For the first time Saudi Electricity Company (SEC) and Qatar Electricity & Water Company (QEWC) are joined in the MEED 100 by a third power company – Iran Power Plants Projects Management Company, entering at 90, with a market capitalisation of $2bn.

The company is an investor and main contractor on independent power and industrial projects in Iran. Since it was founded in 1992, it has been involved in projects with a combined generation capacity of more than 52,000MW. It has subsidiaries that manufacture gas and steam turbines, and their ancillary equipment. On the industrial side, the firm has been involved in oil and gas projects, and more recently railway schemes.

SEC slipped a couple of places this year, but still ranks among the 10 largest publicly listed companies in the Middle East. The company has a huge programme of power projects planned in a bid to meet the kingdom’s rising electricity demand, which is forecast to climb to more than 60,000MW by 2025, from about 38,000MW today. Analysts say at least $270bn worth of investment will be needed to meed consumption growth to 2025.

QEWC also moved down the ranking slightly from 67 to 70. The firm  reported a net profit of QR922m for 2009, a 22-percent increase from the previous year. Sales were up by 17 per cent to QR2,651m.