Google was crowned the world’s most valuable brand on Wednesday by a research firm that found technology firms dominate when it comes to how much a name is worth in today’s markets.
Google, IBM, Apple and Microsoft topped global stalwarts Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, and Marlboro in a Top 10 brand value list packed with seven technology firms.
Google’s brand was worth more than US$114 billion, up 14 percent from last year, according to the annual Millward Brown Optimor BrandZ Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands report.
US technology titan IBM saw its “brand value” surge 30 percent to US$86 billion while the worth of Apple’s name climbed 32 percent to US$83 billion, according to the report.
Factors taken into consideration in the ranking include customer loyalty and opinions regarding brands and how they influence earnings.
Microsoft ranked fourth with its brand valued at slightly more than US$76 billion, just ahead of the nearly US$68 billion that Coca-Cola’s brand was said to be worth.
China Mobile (中國移動), General Electric and Vodafone claimed the eighth through tenth spots respectively.
Social-networking site Facebook made it onto a separate Top 20 technology brands list for the first time, with its company name valued at US$5.5 billion.
Electronics giant Samsung saw the largest jump in brand value, soaring 80 percent from the previous year to US$11.3 billion.
“Technology brands demonstrated their pervasiveness in our daily lives,” Millward Brown said in a release. “Use of social media was a key trend across many of the successful brands.”
The overall value of the Top 100 brands rose 4 percent to more than US$2 trillion, according to Millward Brown, which specializes in brand equity research.
“This ranking has elevated the importance of building brands among some of the world’s most successful companies,” Millward Brown global CEO Eileen Campbell said. “CEOs and CFOs around the world should be asking their brand and marketing teams how they can leverage brand to both protect and grow the business.”
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