The 25 Fastest-Growing Technology Companies in America

Forbes magazine have just published the results of their annual 25 Fastest-Growing Technology Companies in America ranking. This year sees 13 companies making their debuts including Apple which earned almost $5 billion on $33 billion in sales in its latest 12 months. The fastest-growing company, based on five-year annualized sales growth is Illumina a company specialising in tools for analyzing the genes of humans, animals and plants. This company has more than doubled its revenues each year for the past five years. 

Last year's Fast Tech stocks weathered Wall Street's storm somewhat better than the overall market, with stocks falling 30% over the past 12 months, whilst the Nasdaq 100 Technology Sector Index and the S&P 500 each suffered losses of 39%. This marks the sixth consecutive year that each new group of Fast Tech companies outperformed the market in the subsequent 12 months.

To make the list, companies must have latest 12-month revenues of $25 million or more, annualized sales gains of at least 10% over the past five years and be profitable over the past 12 months. In addition, Forbes requires a Thomson IBES long-term consensus profit forecast of at least 10%, annualized.

Last year, Forbes introduced the Fast 15; a group of companies that may not have met all the stringent requirements of the main list, but appear to be on track to break into the top ranks at some future date. This year, the screening criteria for this second group of stocks was further tightened; these companies must now meet all the criteria of the Fast 25, except Forbes screen them on the basis of three-year sales growth rather than five-year.  Top of this year’s Fast 15 is OSI Pharmaceuticals, a biotech company specializing in drugs for cancer, diabetes and obesity. Over the last year, the company has registered earnings of $121 million on $365 million in net revenue. On average, OSI has more than doubled its revenues in each of the past three years.

Click here to view the full list and company profiles

Picture from Creative Commons: Flickr: quapan

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This year, the screening criteria for this second group of stocks was further tightened; these companies must now meet all the criteria of the Fast 25, except Forbes screen them on the basis of three-year sales growth rather than five-year.