Two Indian companies—Jio Platforms and Byju’s— have made it to Time Magazine’s list of 100 most influential companies in 2021.
Reliance Industry Limited’s (RIL) technology wing Jio Platforms and e-learning startup Byju’s have made it to the ‘TIME100 Most Influential Companies’, which is a new list and an expansion of the TIME100 franchise.
The TIME100 Most Influential Companies issue features 5 worldwide covers, each spotlighting a CEO from a company on the list with an in-depth profile, including: Reese Witherspoon of Hello Sunshine, Adam Silver of the National Basketball Association, Mary Barra of General Motors, Francis deSouza of Illumina, and Sara Menker of Gro Intelligence.
The list comprises companies across various sectors including health care, entertainment, transportation, technology and more. According to the magazine, the list has been prepared after evaluation of key factors including relevance, impact, innovation, leadership, ambition and success.
TIME solicited nominations across sectors including health care, entertainment, transportation, technology and more from their global network of editors and correspondents, as well as from industry experts. Then, each key factor was evaluated, including relevance, impact, innovation, leadership, ambition and success. “The result was a diverse array of 100 institutions, from the tech startup engineering a smarter way to recycle to the cryptocurrency firm reimagining the future of money to the pharma titans creating the vaccines of today (and tomorrow),” said the magazine.
The magazine has credited Byju’s for expanding e-learning in India. The company founded by Byju Raveendran has seen a sharp rise in popularity in 2020 as demand for online learning rose in the middle of the pandemic.
“As users of his company’s signature app nearly doubled to 80 million during the Covid-19 pandemic, he went on a spending spree, fuelled by funding from investors like Tencent and BlackRock,” said Time Magazine. Byju’s has also been credited for getting a foothold in markets outside India including the US, UK, Indonesia, Mexico and Brazil.
Pfizer, BioNTech, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson, CVS, Walgreens, and Illumina are among the companies on the list that are playing a critical role in Covid-19 prevention, vaccine creation and the vaccine rollout process. Major tech companies—including Microsoft, Samsung, Huawei, Apple, Tencent, Nintendo, Nvidia, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation, Zoom and more—are also included on the list.
Several companies are in the financial technology industry, including Nubank, Alibaba, Mastercard, Robinhood, Stripe, Flutterwave and more. Some—such as Digital Currency Group and Coinbase—specialize in digital currency.
The entertainment industry is also represented on the list by a range of businesses, including Netflix, Spotify, TikTok, HYBE, and Disney.
The most recently founded company is Clubhouse, which was created in spring of 2020.
On Friday, April 30 at 1pm ET, TIME will host key leaders from companies featured on the inaugural TIME100 Most Influential Companies list for an installment of TIME100 Talks, the virtual series that convenes leaders from every field to spotlight solutions and encourage action toward a better world.
