Alibaba building in Shanghai Photo: VCG

 
Alibaba Group sit at the top of Chinese private enterprises at the end of 2019, according to a report issued by the Hurun Research Institute Thursday. 

The Chinese e-commerce giant ranked No.1 on the Hurun China 500 Most Valuable Private Companies 2019 report, with a market valuation of $545 billion. Tencent followed at $408 billion and Ping An Insurance was the third largest private venure at $215 billion. 

It is the first time the institute has released this list, which ranks non-state-owned enterprises with headquarters based in the Chinese mainland.

Compared to five or 10 years ago, China's private economy has achieved great development, said Rupert Hoogewerf, chairman and chief researcher of the Hurun Report. 

According to the report, the valuation of the top 10 ventures has risen six times in 10 years - from $8 billion to $52 billion. The top 10 companies have a total valuation of $1.8 trillion, compared to $700 billion five years ago and $215 billion 10 years ago. 

Nearly half of the top 500 companies are from new emerging industries, particularly in the fields of advanced manufacturing, healthcare, media and entertainment and e-commerce, the report said.

Private companies in the emerging industries have played a big role in the private sector, and will continue to do so for the next 10 years. 

In the past five to 10 years the development of private enterprises has shown a differentiated pattern, Ye Hang, an economics professor at the College of Economics of Zhejiang University, told the Global Times Thursday.

“The number of private enterprises in labor-intensive and capital-intensive traditional industries has shrunk sharply, while those in technology-intensive emerging industries are growing rapidly, as the report has indicated,” he said. 


Global times