Local companies do well in a wide range of rankings

Many Virginia companies rank among the nation’s leaders. 

Last year, for example, 284 Virginia companies made the Inc. 5000 list, an annual ranking of the nation’s fastest-growing businesses. The list is based on companies’ revenue growth during the past three years.

Virginia ranked fifth in the country in the number of companies on the Inc. 5000, trailing only California with 680, Texas with 380, New York state with 318, and Florida with 296
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Thirty-eight of the Virginia companies are members of an even more exclusive club, Inc.’s top 500 fast-growth firms. The top four from the commonwealth were No. 21, Zantech IT Services in McLean; No. 23, FederalConference.com in Dumfries; No. 35,  OBXtek in Vienna; and No. 80, Innotion Enterprises in Arlington.

Zantech, FederalConference and OBXtek ranked first, second and fourth among fast-growing government services firms while Innotion was second among real estate companies.

Virginia also had 22 companies on the Hispanic Business 500 list last year, topped by Vienna-based Micro Tech with more than 400 employees and annual revenue of more than $340 million. It ranked No. 21 on the Hispanic Business list.

Other Virginia companies ranked by the magazine were Ashburn-based MVM Inc., No. 34; Virginia Beach-based Dynaric Inc., No. 57; Arlington-based The Centech Group Inc., No. 71; and Virginia Beach-based Knowledge Information Solutions Inc., No 91.

Ten Virginia companies also were on the latest Black Enterprise list of top African-American companies. Leading the list for Virginia was Ashburn-based Intelligent Decisions, which ranked seventh with $467 million in revenue, while Thompson Hospitality, based in Herndon, was just behind at No. 8 with $405 million in revenue.

Others on the list were Alexandria-based SENTEL Corp., No. 50; Chantilly-based Communication Technologies Inc., No, 51; Alexandria-based Capstone Corp., No. 52.

While many Virginia companies ranked high in national surveys, the commonwealth has its own ranking of fast-growing local companies, the Fantastic 50. Virginia Beach-based Valkyrie Enterprises led the list with a four-year growth rate of 4,732 percent from 2007 to 2010.

While revenue was growing rapidly at many companies, CEO salaries also were moving up. A salary survey by Equilar Inc., an executive compensation data firm, found that 34 Virginia CEOs heading companies with at least $1 billion in revenue in 2011 averaged $2.4 million in salary and bonus, a 4.4 percent increase from 2010.

Not all news is good news. This section also includes a listing of the biggest layoffs or closings. The list is led by the transfer of more than 2,000 ExxonMobil jobs from Fairfax County to a new company complex in Houston. The relocation, announced last June, is scheduled to take place by May 2014.