Fast Company, the journal covering the latest news in the technology, ethonomics (ethical economics) and design fields, has unveiled its annual ranking The World’s 50 Most Innovative Companies. Apple, Facebook, Google and Amazon are taking the lead (they are No. 1, 2, 3, and 4 correspondingly). Traditionally, the biggest intrigue here is not who will occupy the top lines (these several leaders are featured on most of ‘the best, the most successful, etc.’ ranks), but in which order they will do it (though, there are some newcomers as well). The most unpredictable thing here is what companies will take the rest of the positions and rule in their industries.
Photo: A logo of the 2012 World’s 50 Most Innovative Companies ranking, www.fastcompany.com
If compared to the last year’s chart, for the 2012 list of The World’s Most Innovative Companies they considered less categories, 18 instead of 26 (for instance, Transportation, Design and Russia are left out)—most probably, companies from these industries didn’t impress the creative team behind the chart with their innovative approaches, or there were not that many innovations in the fields last year to create a category. Fast Company is also providing insight into the factors that influenced the decision to choose the four companies as the leader of the chart with a bunch of interactive quizzes, games, and brainteasers, which remind the audience about what the companies did to secure the high positions on the chart.
So, Apple, as in 2011, topped the list “For walking the talk,” Facebook got featured as the #2 most innovative company “For 800 million reasons to share,” Google follows it “For expanding its hit lineup,” and Amazon (it was not featured on the top 10 in the 2011 list, being placed on#27 position) comes after Google “For playing the long game.” Twitter, which was right below Apple last year, moved to the sixth position—it was featured in the top10 “For amplifying the global dialogue.” SolarCity, which has made a long way from the #38 to the #10 position, is another ‘guest’ from the last year’s rating. The rest of the companies in the top 10—Square (#5), Occupy Movement (#7), Tencent (#8) and Life Technologies (#9)—are newcomers, they were not featured in the 2011 top 50 rating. In the supplementary text, Fast Company provides informative explanation in the form of a text or a quiz, what helped the company to stand out last year.
As to the leaders of industries, SoundCloud took the lead in Music, Starbucks topped the Food chart, Greenbox did the same in Fashion, and 72andSunny was placed on the #1 position in Advertising, leaving the previous year’s leader Wieden+Kennedy on the #9 position.
As innovation becomes the core principle of business, thinking outside the box in the world where innovations are just everywhere and pushing the limits of what’s possible becomes the only way to live on. Will Apple manage to be dominating in the tech world and retain the position next year thanks to the new device and platform launches? Will Facebook put one seventh of the whole world on its Timeline and will Google integrate its diversified range of products into just every aspect of our life? Is there a new giant coming up? Find it out in a year.