The logo at the Apple Store in Sydney, Australia goes (RED) (Image: @AusNewsNetwork)
Fast Company on Wednesday published its World’s Most Innovative Companies for 2019 list. Apple, who topped the list in 2018, saw its ranking drop to the 17th spot.
Meituan Dianping – a Chinese tech platform “that expedites the booking and delivery of services such as food, hotel stays, and movie tickets” – ranked as number 1 this time around. The rest of the top five included ride-sharing company Grab, the NBA, The Walt Disney Company, and Stitch Fix.
Last year, Apple benefited from new products like AirPods, the iPhone X, and the development of augmented reality when it ranked in as number one. This year, Fast Company points to the company’s A12 Bionic processor as its most impressive product.
Apple’s most impressive new product of 2018 wasn’t a phone or a tablet, but a chip: the A12 Bionic. Debuting in last fall’s iPhones, it’s the industry’s first processor based on a seven-nanometer manufacturing process. The A12’s 6.9 billion transistors deliver dramatically faster performance, lower power consumption, and more raw muscle for intensive applications such as AI, AR, and high-end photography.
Other companies ranking ahead of Apple in the list are Alibaba, Peloton, Square, Twitch, and Shopify. The full list of Fast Company’s most innovative companies for 2019 is available for perusing here.