Every year, Fortune compiles a list of the world’s most admired companies, and Apple has held the top spot for 17 consecutive years.
The full list includes 1,500 companies, of which 1,000 are US-based and 500 are non-US firms. All companies have revenues of at least $10 billion.
Of the 1,500 companies, Fortune filtered out only the top earners and whittled the list down to 680. Then about 3,700 executives, directors and analysts are asked to rate each company on the list in various categories – investment value, quality of management, social responsibility. . . , etc.
Apple again topped the list with the most points for social responsibility, financial strength, innovation and global competitiveness. The Cupertino-based tech giant follows Microsoft and Amazon.
The former rose to second place this year with the top spot in the computer software industry, while Amazon dropped one spot but still got excellent scores in Internet services and retail.
Notably, though in first place, Apple’s score of 8.19 was lower than last year’s 8.65.
