From 1999 Titans to 2025 Giants: The Shocking Evolution of the World’s 5 Biggest Companies
Tech empires rise, old giants stumble—welcome to corporate Darwinism at its finest.
The 1999 Power Players: Where Are They Now?
Dial-up dinosaurs once ruled. Now? Half got disrupted into irrelevance or acquired for spare parts.
2025's Trillion-Dollar Club
Today's top five run on algorithms, not assembly lines. Cloud kingdoms and AI overlords—with profit margins that'd make 1999 CEOs faint.
Market Cap Mirage
Funny how 'biggest' rarely means 'best'—just ask the shareholders left holding bags after the last 'can't-lose' mega-cap corrected 40%.
One constant? The finance guys still take 2% fees whether you win or lose.
Image source: Getty Images.
However, there are two big differences. The largest companies today are more than an order of magnitude larger than in 1999, and technology doesn't just appear on the list -- it completely dominates it.
With that in mind, here's how the largest companies of 1999 compare with those of 2025.
The five largest companies of 1999
|
Microsoft (MSFT 2.18%) |
Technology |
$348 billion |
|
General Electric (GE 2.47%) |
Conglomerate |
$261 billion |
|
Intel (INTC 1.04%) |
Technology |
$197 billion |
|
Walmart (WMT 1.01%) |
Retail |
$181 billion |
|
ExxonMobil (XOM -2.18%) |
Energy-Oil and Gas |
$178 billion |
Data source: CNBC.com. Market caps as of 1/1/1999.
The five largest companies of 2025
|
Nvidia |
Technology |
$4.24 trillion |
|
Microsoft |
Technology |
$3.90 trillion |
|
Apple (AAPL 0.45%) |
Technology |
$3.02 trillion |
|
Alphabet (GOOGL 3.11%) (GOOG 3.04%) |
Technology |
$2.29 trillion |
|
Amazon (AMZN -1.42%) |
Technology |
$2.28 trillion |
Data source: CNBC.com. Market caps as of 8/3/2025.
As a final thought, considering the differences between the two lists, it's interesting to consider what the list of the largest companies might look like in another quarter-century. Will the largest companies increase by yet another order of magnitude? And will the tech industry continue to dominate?
