Boosted by strong interest in environmentally friendly businesses, the mainland has overtaken Taiwan for the first time as the market with the most fast-growing technology companies in the Asia-Pacific. Global advisory firm Deloitte’s ninth annual ranking of such companies shows the mainland had 147 firms in the top 500, compared with 97 last year and 72 in 2008. Taiwan, which ruled Deloitte’s “Fast 500” lists for the past two years, had 86 firms on the list this year, including top-ranked Giga Solar Materials Corp. Half the companies ranked in the Top 20 are from the mainland, while three are from Taiwan. The mainland dominated the green technology sector, with 15 of the 26 green tech companies in this year’s list. Founded in 2005, Giga produces thick film-metalization pastes used to make photovoltaic solar cells. Third-ranked China United Cleaning Technology is focused on crystal-silicon solar cells and photovoltaic cells and modules. At No 5 is Guodian United Power Technology, China’s largest wind power generation operator. According to Deloitte, Chinese companies also led in several other Fast 500 sectors, including software, telecommunications and networking, biotech, pharmaceutical and medical equipment, and media and entertainment. It said the overall revenue growth across all the ranked firms was 374% cent this year, the South China Morning Post reports.