Every day throughout the world over a billion people rely heavily on Australian inventions. Every time they drive a car, fly, prepare a meal, use a laptop or Smartphone or spend some time in hospital there is a good chance they are relying on Australian inventions or discoveries. Australian inventions include the very old, such as the boomerang and the woomera, and the very new, such as the scramjet, first fired at the Woomera rocket range. Australians have been leaders in inventions relating to both maritime and aeronautical matters, including powered flight, the black box flight recorder, the inflatable escape slide, the surf ski, the wave-piercing catamaran and the winged keel.

The economy of Australia is a developed, modern market economy with a GDP of approximately US$1.2 trillion. In 2009, it was the 13th largest national economy by nominal GDP and the 17th largest measured by PPP. Australia still benefits from the wealth on and under its land and seas. Natural resources and energy companies remain well represented on our list of Australia’s 40 biggest companies. BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto, two mining giants, occupy second and fourth places in the list. The top ten is rounded out by banks, financial services firms, a telecoms group and food retailers. The full 40 spans multinationals in a range of industries, from Fosters, synonymous with beer but whose wine business is now its larger part, to Qantas Airways to Macquarie Bank, which has developed an investment banking niche in large-scale infrastructure and is the world’s largest operator of private toll roads.