Taipei, 10/21/2015. Dun & Bradstreet (D&B), the world's leading source of business information and insights, handed out awards to 1,000 Taiwanese small- and medium-sized enterprises (SME) at a ceremony in Taipei on Tuesday. "We'd like to recognize and honor these winners with the Top 1,000 D&B SME Award," said Michelle Sun, general manager of D&B Taiwan Branch. Among Taiwan's 1.3 million SMEs, the selected companies accounted for one tenth of the country's total exports in 2013 and will continue to drive the local economy, Sun said. With their achievement of the D&B award, the companies can also boost their brand name and credibility in the international arena, she said. At the ceremony, Arun Khanna, president of D&B Asia, praised the leadership of the 1,000 companies. They are "doing the right things," he said, quoting the late Peter Drucker, an American author who was considered the leading management consultant of his time. "Every genuine leader in the world has that, the brilliance to identify what are the right things, and the decisiveness to take opportune actions," Khanna said. Vice President Wu Den-yih, who also attended the ceremony, said that SMEs play a critical role in Taiwan's economy, and that with the recognition gained, the 1,000 companies can achieve higher visibility in the global market. It is the second time the U.S.-based company has recognized Taiwan's top SMEs. In 2010, D&B worked with Standard Chartered Bank to choose 500 outstanding companies across Taiwan. D&B said it expects to grant awards to Taiwan's top 1,000 SMEs every year. Founded in 1841, D&B has a commercial database of some 230 million enterprises around the world.