Forbes released the World’s 100 Most Powerful Women 2015 list

Forbes released the list of World’s 100 Most Powerful Women of 2015 showing women who impacted businesses, media, philanthropy, politics and more.

All 100 women have the power to shape the world, but 18 stand out this year as entrepreneurs, the women who built their status from scratch.

This is Forbes’ definitive annual audit of the foremost heads of state, iconic entrepreneurs, CEOs, celebrity role models, billionaire activists, and pioneer philanthropists. All are ranked by money, media momentum, spheres of influence and impact.

Highlights of the List

• The world’s most powerful woman in the list is German Chancellor Angela Merkel who fetched the first spot.
• Hillary Clinton ranked at 2nd position, she has been appearing on this FORBES ranking every year as a senator, secretary of state and influential personality.
• The most powerful women in politics, philanthropy, business and tech are Angela Merkel, Melinda Gates, Barra and Sandberg.
• The top ranking billionaire in the list is Oprah Winfrey who stood at 12th spot, having personal net worth of 3 billion US dollars.
• Ana Patricia Botin, the newly installed chairman of Banco Santander, is the top woman in finance at 18th position.
• Beyonce Knowles leads the entertainment field at 21st position while Anna Wintour, Conde Nast artistic director, leads the media sector by fetching 28th slot.
• There are 19 newcomers in the list in 2015 including Beth Comstock, CEO of GE Business Innovations and Elizabeth Holmes, founder of blood testing company Theranos, Google CFO Ruth Porat, EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini, power pop star Taylor Swift and top venture capitalist Jenny Lee.
• Seven women who appeared on the inaugural list in 2004 are still in the list today. They are: Melinda Gates, Christine Lagarde, Hillary Clinton, Indra Nooyi, Oprah, Queen Elizabeth II and Ho Ching.
• Technology takes a fourth place as a category on the Power Women list, seven tech women made the top 25 this year including Sandberg, YouTube’s CEO Susan Wojcicki, IBM’s Ginni Rometty, HP’s Meg Whitman and Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer.
• More than half of the women on the list are American, including immigrants such as von Furstenberg (Belgium), Ambassador Samantha Power (Ireland), Weili Dai (China), Donna Langley (UK), and Padmasree Warrior (India).
• 19 women are off the list from last year, among them are Margaret Hamburg, Amy Pascal, Gracas Silva Foster, Gail Kelly, Helene Gayle, Patricia Woertz and Joyce Banda.

Top 10 powerful women in the List

Indian Women in the list

• Four Indians have been named in Forbes list including Arundhati Bhattacharya, Chairperson of State Bank of India (SBI), who stood at 30th position.
• Chanda Kochhar, MD and CEO of ICICI Bank, was placed at 35th position; Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, CMD of Biocon Limited, was placed at 85th position and Shobhana Bhartia, Editorial Director of the Hindustan Times Group, was placed at 93rd position.