London: Two Indian companies, ONGC (Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd) and Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), have found a pride of place among the world's 500 largest companies this year.

ONGC, the public sector giant, is ranked at 326th in the Financial Times Global 500 list, with a market capitalisation of $ 10.7 billion and is categorised in the Oil and Gas sector.

Reliance Industries, India's largest private sector company, with a market capitalisation of $ 8.4 billion is ranked at 442nd place and features in Diversified Industrial sector.

Both ONGC and Reliance are the new entrants in this year's list. Hindustan Lever, which had featured in last year's list at 450th place, did not find a mention this year.

Topping the list this year is Microsoft with market value of $ 264 billion, displacing General Electric (GE) from the top spot. Microsoft and GE have been swapping places on this list since 1996.

The United States still dominates the Global 500 listing with 240 US companies, nearly half of the total, finding place in it, five times as many as its closest competitor, Japan.

In terms of market capitalisation the United Kingdom retained its second position. UK's 34 companies on the list were worth $ 1,000 billion, which is ahead of Japan's $ 872 billion with 47 companies.

PTI