1. HP retains its place at the top.
In 2006, it became official: Hewlett-Packard had passed IBM to become the largest technology company in the world in terms of global revenues. The next year it got better for HP -- the computing giant officially held on to its top spot, fending off a challenge from Samsung. As 2008 comes to a close, HP looks every bit as dominant. Under CEO Mark Hurd's leadership, the company is competitive in all of the main markets and product categories it is involved in -- HP is the No. 1 vendor of servers and personal computers globally, enjoys the biggest presence in the Top 500 Supercomputer List and even ranks as the fifth-largest software company in the world.
