MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Chile's 24 business conglomerates aim at becoming global

In its June 27 edition Chile business magazine Qué pasa published for the second year in a row a list of the country's 24 most prominent business conglomerates, revealing the Luksic, Falabella and Angelini groups the leading three.

Qué pasa's ranking of the relative importance of each group is based on several factors, including stock value, growth in share value over the previous year, total sales, combined assets, and the number of employees. The list includes only business groups directed by Chilean entrepreneurs that have built and directly manage large companies. That means that the Chilean State, which is the largest business in the country, and international conglomerates were not included. Chile's most powerful corporations have all secured their place on the totem pole through a focus on growth not only in Chile, but also in international markets. Guillermo Luksic, who is Chairman of the board of directors of Quinenco S.A., Compañía Cervecerías Unidas S.A., Viña San Pedro S.A., CNT Telefónica del Sur S.A. and Madeco S.A. and serves as a member of the board of directors of Antofagasta Minerals, was ranked number one on last years list as well. He credited his corporation's success to focusing beyond Chile by saying, "Our goal now is to be a global company." Much like Luksic, other Chilean conglomerates are not shy about searching for and finding new opportunities in the global market. Retail giant Falabella, which ranked number two on the list with around 60,000 workers, is the third-largest employer in Chile. The company is also rapidly expanding in Perú, Bolivia, Colombia and Argentina. Chile's retail leaders owe much of their success to an aggressive expansion into the credit business. In a world of slim margins, fierce competition, and high volume, peddling credit along with low-priced goods has allowed retailers like Falabella to greatly expand. Falabella and Cencosud, Chile's two biggest retailers, now count themselves among Latin America's top five in the sector. What's more, retail mega stores make up about a quarter of the stock value among Chile's leading conglomerates. These two companies each work with about 7 billion US dollars in sales annually and together employ 150,000 workers. The only business group of the top ten that has mining in its portfolio is the Luksic group, demonstrating the wealth of Chile's national business. Qué Pasa's Top 24 1. Luksic: Mining, banking, food and beverage, manufacturing, telecommunications. 2. Falabella: Department stores, home improvement centers, retail megastores. 3. Angelini: Logging and forest products, shipyards, mining, fishing, energy. 4. Paulman: Shopping malls, home improvement centers. 5. Ibañez: Telecommunications, grocery stores, supermarkets. 5. Matte: Logging and forest products, shipping, energy, banking. 7. Yarur 8. Claro 9. Ponce 10. Piñera 11. Cueto 12. Fernandez-Leon 13. Hurtado-Vicuña 14. Calderon 14. General Electric Company (CGE) 16. Security 17. Saieh 18. Penta 19. Said 20. Sigdo Koppers 21. Navarro 22. Guilisasti 23. Briones 23. Menendez SOURCE: QUÉ PASA By Julie Sutor (editor@santiagotimes.cl)