Bentley 500 lists world's top infrastructure owners

First global compilation puts private ownership well ahead of public infrastructure.

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At its annual Be Inspired Conference in Amsterdam Wednesday, Bentley Systems released its first Bentley Infrastructure 500 list. The compilation of the 500 largest global infrastructure owners reveals a strong amount of private ownership, to the tune of more than $13 trillion.

The list was generated after Bentley officials said they couldn’t quite find the information from other sources. “We would like to cater to them, frankly, and contribute to the top design firms, but could not find a global compendium of infrastructure owners,” said Bentley CEO Greg Bentley. “By virtue of having the Top 500 list, we can better understand how to compare one sector to another, from one part of the world to the other, from public and private ownership.”

The top 10 infrastructure owners, according to the Bentley 500 list, are:

1.      U.S. Government                                            $282.7 billion

2.      Electricite de France SA – EDF                        $186.4 billion

3.      Gazprom (Russia)                                           $161.8 billion

4.      PetroChina Company Ltd.                              $155.9 billion

5.      Exxon MobilCorp.                                            $139.1 billion

6.      Petrobas (Brazil)                                             $132.2 billion

7.      Royal Dutch Shell                                           $129.1 billion

8.      U.S. Dept of the Army                                   $12219 billion

9.      Enel Spa (Italy)                                               $113.9 billion

10. Nippon T&T (Japan)                                       $107.8 billion

The list was gathered based on cumulative net infrastructure investment, and was gathered from company financial statements and other publically available records. Bentley conceded there may be some gaps in the data, and will offer those who may be left off the list an opportunity to add or augment their data. Still, the list provides some interesting insights. For example:

• The Walt Disney Co. has more infrastructure assets (258 -- $17.5 billion) than the state of South Carolina (270 -- $16.9 billion)
• The State of New York (25 -- $80 billion) has more infrastructure assets than the nation of Australia (26 -- $77.7 billion)
• AT&T (16 -- $100.1 billion) has more infrastructure assets than Verizon (20 -- $91.5 billion).

Almost 70% of the infrastructure owners cited were privately held. The United States leads the list with 166 of the top 500 infrastructure owners, accounting for about $4.2 trillion in infrastructure. They are followed by Japan (58, $1.35 trillion), China (29, $870 billion) France (22, $747 billion)) and the United Kingdom (23, $617 million).

“One aspect that surprised me is that the infrastructure ownership was not concentrated in largest developed countries, but in 47 countries around the world,” Bentley said. “The bulk of the largest infrastructure owners is in private companies, and not governmentally owned.”

The Bentley 500 breakdown among leading markets:

Commercial facilities              Wal-Mart Stores                      $102.3 billion

State government (U.S.)         California                                $102.2 billion

Rail systems                            Ferrovie Dello Stato                $101.6 billion

Manufacturing                         Toyota Motors                          $71.9 billion

Mineral Resources                   Vale                                         $66.1 billion

Infrastructure owners India    Reliance Industries                 $38.1 billion

Private investor                       Ferrovial                                  $35.9 billion

Bank owner                             Royal Bank of Scotland         $25.3 billion

Private water owner                Kemble Water Holdings         $14.3 billion