Here is an interesting statistic I use in my entrepreneurial class, various speeches and eluded to at last Saturday’s MIT D-Lab event. The statistics is from the BusinessWeek/Boston Consulting Group (BCG) World’s top 50 innovative companies for 2008. Obviously, the main intent of this list is to rank the innovative companies for that year. While the companies listed and the ranking itself may be debatable, I find this list useful in explaining the current state of Japan. The slide I’ve created includes just the top 25 companies ranked in order. On top of this, I’ve added the year each corporation was founded.
1. Apple | 1976 |
2. Google | 1998 |
3. Toyota | 1933 |
4. GE | 1892 |
5. Microsoft | 1975 |
6. Tata Group | 1868 |
7. Nintendo | 1889 |
8. P&G | 1837 |
9. Sony | 1946 |
10. Nokia | 1865 |
11. Amazon.com | 1994 |
12. IBM | 1920 |
13. RIM | 1984 |
14. BMW | 1916 |
15. HP | 1939 |
16. Honda Motor | 1946 |
17. Walt Disney | 1923 |
18. General Motors | 1908 |
19. Reliance | 1966 |
20. Boeing | 1916 |
21. Goldman Sachs | 1869 |
22. 3M | 1902 |
23. Wal-Mart | 1945 |
24. Target | 1902 |
25. Facebook | 2004 |
Some interesting things that I find from this list to point out. First, all four Japanese companies (hilighted in red) were all formed on or before 1946. Second, about half the US companies on the list were formed AFTER 1975. Finally, that most of the companies on this list were founded in times of recession or other financial crisis.