Eight SEA companies made Deloitte's APAC Technology Fast 500 index

• Malaysia’s ARB Berhad is top SEA tech company, at 72^nd place
• Chinese mainland maintains lead position with 175 companies represented in index

THE 2020 Asia Pacific Technology Fast 500 index was released today by Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited (DTTL), with Southeast Asia being represented by eight companies on the index.

Malaysia’s ARB Berhad, an IT and IoT solutions and services company, is the top company in the region at 72nd place, and Indonesia ranks on the list for the first time in recent years, with e-commerce tech company PT Tokopedia coming in at 94th place.

In a statement, DTTL said the index is an annual ranking of the fastest growing Asia Pacific companies in the hardware, software, communications, media, life sciences and clean technology industries.

Awardees are selected for the Technology Fast 500 ranking based on their percentage of fiscal year revenue growth over three years.

“Congratulations to all our APAC Technology Fast 500 2020 winners, with a special shout out to the eight companies headquartered in Southeast Asia who made the list,” said Yang Chi Chih, Deloitte Southeast Asia technology, media and telecommunications industry leader.

Yang said even though the Covid-19 pandemic has brought about unprecedented disruptions to businesses in the last year, it has also catalysed digital transformation across Southeast Asia as companies pivoted to respond, recover and thrive.

“Looking ahead, we expect technology companies in the region to continue this growth trajectory, focusing and leveraging on 5G technology, cloud and data analytics.”

Claiming the top spot with a 17,915% growth rate is Terminus Technologies, a Chinese software company that provides smart solutions on public security, public administration and public services to government agencies and corporations.

By securing first place in the ranking, Terminus became the sixth Chinese company to land the top spot. The company was founded in 2015 and is headquartered in Beijing, DTTL said.

Using its AIoT (Artificial Intelligence & Internet of Things) engine to drive the growth of traditional industries, DTTL said the company takes pride in effectively understanding customers’ needs, and is dedicated to creating cutting-edge solutions surrounding community service, public utilities, electric power, cultural products and museum retail scenarios.

Trends around the world

Having 175 companies represented in the index, China maintained its lead position by taking five of the top 10 spots.

Australia broke its own record of 98 companies listed last year with 102 recognized this year. Seventy three companies from Taiwan and 40 from Japan were also listed, and notably, the first Indonesian company also made the list.

Among the top 10 companies, software firm Stamen Co., Ltd., the first Japanese company that made the top 10 in recent years, took the sixth place with 5,914% growth. India and Korea each managed to land a top 10 spot, with strong performers in software and life sciences coming in at fifth (7,295%) and eighth (5,485%) respectively.

Companies from China and Taiwan dominated the sectors represented. Specifically, China companies were the fastest growing in four categories (media, hardware, communications, and software) while their Taiwan counterparts took out the final two sectors (clean technology and life sciences), DTTL said.

Having a strong showing in the top ten with five companies represented, the software sector took up the largest share of 38%, followed by media (21%), hardware (19%), life sciences (15%), communications (5%), and clean technology (2%). Software has maintained 38% of the Technology Fast 500 list for the past three years, it added.

The ratio of life sciences companies listed overall was up 6 percentage points from 2019, thanks in part to the pandemic. Taiwan-based TaiMed, which recorded a growth of 8,251%, was the highest ranked life sciences company, DTTL noted.

The consultancy said this year the top 500 companies had an average revenue growth of 551% percent. For the top ten companies the average revenue for the current year in USD is US$137,046,668. The average revenue growth of the top 10 is 7,621%

Due to the global spread of Covid-19, the average revenue growth in 2020 dropped significantly compared to the 2019 average growth of 717%, and historical high in 2018 (987%), and is the fifth highest recorded by the Asia Pacific Technology Fast 500, it added.