DiGi.Com in Forbes Asia Fabulous 50 list

SINGAPORE: This year's Forbes Asia Fabulous 50 list
separates the
merely good companies from the truly great ones, producing a list of
the best 50 big, publicly-traded companies in Asia-Pacific, among them
Malaysia's DiGi.com

China again dominated the list with 23
entries, the same as a year ago, while India has the second-biggest
group of firms with 11 entries, up from seven.

Some of the
stellar performers this year are Chinese snack companies -- Tingyi
Holding, the number one packaged food-producer on the mainland, and
Want Want China Holdings, whose sales jumped 31 per cent.

Chinese
blue-chip property developers also made a strong showing, with real
estate giant China Vanke returning to the list and newcomers such as
Poly Real Estate Group and Longfor Properties.

Indian technology companies fared well on the list.

Software
giant HCL appears on the list for the third time in a row. The Americas
and Europe supply the bulk of its revenues, which rose 17 per cent last
year.

Tata Consultancy Services, India's largest information
technology services and consulting firm, went on a hiring spree, adding
40,000 employees in the past year.

Indian drug maker Sun Pharmaceutical broke into the list for the first time.

Hong
Kong's Noble Group once again showed its resilience. It has now made
the list for seven straight years, the longest streak of any company
since the start of the list honouring the region's top performers in
2005.

South Korea has the third-largest group of companies on the list, with four entries.

Australia,
Hong Kong, Taiwan and Thailand each had two companies, while Japan,
Malaysia, Philippines and Singapore each had one company that made the
cut this year.

Several big names did not make the list this
year, such as Australia's Wesfarmers, India's Mahindra and Mahindra and
Taiwanese smartphone maker HTC.

The companies are selected from
a pool of 1,295 companies that had at least US$3 billion in annual
revenue or market capitalisation.

Forbes Asia looks at revenue, earnings, return on capital, share-price movements and outlook.

It excludes companies with too much debt or where the government owns at least half of the shares.

Local offshoots that are majority-owned by a multinational (Nestl' India, for example) were not considered.

Forbes Asia will hold the 'Fabulous 50' roundtable and award dinner in Macau on Dec 4, 2012.

The
gathering will bring together the chairmen, chief executive officers
and senior executives of these award-winning companies to exchange
ideas and insights in an economic roundtable, followed by a gala dinner
and award ceremony to mark their success. -- BERNAMA