Eesti Mobiiltelefon is Estonia's top company

TALLINN - Telecommunications and transport are the most successful
businesses in Estonia according to Estonian business daily Aripaev.

Aripaev ranked Estonia's 500 largest companies on the basis of their
turnover profit, profit margin, return on assets, turnover and profit
growths and compiled a list of the top 100 companies according to the
results of 1998.

Eesti Mobiiltelefon, Pakterminal and E.O.S. were the most successful
companies by Aripaev's yardstick. Construction company Merko Ehitus,
Eesti Telefon and a producer of building material, E- Betoonelement,
were the runner-ups.

EMT held third position in Aripaev 's top 100 list last year. One of
the reasons behind the company's fast development is the desire of
Estonians to try new things, chairman of the board of EMT Peep
Aavikso told to Aripaev.

Pakterminal and E.O.S., both of which ship imported Russian oil
through Estonia to Western countries, have benefited from increased
transit trade through Estonia, the business daily reported. E.O.S.
moved to the third place from its previous 272nd slot in Aripaev's
ranking, thanks to the increase of profits by 118 million kroons
($7.65 million). The company's management is planning to double its
turnover and step up next to the market leader Pakterminal.

Pakterminal with its 551 million kroon profit was the largest company
in terms of profit and accounted for 17 percent of the total profit
of Estonia's 100 largest companies. Two Eesti Telekom subsidiaries,
EMT and Eesti Telefon, were the other big profit makers with 390
million kroons and 254 million kroons respectively. Pakterminal also
had the highest profit margin (the proportion of profit to turnover),
which was 58 percent.

State electricity producer Eesti Energia with its 3.75 billion kroon
turnover was the largest company in terms of turnover in 1998. Eesti
Energia has held the leading position in the turnover list since 1993
when Aripaev started ranking companies. The total turnover of the top
10 companies in the turnover list (15.6 billion kroons) is
approximately 30 percent of the total turnover of all 100 companies.

Shipping company Eesti Merelaevandus, which placed in eighth position
in the overall list, had the fastest profit growth (531 million
kroons).