4 different segments: Wealth management (in which the company provides specialized services to ultra or high net worth individuals or institutions), Retail, Small Business and Commercial banking (which is the retail banking arm of the company to serve the general customers with personal and business banking operations), and finally Global banking and Markets (that provide Investment, Capital Markets and Global banking solutions).

The Bank of Nova Scotia’s sales turnover in Canada was 24.4 Billion Canadian dollars in 2015. The company earned 7.2 Billion Canadian dollars profit. The company has team of more than 89,000 employees.

Revenues (in Bill C$)= 24.439

Profit (in Bill C$)= 7.213


8. Enbridge Inc.

Enbridge Inc. was established in 1987. Headquartered in Calgary, Alberta, Enbridge is an energy distribution and transportation company.


Image: company website

The Company operates in 4 broad business segments: Liquids Pipelines; Sponsored Investments, Gas Distribution and Pipelines as well as Processing and Energy Services. Enbridge is Canada's biggest natural gas distribution and transportation network, and in fact the company operates the longest crude oil and liquids transportation system in the world. Operating the crude oil and liquids transportation system, Enbridge is able to cater to the supply across two major nations which are Canada and the United States. The Company is additionally into natural gas gathering as well as mid-stream businesses. Moreover, the company caters to the energy distribution services in Ontario, Quebec as well as New York State. Enbridge is able to generate more than 2,000 megawatts of alternate and renewable energy capacity. The company is gradually expanding the scope towards the wind, solar and geothermal power.

The company’s gas utilities segment caters in around 2 million clients in areas of Ontario and New York for providing natural gas. Additionally, the company moves around 2.5 million barrels of crude oil a day. The company’s Sponsored Investments business segment comprises of 2 major associations: Enbridge Energy Partners and Enbridge Income Fund where the parent company, Enbridge, holds 25% and 72% stake respectively.

Enbridge Inc.’s sales turnover in Canada was 33.7 Billion Canadian dollars in 2015. The company has team of more than 11,000 employees across United States and Canada. Currently, Mr. Albert Monaco is the president of the bank and Mr. John Kendall is the CFO. The company has been nominated for a place on the Global 100 Most sustainable Corporations for seven consecutive years.

Revenues (in Bill C$)= 33.794

Profit (in Bill C$)= -0.159


7. Magna International Inc.

Established in 1957, Magna International Inc. creates, fabricates, engineers, supplies, and offers automotive items and products.


Image: company website

The organization headquartered in Aurora, Canada and founded by Frank Stronach, and the company operates in various parts of North America, Asia, Europe and Rest of World. The organization offers automotive body frameworks, and related designing services; powertrain frameworks, for example, transmissions; seating frameworks including complete seating systems, seat structures and components, and froth and trim items. It likewise gives lighting system frameworks containing inside and outside mirrors, headlamps and tail-lamp systems, actuators etc.

Magna International makes and covers pretty much everything expected to assemble an engine vehicle through its different auxiliaries, divisions and subsidiaries. Vehicle building and assembling is offered by Magna Steyr which is its biggest division. As far as trims, sounds systems, lighting, fixing systems, instrument and entryway boards are made by Magna's internal and external division. Body and chassis frameworks are made by Cosma International. Engine design and manufacturing including transaxles, transmission frameworks, and other motor parts are offered by Magna Powertrain. And Magna Mirrors makes manufactures and driver assistance items.

With 313 assembling and manufacturing operations and 88 product development and operation centres, Magna International is a global automotive component manufacturer and supplier. The company has presence in more than 29 nations through its sales centres.

Magna designs, assembles, manufactures and produces car parts that are principally supplied to General Motors, Tesla Motors, Volkswagen, Toyota, BMW, Chrysler LLC and Ford Motor Company, and Chrysler LLC.

Magna International Inc’s sales turnover in Canada was 32.2 Billion Canadian dollars in 2015. The company earned 2.01 Billion Canadian dollars profit. The company employs more than 125,000 employees with around 118,000 workers that ensure that the customer receives superior value through its world class manufacturing processes.

Revenues (in Bill C$)= 32.134

Profit (in Bill C$)= 2.013


6. Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc

Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc is headquartered in Laval, Quebec, Canada, a suburb of Montreal.


Image:Wikimedia

It was founded in 1980 by Alain Bouchard who is the current chairman of the company. Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc is also called Couche-Tard, where Couche-Tard means night owl. It is one of the biggest company owned convenience operators with presence across the North America (U.S., Canada, Mexico) as well as in Asia (Japan, China, Indonesia). The organization works its corporate stores broadly under following banners: Couche-Tard, Circle K, Mac's, On the Run as well as certain other affiliated brands like Dairy Mart, 7-jours and Winks.

