12 Indian firms in Forbes’ Asia-Pacific ‘best companies’ list
02 Sep 2014
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), HCL Technologies, and HDFC Bank are among the 12 companies included in the Forbes list of the 50 best companies in the Asia-Pacific region.
The other Indian companies on the list are Asian Paints, Axis Bank, Lupin Laboratories, Mahindra & Mahindra, Motherson Sumi Systems, Sun Pharmaceuticals, Tata Motors, Tech Mahindra and Titan, another Tata Group company.
Not surprisingly, Forbes ranked India second behind China as home to the "world's next growth engines".
The Forbes 'honour roll of the Fabulous 50' lists the best of Asia-Pacific's biggest publicly listed companies. China has 16 companies on the 2014 list, continuing the leadership it has held for the last three years.
However, the number of Chinese companies on the list has gone down from 20 last year on the back of slow economic growth in the country.
India continues to trail China with 12 companies on the list, the same number as last year.
HDFC Bank, India's second-largest private sector bank, has made the list eight times, more than any other company since Forbes started compiling the Asia-Pacific list in 2005.
TCS makes it to the list for the seventh time, while Tech Mahindra, the country's fifth-largest IT firm, debuts on the list after net profits soared 112 per cent to touch $500 million.
Cigarette-based Indian conglomerate ITC failed to make it to the list this year.
Forbes said TCS, India's largest IT firm, boasts a market cap of $71.25 billion, bigger than the country's next three IT outfits combined.
"Long dependent on the US market, [TCS] may soon generate more than half its revenue outside the US," the publication said.
South Korea has six companies on the list, followed by Hong Kong with three and two each from Japan, Australia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand
Technology companies dominated the list, with nine representatives.
The consumer durables industry has the second-most members with seven companies, including four motor vehicle giants from China and India, as the rise of Asia's middle class continues to drive global demand.
Three oil and gas companies make it into the list, up from only one last year.
The list is chosen from a pool of 1,300 companies in the region that have at least $3 billion in market cap or annual revenue.
Forbes took into account performance measures and outlook, and did not include companies that carried a lot of debt or were more than 50 per cent state-owned.
