None of those companies were started in the last 15 years as far as I can tell. The list is skewed by propped up high growth stocks with much more built in ris

None of those companies were started in the last 15 years as far as I can tell. The list is skewed by propped up high growth stocks with much more built in risk than we might imagine to their long term growth. I don't see how Facebook necessarily has fat margins and growth for the next 20 years - they could conceivably go into decline. All the measures are crude but Revenues might be the best, because frankly 'profits/earnings' are more of an investor thing, that doesn't take into consideration all the other members of the value chain. Maybe 'Gross Margins' might be even better though difficult to determine, because Wallmart and Amazon (retail) operate on thinner margins, 'most of their sales' go down the value chain. By 'Revenue' Germany is actually batting above it's weight, Europe could probably do to have some kind of continental winners in certain areas but that's a really hard thing to do. Even with EU integration ... nobody wants to give up their national champions. The biggest negotiation ever that could happen in Europe would be for Germany/France/UK to maybe to agree on different sectors and allow/promote acquisitions along those lines. That will never happen of course. That could happen but more by large funds driving it to happen.