In Canada, Couche-Tard is the pioneer in the convenience store industry. The company is the biggest independent convenience store operator in the United States in terms of the number of company operated stores. As far as Europe is concerned, Couche-Tard is a pioneer in convenience store and road transportation in the Scandinavian and Baltic nations along with a noteworthy presence in Poland.

All across North America, Couche-Tard's system has more than 7,900 convenience stores. The company has more than 15 business units with 11 of those in United States. These 11 units cover more than 41 states in US. In Canada, the company has 4 business units covering all the 10 provinces

Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc.’s sales turnover in Canada was 34 Billion Canadian dollars in 2015. The company earned 1.12 Billion Canadian dollars profit. The company employs more than 80,000 employees that ensure that the customer receives superior value through its wide network and service offices in North America.

Revenues (in Bill C$)= 34.5299

Profit (in Bill C$)= 0.9335


5. Manulife Financial Corp.

Headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, Manulife or Manulife Financial is a Canadian insurance provider.


Image:Wikimedia

The company also offers a wide range of financial services, and Sir John A Macdonald who was organization's first president was also Canada's first Prime Minister. Geographically, the company is divided into 2 broad segments: The organization that works in Canada and Asia is "Manulife" while the one that operates in United States is its John Hancock division. The company offers financial services through its Manulife Bank of Canada which is an entirely owned subsidiary of Manulife.

Canadians have reached out to Manulife for the large money related choices in their lives over the last 125 years. Today, we have developed into a wide network, serving one in each five Canadians. Our portfolio incorporates a full scope of security and investment funds items and services addressing the requirements of a wide market segment and customers. Manulife Investments offers a broad scope of items, products and services under financial services, while in 1993 Manulife Bank turned into Canada's first insurance agency possessed bank. Manulife's Group Benefits are realized by more than 16,000 Canadian organizations that entrust their employee benefits programs on them. Manulife Private Wealth offers a different variety of consistent and coordinated way to handle with the wealthy affluent individuals through its wealth management program. Manulife is one of Canada's 10 Most Admired Corporate Cultures of 2015, as per Waterstone Human Capital.

Manulife Financial Corp’s sales turnover in Canada was 34.4 Billion Canadian dollars in 2015. The company earned 2.19 Billion Canadian dollars profit. The company employs more than 34,000 employees and around 63,000 agents under contract that ensure that the customer receives superior value through its world-wide network. Asset under management and administration for the company is in the range of $935 CAD.

Revenues (in Bill C$)= 34.43

Profit (in Bill C$)= 2.191


4. Toronto-Dominion Bank

Headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Toronto-Dominion bank caters to more than 24 million customers.


Image:Wikimedia

The existence of the company dates back to more than 150 years but TD group as such as founded in 1955, and the company has more than 1200 retail branches across the North American region. A diversified financial services sector company, TD bank group offers a variety of financial products and services. The company is into three different segments: TD wealth and TD asset Management (in which the company provides specialized services to ultra or high net worth individuals or institutions), Canadian and US Retail (which is the retail banking arm of the company to serve the general customers with personal and business banking operations) and TD Insurance (which includes various products like Auto Insurance, Credit Protection, Health and Life insurance, Home insurance etc).

There is a wholesale banking arm of the company that provides a range of corporate banking, Investment banking and capital markets products and services to its partners and customers. The investment banking and capital markets product group includes financial advisory, trading, facilitation, underwriting and execution services. The equity investment portfolio comprises primarily of investments from private equity. Corporate lending, cash management services and trade finance are included in the corporate banking product group.

With assets under management exceeding more than 944 bn Canadian dollars, the company is set to break the top 50 rank of Forbes Global 2000. According to Financial Post, the company is already one of Canada’s top 10 employers.

Toronto-Dominion Bank’s sales turnover in Canada was 31.42 Billion Canadian dollars in 2015. The company earned 7.8 Billion Canadian dollars profit. All around the world, the company employs more than 80,000 employees.

Revenues (in Bill C$)= 31.426

Profit (in Bill C$)= 7.813


3. Power Corp. of Canada

Power Corp. of Canada is a large public company that was established in the 1920s.


Image:Wikimedia

The company is headquartered in Montreal and has diversified international management and investments in sectors like financial services, communications etc across North America, Europe and Asia. Founded to develop hydroelectric power, Power Corporation of Canada now ventures into financial sector, not power. Through its large part stake in Power Financial, the organization controls one of Canada's driving common asset firms (IGM Financial), one of its biggest life insurance providers (Great-West Lifeco), and other protection/ insurance based firms. The company also six different daily newspaper in Quebec and Ontario and publishes Montreal's La Presse. It also owns a larger part of Pargesa Group, which has stakes in various big organizations like construction (namely Lafarge), wines and spirits (Pernod Ricard), utilities (GDF SUEZ) and different divisions/ sectors in Europe through a controlling stake in another subsidiary Groupe Bruxelles Lambert.

