“Big four” German utilities drop out of top 100 company list

The “big four” utilities in Germany - RWE, E.ON, Vattenfall Germany, and EnBW - have all disappeared from a list of the country’s 100 largest companies compiled by the German Monopolies Commission, the competition watchdog says in its annual report. The list ranks companies according to their economic value added, the number of employees, and total sales volumes in 2016. While the big four utilities were still among the country’s top 50 companies in the 2014, they were all but gone from the top 100 two years later, the 2018 report says. “The Energiewende has caused major restructuring in these companies,” the monopolies commission writes. The split-off of subsidiaries at RWE, which used to be ranked 11th in 2014, and at E.ON, formerly 22nd, has significantly reduced both company’s individual economic weight and the “value correction” of their conventional energy generation capacities, the commission says.

Find the report in German here.

For background, read the dossiers Utilities and the energy transition, The energy transition's effects on the economy and the factsheet Germany’s largest utilities at a glance.