Indian firms create a niche in the Forbes' list of world's most innovative companies

New Delhi: Hindustan Unilever and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), along with three other Indian companies, have found themselves among Forbes' list of the world's 100 most innovative companies that investors think are most likely to "generate new growth ideas"

The annual list of 'World's Most Innovative Companies', has been topped by California-based global cloud computing company Salesforce for the fourth year in a row.

The five Indian companies on the list are Hindustan Unilever, ranked 14th, followed by TCS at 57th, Larsen & Toubro at 58th, pharma major Sun Pharma Industries at 65th and Bajaj Auto at 96th.

Innovation premium is a measure of how much investors have bid up the stock price of a company above the value of its present business based on expectations of future innovative results such as new products, services and markets, according to Forbes.

The innovation premium recorded by Hindustan Unilever was 54.7 per cent, while TCS recorded 39.58 per cent and had a market capitalisation of US$ 71.25 billion, as of May 2014.

Also, Larsen and Toubro had an innovation premium of 39.4 per cent and market cap of US$ 19.81 billion, Sun Pharma with 38.84 per cent and US$ 19.88 billion, and finally Bajaj Auto with 31.73 per cent and US$ 10 billion.

The leader Salesforce which has a market cap of US$ 35.87 billion and an innovation premium of 75.9 per cent, continued its reign as Forbes' most innovative company for the fourth straight year.

The US had the maximum number of companies on the list with 41 firms having their headquarters in the country, followed by Europe with 29 companies.

Disclaimer: This information has been collected through secondary research and IBEF is not responsible for any errors in the same.