Katie Kuehner-Hebert

3M is all about championing the power of science, says chairman, president and CEO Inge Thulin.

CEO, president and chair Virginia “Ginni” Rometty is helping to reshape IBM into “the incumbent disruptor.”

Since Nadella was named the third CEO of the Bellevue, Wash. company in 2014, Microsoft’s market cap has more than doubled to $681.6 billion.

Facebook founder, chair and CEO Mark Zuckerberg is leading the platform back to its roots: focusing more on the personal connections between friends and family.

Under chair and CEO Mary Barra, General Motors is focusing on emerging technologies -- like the self-driving car, mobility apps and an autonomous fuel cell electric platform.

Penske Corp. in Bloomfield Hills, MI., is a $26B global company that manages retail automotive, truck leasing, transportation logistics and professional motorsports businesses.

Doug Parker, chairman and CEO of American Airlines Group Inc., says the world's biggest airline will never lose money again – thanks to less competition from industry consolidation, better logistics and new types of fee-based products and services. Parker told analysts in September that the Fort Worth-based airline was on track to earn $19.2 billion in pretax income from 2014 to the end of 2017. Quite a feat, considering that from 1978 through 2013, American's cumulative profit was $1 billion. Even in a bad year, Parker says the airline should earn about $3 billion in profit before taxes. The company’s latest earnings report didn’t disappoint. American posted better-than-expected fourth-quarter earnings and higher revenue of $10.6 billion, up from $9.8 billion in the last three months of 2016. “We enter 2018 with strong momentum,” Parker says. “Demand for American’s reliable, friendly service remains strong, our network is expanding, and the products we are bringing to market are resonating with customers.” As part of the company’s commitment to launch new products, embrace technological change and “quickly seize upon new opportunities,” American in 2017 announced a $200 million equity stake in China Southern Airlines; executed an amended trans-Atlantic joint business agreement, strengthening the company’s relationship with other key global partners; adopted next-generation technology such as cloud hosting and machine learning to speed time to value; announced a commitment for more than $1.6 billion for improvements of LAX Terminals 4 and 5; and built a five-gate expansion at Chicago O’Hare Terminal 3. Parker has also detailed the company’s plan to increase revenue by $3.9 billion over the next four years through new deals with credit card companies, more seats on planes and other measures. “As an airline, we will always operate in a just-in-time environment, however, we recognize we must lead for the long term,” Parker says. “This means we must be more nimble in our problem solving and in how we innovate and develop the right products, technology, and network both for customers of today and the future. “Ultimately, all of this work will produce a company built for the long term, led by a team that thinks long-term, sees the potential of future opportunities, and brings innovative concepts to market quickly and efficiently,” he says. He’s No. 67 on Chief Executive and RHR International’s CEO1000 Tracker, a ranking of the top 1,000 public/private companies.

Doug Parker, CEO, American Airlines

Headquarters: Fort Worth, TX Age: 57 Undergraduate degree: Albion College Graduate degree: Vanderbilt University First position with company: Financial analyst First joined company: 1986 Named CEO: 2013

A designer by heart, CEO Mark Parker has helped Nike post stellar financials by not only encouraging continuous product innovation, but also by volunteering his own successful design ideas.

As department stores struggle, business is booming for The TJX Cos., the discount retailer led by CEO Ernie Herrman.

Mark Hurd, CEO of enterprise giant Oracle, is pushing through big changes at the Redwood Shores, Calif. company, directing its business more and more toward the cloud. “We made the decision to go at this hard three or four years ago, changing virtually everything in the company,” Hurd says. “We made the decision to build all these global data centers, to deploy this technology and to do it fast.” Oracle has long been the backbone of many corporate companies' operations, and with its growing cloud capabilities, businesses of all sizes can connect their companywide operations anytime, anywhere and from any device. With 430,000 customers in 175 countries, Oracle provides leading-edge capabilities in software as a service, platform as a service, infrastructure as a service, and data as a service. Customers can subscribe to more than a thousand software-as-a-service (SaaS) applications, including enterprise resource planning, enterprise performance management, supply chain management, human capital management, and customer experience. Oracle also provides industry-specific applications for running a customer’s core business, on premises or in the cloud, for more than two dozen industries. Oracle’s open platform-as-a-service (PaaS) offerings enables developers, IT professionals, and business leaders to develop, extend, connect and secure cloud applications, share data, and gain insights across applications and devices. Oracle’s infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) capabilities enable companies to run any workload in the cloud, providing compute, storage, network, container services and more. Oracle Database Cloud Service makes it easy to migrate enterprise workloads to the cloud. Available in the cloud or on premises, the database works seamlessly in hybrid environments. “We have more application offerings than anybody else,” Hurd, told CNBC. “We're competing in more categories, franky the biggest categories. For us it really is the bigger picture not just the competition in one segment.” The next direction for the company is investment in artificial intelligence. “We believe the application of AI, pattern matching, whatever word you want to use for the technology ... is really getting it integrated and embedded into the applications,” he says. A 30-year veteran of the technology industry, Hurd joined Oracle in 2010. He manages corporate direction and strategy, facilitating company activity in consulting, sales, marketing, alliances and channels, and support. Hurd is also responsible for Oracle’s global business units for industries, creating products for specific markets and industries such as telecommunications, financial services, health sciences, and utilities. Since joining Oracle, Hurd has worked to share Oracle’s strategy and vision with customers, partners, shareholders, and investors. In 2007, Hurd was recognized by Fortune magazine as one of its 25 Most Powerful People in Business. He has been named multiple times by Business 2.0 magazine as one of the 50 Who Matter. Hurd was featured several times in Barron’s in the publication’s Best CEOs lists. In 2008, the San Francisco Chronicle named him CEO of the Year. Mark Hurd is No. 75 on Chief Executive and RHR International’s CEO1000 Tracker, a ranking of the top 1,000 public/private companies.

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Mark Hurd, CEO, Oracle

Headquarters: Redwood, CA Number of employees: 136,000 Age: 55 Undergraduate degree: University of Pennsylvania Graduate degree: University of Pennsylvania Previous position: Hewlett-Packard CEO First job: Sales/business development