Billionaire Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries has toppled PSU giant IOC for the first time ever to emerge as the highest ranked Indian firm on Fortune 500 list. Until now, PSU major Indian Oil Corp (IOC) had been the top-ranked Indian company on the list since 2010, when the list was first compiled. “This year, ranked 106, Reliance Industries (RIL) has replaced IOC (117) as the top-ranked Indian company on the Global 500 list,” Fortune said. Notably, Reliance Industries’ revenue has increased by 32.1% from $62.3 billion in 2018 to $82.3 billion in 2019, according to Forbes. In comparison, IOC’s witnessed a 17.7% growth in revenue from $65.9 billion to $77.6 billion in the same period. “Over the past 10 years, RIL’s revenue rose at a compounded annual growth rate of 7.2% from $41.1 billion in 2010, while that of IOC rose at 3.64% from $54.3 billion in 2010,” Fortune noted.

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Apart from Reliance Industries, and Indian Oil,  there are five more Indian companies: Oil & Natural Gas Corp, State Bank of India, Tata Motors, Bharat Petroleum, and Rajesh Exports. RIl made it to the Global 500 list for the 16th consecutive time. It has made it to the top in the list for the first time ever in the period. The average difference of its revenues with that of IOC was $9.4 billion in the nine years from 2010 to 2018, noted Fortune. “The difference was as high as $13.2 billion in 2010. The gap started to narrow after 2016 when RIL’s revenue was $11.3 billion lesser than IOC,” said the report.  The difference further fell to $6.6 billion and $3.6 billion in 2017 and 2018, respectively, and RIL surpassed IOC by $4.7 billion in 2019.

Over the last decade, IOC saw its highest revenue at $86 billion in 2012, which is $9.8 billion higher than its revenue in 2019. Interestingly, 2012 also saw RIL’s second highest revenue of $76.1 billion; the absolute increase in RIL’s revenue between 2012 and 2019 is $8.2 billion, said Fortune. At the 2012 peak, IOC and RIL were ranked 83 and 99, respectively, on the Global 500 list. In 2018, RIL was ranked 148 and IOC’s rank stood at 137. RIL has also earned the feat of being the only private sector firm to pip PSU giant IOC to make it to the coveted list.