Ratings

Boston Consulting Group (BCG) is an American management consulting firm which was founded in 1963. The company annually releases a ranking of the most innovative companies from all fields of industry. The most recent ranking can be viewed on the company's website.

The metrics of the ranking are mainly based on a survey of 2,500 global innovation executives. For the ranking, the performance of the ranked companies was evaluated and then an average of normalized scores was taken to calculate the overall ranking. This year a new fourth scoring dimension has been added which looks at the efficiency of interdisciplinary activities and evaluates the ability of companies to gain a foothold and successfully do business in markets outside their own industry. The new metrics include: Global “Mindshare”- votes received from all global innovation executives; Industry Peer View - votes received from executives in a company’s own industry; Industry Disruption- Diversity Index (Herfindahl-Hirschman) of votes across industries; and Value Creation- TSR including share buybacks from January 2017 through December 2019.

The research carried out in the course of the ranking process has made one thing clear:  companies embracing and investing in innovation for the recovery after COVID-19 will outperform others in the long run. These companies have developed clear innovation strategies and support them with appropriate investment as well as ensure that their innovation system is flexible enough to adapt quickly to changes in the market. Also, successful innovators always concentrate on only a handful of problems and as a result address them more efficiently. To draw up business schemes, they employ advanced analytics, digital design, and technology platforms. Also, cross-boundary innovation is an increasingly important innovation ability. A fine example of this ability is, for example, Amazon in health care. Also, car makers and industrial manufacturers frequently cooperate with other companies as they see opportunities for new business models and profits outside their own core businesses.

This year, the top three spots were again taken by Apple, Alphabet/Google and Amazon mainly due to their skill to adapt to rapidly-changing patterns of supply, demand and business opportunities. Apple’s success is mainly founded on a broadened business system; for example, by engaging Microsoft as a partner, strengthened governance by focusing on the projects most likely to create revenue such as the iMac, and an increased ambition to carve out new domains for innovation (iPod, iTunes Music Store).

In the electric car industry, Tesla has achieved the best results, occupying 11^th position. This may be due to their efforts to replace expensive nickel-cobalt-aluminium (NCA) or nickel-manganese-cobalt (NMC) batteries by so-called lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries in some of its vehicles.

Volkswagen, which managed to secure 32nd position, has also invested a lot of financial resources as well as energy in the development of new e-car technologies. The company plans to launch an entirely new generation of full electric vehicles sometime in 2020: the I.D. family. These cars will be based on the new Modular electric drive matrix (MEB) whose range is comparable with current petrol models. Their zero-emission powertrain consists of up to 2 electric motors (front and/or rear), power electronics (to control the high-voltage energy flow between electric motor and battery), a transmission, and a flat high-voltage battery installed in the floorpan.

In the energy sector Royal Dutch Shell has dropped to 40^th position from last year’s 30^th. Shell is best known for constantly improving its production methods to help it make smarter decisions and reduce its environmental impact. The company has begun to use fibre optic cables to gather information on seismic waves in potential oil fields, which then transfer the data to its servers and allow them to get a more accurate idea of site capacities. The company has also used comprehensive data to monitor its machinery, which has resulted in fewer breakdowns and failures contributing to pollution.

Among the top 10 most innovative companies, 6 have their company headquarters in the United States: Apple, Alphabet/Google, Amazon, Microsoft, IBM, Facebook. The other countries represented in the top 10 include Asian nations, such as South Korea (Samsung), the People’s Republic of China (Huawei, Alibaba), as well as Japan (Sony).