IRN100 Extended Edition 2018

The year 2017 proved an action-packed year in the global equipment rental industry. As ever, there were major acquisitions and examples of strong organic growth, as companies continued to ride on the crest of rental success across most regions, and feel the force. One of the first things to note about this year’s survey – for revenues in 2017 or the 2017/18 financial year – is that the appreciation of the Euro against most currencies between Dec 2016 and Dec 2017 has a distorting impact. US dollar figures, for example, are ‘reduced’ by 13% year-on-year when reported in Euros, while the impact for the Japanese Yen is 10%. This means that US and Japanese rental companies – some of the biggest in the world – have grown more than the Euro revenue figures in the table would indicate.

Corrected for exchange rate changes, the true growth of the world’s biggest markets is revealed. For the top 100, like-for-like growth is around 8%, which is high, reflecting not just market growth but also consolidation. For the US companies in the list, like-for-like growth is more than 10%, while for European businesses it is closer to 4.5-5.0%. The currency corrected increase for the Japanese IRN100 companies is around 4%.

These figures are ahead of the numbers given by the European Rental Association (ERA) – growth of 3.1% for Europe in 2017 - and the American Rental Association (ARA), which reported an increase of 4.5-5.0% in 2017. The explanation is that the largest businesses in these markets – the IRN100 companies – are growing faster than the market, expanding their fleets and making big acquisitions.

As per last year, the top 10 remained intact, but the order has somewhat shifted, with Loxam soaking up the benefits of acquisitions made over the last 18 months, in the shape of Lavendon Group, Hune Rental and Nacanco.