Walmart Inc. is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets, discount department stores, and grocery stores in the United States and 23 other countries. It is headquartered in Bentonville, Arkansas. The company was founded by brothers Sam and James "Bud" Walton in nearby Rogers, Arkansas in 1962 and incorporated under Delaware General Corporation Law on October 31, 1969. It also owns and operates Sam's Club retail warehouses.
Samuel Moore Walton was an American business magnate best known for founding the retailers Walmart and Sam's Club, which he started in Rogers, Arkansas and Midwest City, Oklahoma in 1962 and 1983 respectively. Wal-Mart Stores Inc. grew to be the world's largest corporation by revenue as well as the biggest private employer in the world. For a period of time, Walton was the richest person in the United States. His family has remained the richest family in the U.S. for several consecutive years, with a net worth of around US$240.6 billion as of January 2022. In 1992 at the age of 74, Walton died of blood cancer and was laid to rest at the Bentonville Cemetery in his longtime home of Bentonville, Arkansas.
Walmart de México y Centroamérica, also known as Walmex, is the Mexican and Central American Walmart division. Walmart de México y Centroamérica is Walmart's largest division outside the U.S. as of October 31, 2022, consists of 2,804 stores around the country, including 300 Walmart Supercenter stores and 167 Sam's Club stores. It has been traded in the Mexican Stock Exchange since 1977. Walmart de México y Centroamérica is the biggest retailer in Latin America.
Metro AG is a German multinational company based in Düsseldorf which operates business membership-only cash and carry stores primarily under the Metro brand. As of March 2024, Metro is operating 626 wholesale stores in 21 countries, including Europe, Kazakhstan, and Pakistan.
A hypermarket or superstore is a big-box store combining a supermarket and a department store. The result is an expansive retail facility carrying a wide range of products under one roof, including full grocery lines and general merchandise. In theory, hypermarkets allow customers to satisfy all their routine shopping needs in one trip. The term hypermarket was coined in 1968 by French trade expert Jacques Pictet.
Makro is a Dutch international brand of warehouse clubs, also called cash and carry stores. Makro was founded by SHV Holdings, a Dutch conglomerate based in Utrecht in partnership with German company Metro AG, with the first warehouse club opened in Amsterdam in 1968. Currently, ownership of the worldwide chain of stores is split between different companies like Metro AG in Europe, SHV Holdings in Latin America and CP All in Asia. In many countries, access to stores is restricted to business customers, and the stores are not open to the general public.
Absa Group Limited, commonly known simply as Absa and formerly the Amalgamated Banks of South Africa (ABSA) until 2005 and Barclays Africa Group Limited until 2018, is a multinational banking and financial services conglomerate based in Johannesburg, South Africa and listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange. It offers personal and business banking, credit cards, corporate and investment banking, wealth and investment management and bank assurances.
Walmart Canada is a Canadian retail corporation and the Canadian branch of the U.S.-based multinational retail conglomerate Walmart. Headquartered in Mississauga, Ontario, it was founded on March 17, 1994, with the purchase of the Woolco Canada chain from the F. W. Woolworth Company.
The history of Walmart, an American discount department store chain, began in 1950 when businessman Sam Walton purchased a store from Luther E. Harrison in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and opened Walton's 5 & 10. The Walmart chain proper was founded in 1962 with a single store in Rogers, Arkansas, expanding inside Oklahoma by 1968 and throughout the rest of the Southern United States by the 1980s, ultimately operating a store in every state of the United States, plus its first stores in Canada, by 1995. The expansion was largely fueled by new store construction, although the chains Mohr-Value and Kuhn's Big K were also acquired.
Edcon Limited was a retail company based in Johannesburg, South Africa. Its subsidiaries included Edgars, a department store with 203 branches. In 2020, the Competition Tribunal approved the sale of the Edgars division to Retailability (pty) Ltd, and Jet to The Foschini Group.
Webber Wentzel is an African law firm headquartered in Johannesburg, South Africa. The firm operates in a collaborative alliance with global law firm, Linklaters.
Sanlam is a South African financial services group headquartered in Bellville, Western Cape, South Africa. Sanlam is one of the largest insurance company in Africa. It is listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, the Namibian Stock Exchange and the A2X. Established in 1918 as a life insurance company, Sanlam Group has developed into a diversified financial services business. Its five business clusters comprise Sanlam Personal Finance, Sanlam Emerging Markets, Sanlam Investments, Sanlam Corporate and Santam.
FirstRand Limited, also referred to as FirstRand Group is the holding company of FirstRand Bank, and is a financial services provider in South Africa. It is one of the financial services providers licensed by the Reserve Bank of South Africa, the national banking regulator.
Choppies Enterprises Limited is a Botswana multinational grocery and general merchandise retailer headquartered in Gaborone, Botswana. The retailer initially sold only food-based goods and other fast-moving consumer goods. The group owns a centralized, in-house distribution network in South Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia, and Kenya.
Carl Douglas McMillon is an American businessman, and the president and chief executive officer (CEO) of Walmart Inc. He sits on the retailer's board of directors. Having first joined the company as a summer associate in high school, he became the company's fifth CEO in 2014. He previously led the company's Sam's Club division, from 2005 to 2009, and Walmart International, from 2009 to 2013.
David Cheesewright is the British former president and CEO of Walmart International, a division of Wal-Mart Stores, Inc..
Naivas Supermarket, often referred to simply as "Naivas", is the largest supermarket chain in Kenya, with 103 outlets as of March 2024. At that time, Naivas was the largest supermarket chain in Kenya, ahead of Quick Mart Limited with 51 outlets in the country.
Alexander Forbes Group Holdings, commonly referred to as Alexforbes is a diversified financial services organisation. The company is headquartered in Johannesburg, South Africa, with a presence in two other countries on the African continent: Namibia and Botswana and in the Channel Islands through an offshore Jersey operation.
James Wellwood "Whitey" Basson is a South African businessman and billionaire who was largely responsible for growing a small business called Shoprite from an 8-store chain valued at R1 million into an international retail conglomerate with revenue in 2019 of R150 billion, market capitalisation of R114 billion, more than 2 300 stores and 140 000 employees across 15 African countries. Deloitte's Global Powers of Retailing 2019 ranked The Shoprite Group as the 86th largest retailer in the world.
R91.564 billion (2016) [3] : 40 