The company has a total of $1.22 trillion of assets under management. The company has presence in communications sector as well through Square Victoria Communications Group which is its subsidiary. Power Corporation likewise holds and effectively deals with a portfolio of investments in the United States, Europe and Asia. Power Corporation is a dominant stake possessor of Great-West Lifeco through its subsidiary Power Financial. Great West Lifeco provides life and medical coverage as well as retirement and investment management services.

The enterprise is known for its dynamic interest in Canadian governmental issues through its connections and the connections of the Desmarais family with different politicians.

Power Corp. of Canada’s sales turnover in Canada was 38.2 Billion Canadian dollars in 2015. The company earned 1.78 Billion Canadian dollars profit.

Revenues (in Bill C$)= 38.265

Profit (in Bill C$)= 1.786


2. Royal Bank of Canada

Royal Bank of Canada is situated in Toronto, Canada and caters to more than 16 million customers. It is the biggest bank in Canada.


Image:Wikimedia

The bank also has more than 78,000 workers worldwide, and the bank was established in Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1864, and the bank number or Institution Number of Royal Bank of Canada is 003. Royal Bank of Canada has more than 1,200 branches in Canada with around 127 branches crosswise over seventeen nations in the Caribbean, that cater to more than 1.6 million clients. Apart from Canada, the company serves in US as well as another 37 countries. Additionally, RBC also has an investment brokerage arm called RBC Dominion Securities and an investment & Corporate banking arm called RBC Capital Markets.

With assets under management exceeding more than 670 USD bn, the company has one of the largest market capitalizations in Canada as per the Scorpio Partnership Global Private Banking Benchmark.

A diversified financial services sector company, Royal bank of Canada offers variety of services. The company is into five different segments: Wealth management (in which the company provides specialized services to ultra or high net worth individuals or institutions), Personal and commercial banking (which is the retail banking arm of the company to serve the general customers with personal and business banking operations), Insurance (which includes the 2 business sub-segments that are Canadian and International insurance), Investor and treasury services ( for providing asset servicing solutions) and finally Capital Markets (that provide Investment and Global banking solutions).

Royal Bank of Canada’s sales turnover in Canada was 35.3 Billion Canadian dollars in 2015. The company earned 10.02 Billion Canadian dollars profit. Royal Bank of Canada is listed as the largest profitable company in Canada for 2015.

Revenues (in Bill C$)= 35.321

Profit (in Bill C$)= 10.026


1. George Weston Ltd.

George Weston Limited is a large private sector Canadian company that was established in 1882.


Image: company website

The company is headquartered in Toronto, Canada and is largely owned by Wittington Investments, Canada, and the company is into the field of food and drug retail business. The company has 2 broad segments: One is the Loblaw Companies Limited and other is the Weston Foods. The company has more than 2300 stores for its retail operations that are able to cater to most Canadians serving their regular nourishment, wellbeing and health needs. Weston is one of Canada's driving dough punchers and bakers, offering a wide choice of fresh bakery items toward the North American business sector. The Weston Foods portion delivers crisp and fresh bakery products likes cakes, pies, donuts, breads etc. It is also into the business of ice cream and sandwich wafers.

Loblaw, on the other hand, serves the hard items like pharmacy drugs, apparel, banking and mobile solution products, general merchandise etc. With around 2,300 corporate and franchised owned stores, it has a wide and easy accessibility to the Canadian people. The company recently acquired Shoppers Drug Mart that offer over-the-counter medicines, beautifying agents and aromas and family unit essentials. What's more, the company develops and oversees real estate properties in the areas of retail and commercial areas with a portfolio comprising of 435 properties. The portfolio fundamentally concentrates on general store shopping malls, super and hypermarkets, and other commercial properties.

George Weston’s sales turnover in Canada was 46.8 Billion Canadian dollars in 2015. The company earned 864 Million Canadian dollars profit. It is the largest employer in the private sector with more than 200,000 employees.

Revenues (in Bill C$)= 46.894

Profit (in Bill C$)= 0.864


Ranking Methodology:

Step 1: A laundry list of companies were shortlisted based on revenue and profit

Step 2: Top 10 companies were shortlisted based on the above 2 parameters.

Step 3: A weighted average score based on the 2 parameters Revenues and Profits were used to develop ranks.

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