By Gokhan Ergocun
ISTANBUL (AA) – The refinery giant Tupras continued to be Turkey’s top industrial enterprise, according to the Istanbul Chamber of Industry ((ICI).
According to the 2018 survey, Tupras retained the leadership with production-based sales worth 79 billion TL ($14.9 billion) in 2018.
Automotive companies Ford also maintained its second position with a production-based sales value of 31 billion TL ($5.85 billion). Toyota Automotive takes the third place with 23.6 billion TL ($4.45 billion), according to an annual survey of Turkey's top 500 industrial enterprises, conducted by the ICI.
The survey, which was released on Tuesday also found that car manufacturer Oyak-Renault and Tofas, major appliances producer Arcelik, iron/steel companies Iskenderun Demir ve Celik, Eregli Demir ve Celik and Icdas Celik, and vehicle producer Hyundai Assan, were also among top 10 enterprises.
The 500 top Turkish enterprises posted a total of 878 billion TL ($165.7 billion) production-based sales in 2018, up 34.5% from the previous year.
It added that increasing prices and foreign exchange rates were key factors for this rapid growth.
The first 50 enterprises' share in total production-based sales of top 500 firms was 50.6% in 2018, up from 50.2% in 2017.
The operational profit rate of 500 enterprises' rose by 1.3 percentage point to 10.9%, accounting to 107.8 billion TL ($20.34 billion), in the last year.
Their share in the country's total exports was 42.8% in 2018, rising from 41.1% in 2017.
They employed over 690,000 people last year, an increase of 2.4% from the previous year. The ICI has been announcing data on Turkey’s top 500 companies since 1968.
The U.S. dollar / Turkish lira rate was 5.30 as of the end of 2018.