Technology

Visualizing Financials of the World’s Biggest Companies: From IPO to Today

Published

2 years ago

November 9, 2022

Truman Du

Featured Creator

Article/Editing:

Carmen Ang

In today’s fast-paced world, companies need to adapt if they want to stay relevant. Even the Big Tech giants can’t get too comfortable—to remain competitive, large corporations like Google and Amazon are constantly innovating and evolving.

This series of graphics by Truman Du illustrates the income statements of five of the world’s biggest companies—Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Tesla, and Alphabet—and shows how their financials have evolved since the date of their very first public disclosures.

Editor’s note: Click on any graphic to see a full-width version that is higher resolution. Also, because these companies are in some cases 10,000x the size they were at IPO date, the two visual financial statements are not meant to be directly comparable in sizing.

Visual Income Statements: From IPO to Today

Let’s start with Apple, the first company to go public, and the biggest in the mix:

1. Apple

View the full-size infographic

Back in 1998, Apple went by the name “Apple Computer,” because at the time, the company only sold computers and computer hardware kits. However, over the next decade, the company expanded its product offerings and started to sell various consumer tech products like phones, portable music players, and even tablets.

Apple’s consumer tech was so successful, that by 2007 the company decided to drop “Computer” from its name. Fast forward to today, and the company also generates revenue through services like Apple TV and Apple Pay.

While computers are still a core part of its business, the iPhone has become the biggest revenue driver for the company.

In 2021, Apple generated $94.7 billion in profit at a 26% margin. Today, the company is one of the only Big Tech companies that has been able to withstand the industrywide drop in valuations. Sitting strong with a market capitalization over $2 trillion, the company is worth roughly the same as Amazon, Alphabet, and Meta combined.

2. Microsoft

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Microsoft, one of the oldest companies on this list, went public in 1985. Back then, the company only sold microprocessors and software—hence the name Micro-Soft.

And while Microsoft’s flagship operating system (Windows) is still one of its major revenue drivers, the company’s product offerings have become much more diverse.

Now, its revenue streams are split fairly evenly between its cloud service (Azure), productivity tools (Office), and personal computing (Xbox and Windows OS).

3. Amazon

View the full-size infographic

When Amazon went public in 1997, the online retailer was only selling books.

But by 1998, Amazon started rapidly expanding its product offering. Soon it was selling everything from CDs and toys to electronics, and even tools.

Fast forward to now, and the ecommerce segment of Amazon has become just a portion of the company’s overall business.

Amazon is also a cloud-service provider (AWS), supermarket chain (with its grocery brands Amazon Fresh and its acquisition of Whole Foods) and even a video streaming service (Prime Video). In particular, AWS stands out as an important part of Amazon’s overall business, driving a whopping 74% of operating profits.

4. Alphabet

View the full-size infographic

When Google went public in 2003, it was a simple search engine that generated about $1.4 billion in ad revenue from its website and cloud network.

Today, the company (now renamed Alphabet) has become synonymous with the internet, and accounts for an overwhelming majority of the internet’s search traffic. Because of this, it generates hundreds of billions in ad revenue each year.

The company also owns YouTube, and has branched out into different verticals as well like consumer tech (Fitbit), and premium streaming (YouTube Premium &TV).

5. Tesla

View the full-size infographic

Tesla’s IPO was in 2008, making it the youngest company on the list. And as the newest kid on the block, Tesla’s revenue streams haven’t changed as drastically as the others have.

However, while electric vehicles are still the company’s main revenue driver, Tesla has managed to dip its toes into other verticals over the last 10 years. For instance, in 2021, about $2.8 billion of its $53.8 billion in revenue came from energy generation and storage.

This article was published as a part of Visual Capitalist's Creator Program, which features data-driven visuals from some of our favorite Creators around the world.

Related Topics:apple google tesla innovation amazon microsoft alphabet featured tech ipos Big Tech Revenue consumer tech

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AI

Charted: Countries Accumulating the Most AI Patents

Uncover which countries hold the most AI patents—and why the quality and impact of patents matter more than quantity.

Published

11 hours ago

April 22, 2025

Marcus Lu

Charted: Countries Accumulating the Most AI Patents

This was originally posted on our Voronoi app. Download the app for free on iOS or Android and discover incredible data-driven charts from a variety of trusted sources.

Key Takeaways

According to the 2025 AI Index Report, China has accumulated 70% of global AI patents
Evidence suggests that the majority of China’s AI patents are only applied for and protected within China

Artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to reshape industries globally, but which nations are leading its innovation?

One way to measure leadership is through patent filings, which legally protect novel ideas or inventions. In the case of AI, securing a patent typically involves demonstrating unique methodologies, machine learning algorithms, or applications capable of significantly advancing existing technologies.

This visualization is part of Visual Capitalist’s AI Week, sponsored by Terzo, and uses data from the 2025 AI Index Report to see which countries & regions have accumulated the most AI patents.

Data & Discussion

The data we used to create this graphic is listed below. Note that 2023 is the most recent year for which data was accessible. All figures were sourced from patent-level bibliographic records in PATSTAT Global, provided by the European Patent Office (EPO).

Year	China	U.S.	Rest of Asia	Europe	Rest of World
2010	13.4%	40.0%	37.2%	8.6%	0.8%
2011	18.8%	32.4%	40.1%	7.9%	0.7%
2012	21.2%	34.6%	35.9%	7.8%	0.5%
2013	20.4%	38.1%	34.8%	5.9%	0.8%
2014	18.1%	42.1%	32.7%	6.4%	0.7%
2015	25.8%	42.8%	24.4%	6.4%	0.6%
2016	31.3%	39.2%	22.5%	6.3%	0.8%
2017	36.9%	34.5%	21.3%	6.6%	0.8%
2018	43.8%	28.7%	20.8%	6.1%	0.6%
2019	42.9%	31.2%	20.0%	5.4%	0.5%
2020	50.2%	26.5%	18.8%	4.1%	0.4%
2021	57.9%	21.0%	17.3%	3.5%	0.4%
2022	64.9%	17.5%	14.3%	3.0%	0.3%
2023	69.7%	14.2%	13.1%	2.8%	0.3%

Rethinking China’s Lead in AI Patents

While China has filed more generative AI patents than any other country—over 38,000 between 2014 and 2023—experts caution that this volume may not equate to technological dominance.

For starters, a significant portion of its patents are filed only within China, with just 7.3% submitted internationally.

The quality of these patents is also under scrutiny, based on the patent grant ratio which is the ratio of patents granted against the number of applications.

China’s general patent grant ratio is 55% as of 2023, which trails that of other major economies like Japan (70%) and Canada (77%). Numbers released by the Ministry of Industry and Information of China in April 2024 suggest that the grant ratio of China’s AI patents is even lower, at 32%.

Quantifying U.S. Leadership

While falling behind China in terms of patents, the U.S. is undoubtedly leading the direction of global AI development.

In 2024, U.S. organizations produced 40 “notable AI models” compared to China’s 15. The AI Index Report defines notable AI models as those that make meaningful technological advancements.

According to WIPO’s Patent Landscape Report, American patents and publications also receive significantly more global citations, highlighting their outsized impact.

For example, OpenAI has published just 48 articles (ranked 325th), but its publications have received 11,816 citations (ranked 13th).

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