The World's Largest Tech Companies 2018: Apple, Samsung Take Top Spots Again

Though the U.S. remains on top, Asian companies are slowly inching their way onto our list of the top technology companies in the world. Seven of the largest tech companies in 2018 hail from the U.S. — down one from last year.

But Apple remains the top player in the tech scene, not only ranking as the largest tech company in the world, but also the eighth largest company in the world on Forbes’ Global 2000 list. The company saw $247.5 billion in sales, $53 billion in profit, $367.5 billion in assets and a market cap of $927 billion for the past year. Apple also ranked #1 last month on our list of America's Largest Public Companies, after rewarding its shareholders with plans to return another $100 billion via buybacks.

Tech companies account for 130 spots spots on Forbes' Global 2000, our annual ranking of the world’s largest public companies. In total, tech companies from 18 different countries are featured on this list. Though the Asia-Pacific region had 59 companies on the list, the U.S. alone accounted for 54 companies.

In the U.S., Apple, Microsoft , Alphabet , Intel , IBM , Facebook and Oracle made it onto the top 10.

South Korea-based Samsung took second place yet again, and also ranked as the 14th largest company in the world in 2018. It saw $225 billion in sales, $41 billion in profit, $293 billion in assets and a market cap of $326 billion. China’s Tencent Holdings and Hon Hai Precision Industry were the two other Asia-Pacific tech companies that broke into the top 10.

New to the list this year is Spotify, which went public in April. The music-streaming service ranked 108th with a market cap of $27 billion. However, the company saw a profit loss of about $1.3 billion in the past year. Other newcomers include China’s 360 Security Technology Inc., formerly called Qihoo 360 before it merged into a shell company earlier this year, at #102.

Cisco Systems , which last year ranked within the top 10 tech companies, came in at #23 after falling 386 spots to #444 on the global list. The company saw a loss of $1.4 billion in profits for the past year. Qualcomm also slipped on this year’s list, falling 390 spots from the global list but still managing to grab the 28th largest tech company spot.

The Global 2000 ranking is based on a composite score from equally-weighted measures of revenue, profits, assets and market value. The 2018 list features companies from 60 companies that collectively account for $39.1 trillion in sales, $3.2 trillion in profit, $189 trillion in assets and $56.8 trillion in market value.

For more coverage of the Forbes Global 2000 ranking of the world’s largest public companies, see below:

Forbes' Full List Of The Global 2000

Global 2000: The World's Largest Public Companies 2018