What are the largest privately held companies in America? Several websites (Forbes, for example) attempt to identify these companies by looking at their total revenues. We’re guilty of this too (see 11 biggest private companies in the world). Total revenue is an OK metric if you don’t have anything else to use but businesses don’t exist to maximize revenue, they exist to maximize profits and ultimately the value of the company. We don’t consider a middleman company that spends $100 billion on commodities and sells them for $101 billion to be one of America’s largest privately held companies. Several of the “biggest” privately held companies on Forbes’ list were like this. They had $20 billion to $30 billion in sales but they were in low margin businesses and the total market value of these companies were less than $10 billion.
People generally presume private companies to be running on a small scale with miniscule profits. That is usually true but there are a lot of exceptions. Private equity firms usually snap up mid size public and private companies with the intention of returning them back to the public markets at a future date potentially at much higher valuations. There are also some family owned or controlled private businesses that may be valued at tens of billions of dollars. In this article, we will estimate market values of these private companies by using price-to-sales ratios of similar publicly traded companies. To do this, we used revenue estimates from Forbes and price-sales ratios from Yahoo Finance. We also included other privately held technology companies that don’t have large revenues to make Forbes’ list but valued in billions in financing rounds. Here are the 30 largest privately held companies in America ranked by market capitalizations:
30. Pilot Flying J
Total revenue: $32.1 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 7
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 0.25
Estimated Market Capitalization: $8 billion
After the merger back in 2010, Pilot Flying J became the largest privately held gas and convenience chain store in the country. The company boasts over 700 locations, which can be found in every single state in the country.
29. Allegis Group
Total revenue: $10.4 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 32
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 0.77
Estimated Market Capitalization: $8 billion
28. Toys ‘R’ Us
Total revenue: $12.5 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 22
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 0.65
Estimated Market Capitalization: $8.2 billion
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27. Menard
Total revenue: $8.3 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 42
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 1.2
Estimated Market Capitalization: $10.0 billion
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26. Dropbox
Total revenue: $216 million
Ranking according to revenue: Nowhere near the top.
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: nearly 50
Estimated Market Capitalization: $10.0 billion
25. Enterprise Holdings
Total revenue: $17.8 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 16
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 0.6
Estimated Market Capitalization: $10.7 billion
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24. Pinterest
Total revenue: Analysts hope that Pinterest will generate as much as $500 million in revenue in 2016
Ranking according to revenue: Nowhere near the top
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 22 times hypothetical 2016 revenue.
Estimated Market Capitalization: $11.0 billion
23. Bechtel Corporation
Total revenue: $39.4 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 4
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 0.29
Estimated Market Capitalization: $11.4 billion
This construction and engineer company has managed to expand to telecommunications, infrastructure and oil and gas. Some of the major projects that this company has worked on include the development of the Jubail Industrial City and the Hoover Dam.
22. SpaceX
Total revenue: $1 billion
Ranking according to revenue: Nowhere near the top
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 12
Estimated Market Capitalization: $12 billion
21. C&S Wholesale Grocers
Total revenue: $25 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 10
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 0.5
Estimated Market Capitalization: $12.5 billion
20. McKinsey & Co.
Total revenue: $8 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 47
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 1.95
Estimated Market Capitalization: $15.6 billion
19. Snapchat
Total revenue: $3 million
Ranking according to revenue: Slightly higher than the ranking of the Greek restaurant on 58th Street and 10th Avenue
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 5000
Estimated Market Capitalization: $16 billion
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18. Capital Group Cos
Total revenue: $7.3 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 49
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 2.5
Estimated Market Capitalization: $18.3 billion
17. Platinum Equity
Total revenue: $12 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 24
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 1.6
Estimated Market Capitalization: $19.2 billion
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16. Palantir
Total revenue: $1 billion
Ranking according to revenue: Nowhere near the top
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 20
Estimated Market Capitalization: $20 billion
15. SC Johnson & Son
Total revenue: $9.6 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 36
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 2.5
Estimated Market Capitalization: $24 billion
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14. Dell
Total revenue: $57.2 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 3
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 0.42
Estimated Market Capitalization: $24 billion
Now this is a company you’ve definitely heard of. In fact, chances are that you are reading this on a Dell device. While the company was public, it ceased trading back in 2013.
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13. First Data
Total revenue: $10.8 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 31
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 2.3
Estimated Market Capitalization: $24.9 billion
12. Airbnb
Total revenue: $420 million
Ranking according to revenue: Nowhere near the top
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 60
Estimated Market Capitalization: $25.5 billion
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11. Amway
Total revenue: $11.8 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 26
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 2.5
Estimated Market Capitalization: $29.5 billion
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10. Cox Enterprises
Total revenue: $15.9 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 18
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 1.9
Estimated Market Capitalization: $30.2 billion
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9. HJ Heinz
Total revenue: $11.2 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 30
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 3
Estimated Market Capitalization: $33.6 billion
8. Fidelity Investments
Total revenue: $13.6 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 21
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 2.5
Estimated Market Capitalization: $34.1 billion
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7. Bloomberg
Total revenue: $8.3 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 43
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 5
Estimated Market Capitalization: $41.5 billion
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6. Cargill
Total revenue: $134.9 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 1
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 0.34
Estimated Market Capitalization: $45.9 billion
As mentioned earlier, Cargill managed to outearn AT&T. The company was initiated in 1865 and has operations in over 60 countries, allowing it to become number one in the 10 largest privately held companies in America.
5. Uber
Total revenue: $400 million
Ranking according to revenue: Not in top 1000
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 127
Estimated Market Capitalization: $51 billion
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4. Ernst & Young
Total revenue: $27.4 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 9
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 1.95
Estimated Market Capitalization: $53.4 billion
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3. PricewaterhouseCoopers
Total revenue: $34 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 5
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 1.95
Estimated Market Capitalization: $66.3 billion
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2. Mars Inc.
Total revenue: $33 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 6
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 2.4
Estimated Market Capitalization: $79.2 billion
Mars bar. The company’s growth in stature has come mainly due to its acquisition of other companies such as the Wrigley company.
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1. Koch Industries
Total revenue: $115 billion
Ranking according to revenue: 2
Estimated Price-Sales Ratio: 0.8
Estimated Market Capitalization: $92.0 billion
While the company focused solely on energy after its inception in 1940, it became a global conglomerate. It is mostly owned by the members of the insanely wealthy Koch family and is the main basis for the funding behind the political activities of the Koch brothers.
