Apple Climbs to #35 in Fortune 500 Rankings

[MacRumors]

Fortune today released its annual "Fortune 500" rankings of the world's largest companies by revenue, revealing that Apple leapt 21 spots this year to land at #35 with over $65 billion in revenue.

Apple climbed 21 slots into the top 50 of the Fortune 500 this year. How'd it get there? The company not only continues to expand its reach in existing markets, it also keeps creating new ones.

Take the iPad, which showed the world the power of tablet computing when it was introduced last year. iPad 2 followed, and was one of the most highly anticipated electronic products this year. CEO Steve Jobs' appearance at its debut in March reassured shareholders worried about his most recent medical leave. Regardless of who's in charge, though, investors have plenty of reason to believe Apple's magic spell on consumers can continue.

Apple's profits of $14 billion in 2010 also made it the 8th most profitable company, up from 26th place last year. In the Computer and Office Equipment category, Apple passed Dell in overall revenue to move into second place behind HP. Apple leads that category in profits by a wide margin.

Apple was also cited as one of the seven biggest hirers of 2010, adding 12,600 employees during the year to reach nearly 50,000 total employees. Apple also leads the Fortune 500 in average annual investment returns over the past decade, averaging 45.8% annual growth.

Overall, Wal-Mart repeated as the world's largest company with $421 billion in revenue, well ahead of second-place Exxon Mobil's $354 billion figure.

Article Link: Apple Climbs to #35 in Fortune 500 Rankings

 

[gkarris]

Wow - who's Big Brother now?

 

[Tones2]

For anyone who equates size to quality, remember that Wal-Mart is #1 and Exxon is #2.

Tony

 

[jrtc27]

Apple's Secret

The iPad is their secret. I was skeptical at first, but now I have to have one! Both teenagers and adults buy them - they sell so many with such a high profit margin! And now many of them will be buying the iPad 2 to get their promised 2x processing power and 9x graphics power.

 

[DTphonehome]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

Love the point about hiring. Apple haters should at least be proud that in a brutal global economy, there's at least one company adding jobs at a fast clip right here in the USA!

 

[C. Alan]

The Ipad is not Apple's secret to sucess. Their secret is being able to create markets for their products where no market previousely existed. That being said, the Ipad is a case in point.

 

[dukebound85]

I didnt realize ATT was quite a bit more profitable than Apple was in 2010 yikes!

 

[dethmaShine]

For anyone who equates size to quality, remember that Wal-Mart is #1 and Exxon is #2.

Tony

Apart from that, Apple is all about Quality.

It doesn't mean you can apply the same ridiculous analogy everywhere.

 

[Tones2]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

Love the point about hiring. Apple haters should at least be proud that in a brutal global economy, there's at least one company adding jobs at a fast clip right here in the USA!

Stats to support this? All these jobs could be overseas, or efficiencies could actually have reduced employment levels.

Tony

 

[Tones2]

Apart from that, Apple is all about Quality.

It doesn't mean you can apply the same ridiculous analogy everywhere.

Nice.... Like quality isn't a subjective thing.

But whatever you think about Apple's quality, size and growth is NOT about quality, as evidenced by many in the top 50. And that was my point.

Here are the Top Ten:

1 Wal-Mart Stores
2 Exxon Mobil
3 Chevron
4 ConocoPhillips
5 Fannie Mae
6 General Electric
7 Berkshire Hathaway
8 General Motors
9 Bank of America Corp.
10 Ford Motor

Not something really to aspire to.


Tony

 

[rdowns]

Love the point about hiring. Apple haters should at least be proud that in a brutal global economy, there's at least one company adding jobs at a fast clip right here in the USA!

Keep in mind that most of them are retail jobs.

 

[gkarris]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

Love the point about hiring. Apple haters should at least be proud that in a brutal global economy, there's at least one company adding jobs at a fast clip right here in the USA!

Part-time slightly-above minimum wage retail with no benefits?

 

[cvaldes]

Stats to support this? All these jobs could be overseas, or efficiencies could actually have reduced employment levels.

Tony

Actually, the majority of the new hires are in Apple Retail (worldwide). Their engineering ranks continue to grow, but far more slowly.

 

[dethmaShine]

Nice.... Like quality isn't a subjective thing.

But whatever you think about Apple's quality, size and growth is NOT about quality, as evidenced by many in the top 50. And that was my point.

Here are the Top Ten:

1 Wal-Mart Stores
2 Exxon Mobil
3 Chevron
4 ConocoPhillips
5 Fannie Mae
6 General Electric
7 Berkshire Hathaway
8 General Motors
9 Bank of America Corp.
10 Ford Motor

Not something really to aspire to.


Tony

And what about Consumer Electronics? Sure Quality is a subjective quantity but over the years, statistics have proven that Apple makes high quality products; much better than probably any other consumer electronics company in the world.

