Already for the fourth time the journal „Rzeczpospolita” together with the Deloitte company and local partners in Central and Eastern Europe have prepared a list with the 500 largest companies in the region. While preparing it 867 companies from 18 countries were taken into consideration. Eventually, there are 180 companies from our country on the list, which account for 36% of all the companies. A year ago the number of Polish companies amounted to 188, however, on the other hand the number of Czech or Hungarian companies has increased yet Polish capital still plays the dominating role. Companies operating in Poland are also leaders of specialist rankings – PKN Orlen is the largest fuel concern, PZU is the largest insurance company, PKO BP is the largest bank and Jeronimo Martins Dystrybucja managing the network of Biedronka supermarkets in Poland is the largest trade company.
„The green color is slowly becoming a new Polish brand because we are on the green side of the power and this is our largest success,” says Waldemar Pawlak, Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Economy.
PKN Orlen with revenues of 15.7 billion Euro is still the largest company in the region, the Hungarian MOL is on the second position – these companies outdistance CEZ, which is the next one on the list by almost 100% whereas the next positions in this comparison belong to the banks PKO BP and Pekao. CEZ has been long the largest company in Central Europe in terms of capitalization.
„We have to learn to respect and to strengthen the position of the companies which are already strong in the region. The crisis has given them an opportunity for a more aggressive development,” said Jan Krzysztof Bielecki, head of the Economic Council working close to the Prime Minister Donald Tusk. „As many as one quarter of the companies from the list are controlled by state owned capital – a higher percentage can be notice only in case of enterprises from Croatia or Serbia. However, we can say that they have managed to go through the crisis almost unscathed,” concluded Paweł Lisicki, chief editor of the journal „Rzeczpospolita”.
The Hungarian pharmaceutical concern Gedeon Richter has been awarded the prize for the best company in the region (160th place on the list). The prize-awarding jury (among others Henryka Bochniarz, Jan Krzysztof Bielecki, Jerzy Hausner and Paweł Lisicki) also distinguished PKO BP, the Czech CSOB bank, the Polish Can-Pack company, the Slovenian KRKA and the Romanian Romgaz. „We are extremely proud of the award. Our strategy focusing on strong development not only in the region but also on the global market has been appreciated. What matters for us is not only improvement of financial results but also undertaking activities for the sake of local communities,” said Laszlo Kovacs, Vice President of Richter Gedeon.
