September 13 (SeeNews) - Romania performs best among the countries of Southeast Europe (SEE) in the 2017 edition of the annual Coface CEE Top 500 ranking, followed by Bulgaria and Slovenia, the survey shows.
The CEE Top 500 is a joint project by the Coface offices in Central Europe. The ranking covers the largest companies in the region of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), excluding financial services providers, based on their turnover in 2016 calendar year. The study includes the following countries: Romania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia.
Romania has turned the largest number of companies among the SEE countries in the ranking, 65, Coface said. Romanian car manufacturer Automobile Dacia ranked highest among the companies from SEE countries with a turnover of 4.6 billion euro (5.5 billion euro) in 2016.
"Romania should be watched very closely in the coming years. In the recent past, more and more companies have grown large enough to enter the Top 500 ranking (from 56 in 2013 to 65 in 2016). The average turnover of Romanian businesses (891 million euro) is still lower than in most other CEE countries, but recorded its highest ever growth rate in 2016 (+6.6%)," Coface said.
Bulgaria is represented by 18 companies, of which state-owned Bulgarian Energy Holding (BEH) is the country's best performer, ranking in 25th place with a turnover of 3.1 billion euro.
Energy company Petrol is Slovenia's top entrant in 24th place, with a turnover of 3.17 billion euro. Slovenia has landed a total of 15 companies in the 2017 edition of the ranking.
Oil and gas company INA leads the Croatian companies in the ranking with a turnover of 1.98 billion euro in 2016, which has sent it to 62nd place. Croatia has 13 representatives in the ranking.
Majority state-owned power utility EPS Beograd is Serbia's highest ranked company in 73rd place. The company's turnover amounted to 1.78 billion euro in 2016. Serbia has a total of 7 companies in the ranking.
In SEE, in a breakdown by sector, energy companies dominated the ranking, trailed by telecoms and automotive industry representatives.
Poland leads the CEE Top 500 ranking with 168 entrants, followed by Hungary with 75 and the Czech Republic with 71. Companies from the automotive industry dominated the ranking in CEE, trailed by energy and trade companies.
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