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> Even though they mention it, I came across this chart a while back that shows just by how much bigger it was than the recent largest corporation FYI, that's

> Even though they mention it, I came across this chart a while back that shows just by how much bigger it was than the recent largest corporation FYI, that's the Dutch East India Company, which was separate from the British East India Company, which this article is about. The British East India Company was actually much larger.

jorams 9y ago
> The British East India Company was actually much larger. Do you have any sources for that? Most things I can find mention the opposite. For example, from Wikipedia[1]: > Between 1602 and 1796 the VOC sent almost a million Europeans to work in the Asia trade on 4,785 ships, and netted for their efforts more than 2.5 million tons of Asian trade goods. By contrast, the rest of Europe combined sent only 882,412 people from 1500 to 1795, and the fleet of the British East India Company (EIC), the VOC's nearest competitor, was a distant second to its total traffic with 2,690 ships and a mere one-fifth the tonnage of goods carried by the VOC. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_East_India_Company https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_East_India_Company
- chimeracoder 9y ago
  Hm, not offhand, but one reason for the discrepancy may be the way Indian trade is counted versus trade with other parts of Asia (both companies did trade outside the Indian subcontinent as well). Furthermore, the Dutch company was much more organized in its earliest days, being the first publicly traded company, so it's possible that the British company reports are underestimated, depending on the timeframe we're talking about . I'd have to go back and check, though; I'm not certain.
- btilly 9y ago
  The reason for the disagreement is that they were big at different times. During the lifetime of the Dutch company, it was far the bigger. But the British company conquered India, held it for decades, and then supplied Britain during the Industrial Revolution. The British company had the bigger long-term impact. And probably did a lot more business in the end. But not while the Dutch company existed.

jorams 9y ago

> The British East India Company was actually much larger. Do you have any sources for that? Most things I can find mention the opposite. For example, from Wikipedia[1]: > Between 1602 and 1796 the VOC sent almost a million Europeans to work in the Asia trade on 4,785 ships, and netted for their efforts more than 2.5 million tons of Asian trade goods. By contrast, the rest of Europe combined sent only 882,412 people from 1500 to 1795, and the fleet of the British East India Company (EIC), the VOC's nearest competitor, was a distant second to its total traffic with 2,690 ships and a mere one-fifth the tonnage of goods carried by the VOC. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_East_India_Company https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_East_India_Company

chimeracoder 9y ago
Hm, not offhand, but one reason for the discrepancy may be the way Indian trade is counted versus trade with other parts of Asia (both companies did trade outside the Indian subcontinent as well). Furthermore, the Dutch company was much more organized in its earliest days, being the first publicly traded company, so it's possible that the British company reports are underestimated, depending on the timeframe we're talking about . I'd have to go back and check, though; I'm not certain.
btilly 9y ago
The reason for the disagreement is that they were big at different times. During the lifetime of the Dutch company, it was far the bigger. But the British company conquered India, held it for decades, and then supplied Britain during the Industrial Revolution. The British company had the bigger long-term impact. And probably did a lot more business in the end. But not while the Dutch company existed.