Johnson Controls and Daikin are top innovators

USA: Johnson Controls and Daikin remain two of the most innovative companies according to Forbes, the influential US business magazine and website.

The magazine’s latest league table of the top 100 most innovative companies across all business areas places Johnson Controls 71st in the list – up from 73 last year. Daikin, meanwhile, just holds on at no100 – down from 70 last year.

Forbes Most Innovative Companies List ranks the top 100 of what it considers to be the companies that benefit both from existing innovations and what’s anticipated to happen in the future. Forbes uses its own Innovation Premium as a measure of how much investors have bid up the stock price of a company above the value of its existing business based on expectations of future innovative results (new products, services and markets). Members of the list must have $10bn in market capitalization, spend at least 2.5% of revenue on R&D and have seven years of public data.

Johnson Controls improved on its position with an Innovation Premium of 23 and 5-year annualised returns of 8.2%. Daikin achieved an Innovation Premium of 18.6, backed by average 5-year returns of 6.1% and a 12-month’s sales growth of 5.3%.