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Apple topples Google as world’s most valuable brand

by Scott Bicheno on 9 May 2011, 09:32

Tags: Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), Google (NASDAQ:GOOG)

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Dominant year

The significance of the mobile Internet market has been given another metric with the announcement that Apple has ended Google's four year reign as the world's most powerful brand.

This is the conclusion of the sixth annual BrandZ study, conducted by WPP subsidiary Millward Brown, which attaches a dollar figure to a company's brand based on financial data and public perceptions.

Google's online ubiquity has kept it at the top for the past few years, but Apple had such a storming 2010 - powered primarily by the immensely popular iPhone 4, but also, of course, the launch of the iPad - that its brand value jumped 84 percent.

"Our brand valuations are a powerful measure of an organization's ability to create real and lasting value for shareholders." said Eileen Campbell, CEO of Millward Brown. "By nurturing its brand and constantly innovating, Apple is able to command a high price premium and weather economic turbulence, providing a global business success story that other brands can learn from."

Here's the table, with four of the top five brands (and a third of the top 100) coming from the technology industry. While it's remarkable that Marlboro remains a top ten brand, with smoking so unfashionable, the presence of China Mobile is more telling. 19 of the top 100 now come from BRIC markets (Brazil, Russia, India, China), compared with just two five years ago.

 

The Most Valuable Global Brands 2011

Rank

Brand

Value in $ million

Brand Value change from 2010

1.

Apple

$153,285

+84%

2.

Google

$111,498

-2%

3.

IBM

$100,849

+17%

4.

McDonald's

$81,016

+23%

5.

Microsoft

$78,243

+2%

6.

Coca-Cola*

$73,752

+8%

7.

AT&T

$69,916

-

8.

Marlboro

$67,522

+18%

9.

China Mobile

$57,326

+9%

10.

GE

$50,318

+12%

*The Brand Value of Coca-Cola includes Lites, Diets and Zero

 

HEXUS Forums :: 3 Comments

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Posted by Singh400 - Mon 09 May 2011 09:56
The bubble will burst soon. Steady growth is key, not massive growth. You can't sustain massive growth.
Posted by CAT-THE-FIFTH - Mon 09 May 2011 10:10
Out of interest is this an estimated or actual value??

Not surprising that Apple has gone ahead of Google as they also much more hardware too(Google is primary a software company with nearly half the employees of Apple and even then a lot of the software is free too).

However,Google leaving China did affect it in 2010 though.

Having said that Walmart is the biggest company worldwide in terms of revenue and has much bigger cash reserves than Apple. There are Oil companies such as Exxon which have made very good profits(30 billion alone last year).
Posted by TooNice - Mon 09 May 2011 14:44
^ Hmm, I stopped following the drama since last summer when the Chinese government renewed Google's ICP license, and Google.cn appears to work. Am I missing anything? It's worth noting that Baidu has always been ahead of Google in China as a search engine.

I'd take brand valuation with a large pinch of salt. It's probably like trying to establish the richest people in the world, the top few can easy switch places depending on the methodology used and I am quite sure that no methodology covers the whole things.

I don't think the “value” of a brand is necessarily to do with the revenue or cash reserve, but more to do with the “appeal” so to speak. All things being equal, would a Apple / Google branded mundane product sell for more than Walmart? Not unlikely. Granted, they wouldn't want to go too mundane as it would dilute the brand if they can't market the product properly (even Apple will struggle convincing that their broom is really so much more awesome than Tesco value).