Maybe I'm sounding like a fanboy praising Apple on an apple forum, but I don't think stating the truth is synonymous with being a fanboy. It's synonymous to stating the truth.

 

[dukebound85]

Nice.... Like quality isn't a subjective thing.

But whatever you think about Apple's quality, size and growth is NOT about quality, as evidenced by many in the top 50. And that was my point.

Here are the Top Ten:

1 Wal-Mart Stores
2 Exxon Mobil
3 Chevron
4 ConocoPhillips
5 Fannie Mae
6 General Electric
7 Berkshire Hathaway
8 General Motors
9 Bank of America Corp.
10 Ford Motor

Not something really to aspire to.


Tony

I am confused as to why/how you came to that conclusion

 

[cvaldes]

The iPad is their secret.

No, the key to Apple's success is no secret and it's not the iPad.

It's the iPhone.

It generates over half the company's revenue and has the fattest gross margins of all their product lines.

 

[koruki]

The iPad is their secret. I was skeptical at first, but now I have to have one! Both teenagers and adults buy them - they sell so many with such a high profit margin! And now many of them will be buying the iPad 2 to get their promised 2x processing power and 9x graphics power.

The iPads do NOT have a high profit margin, infact they are priced so competitively that their closest rival, the Xoom, actually has a higher starting price

 

[MH01]

Nice.... Like quality isn't a subjective thing.

But whatever you think about Apple's quality, size and growth is NOT about quality, as evidenced by many in the top 50. And that was my point.

Here are the Top Ten:

1 Wal-Mart Stores
2 Exxon Mobil
3 Chevron
4 ConocoPhillips
5 Fannie Mae
6 General Electric
7 Berkshire Hathaway
8 General Motors
9 Bank of America Corp.
10 Ford Motor

Not something really to aspire to.


Tony

The Name gives it away actually "Fortune". And how exactly are you going to compare the quality of the Apple made cars or Apple produced petroleum versus the low quality General motors crap or Exxon.

 

[rjohnstone]

I didnt realize ATT was quite a bit more profitable than Apple was in 2010 yikes!

AT&T is more than just a wireless carrier.
The wireless unit only accounts for 1/3 of their annual profits.

 

[Tones2]

The Name gives it away actually "Fortune". And how exactly are you going to compare the quality of the Apple made cars or Apple produced petroleum versus the low quality General motors crap or Exxon.

I'm not. I'm just saying that:

1) "Quality" is a subjective thing

AND

2) Size does not mean quality - Proof by looking at the Top 10 list.

So for the fanboys that are going to EQUATE increasing size with quality, you can't. That doesn't mean that Apple does or does not make quality products relative to the market. It just means that size has little to do with that. Size is about either about base need or conversely about marketing, resources, and time.

And "Profitability" is about how high a price a company can set and get away with it because of supply being greater than demand or because they have sufficiently created a fanatical fanboy base that will accept a higher than rest of the market price for similar items. So if Apple is more profitable as a percent of revenues compared to similar companies, then they are charging us too much but are able to get away with it. Just like the oil companies and banks on the list.

Tony

 

[apolloa]

The company I work for should be on that list if it's done by earnings but it's not?? Or has the company got to provide services and products globally to be on there??


And at number one is a supermarket lol!!! What a world we live in now where selling food primarily, makes you the biggest company by turnover in the world!! hahahahaha

 

[NinjaHERO]

As long as they keep pumping out quality products, they should continue to soar.

Let's just hope success doesn't make them lazy.

 

[TMay]

I'm not. I'm just saying that:

1) "Quality" is a subjective thing

AND

2) Size does not mean quality - Proof by looking at the Top 10 list.

So for the fanboys that are going to EQUATE increasing size with quality, you can't. That doesn't mean that Apple does or does not make quality products relative to the market. It just means that size has little to do with that. Size is about either about base need or conversely about marketing, resources, and time.

And "Profitability" is about how high a price a company can set and get away with it because of supply being greater than demand or because they have sufficiently created a fanatical fanboy base that will accept a higher than rest of the market price for similar items. So if Apple is more profitable as a percent of revenues compared to similar companies, then they are charging us too much but are able to get away with it. Just like the oil companies and banks on the list.

Tony

You would think that after all of these years, people as yourself would get over the need to apply the Apple fanboy label.

A substantial portion of the purchases that are driving Apple's growth are to new customers. I doubt that Apple has the time to indoctrinate all of these folks, and unless the RDF is at eleven, I just don't see Apple pulling in all the new buyers except on the merits of the products.

 

[adt100]

Not the Worlds

Fortune today released its annual "Fortune 500" rankings of the world's largest companies by revenue, revealing that Apple leapt 21 spots this year to land at #35 with over $65 billion in revenue.

The list includes America's largest corporations not the Worlds.

 

[bearcatrp]

How about apple release where those jobs were created by country.