18 February 2014Trademarks

Apple and Samsung earn top spots in brand rankings

Tech heavyweights Apple and Samsung are the two most valuable brands on the planet, according to a report by Brand Finance.

The brand consultancy, which released its annual list of the top 500 global brands on Tuesday, valued Apple at nearly $105 billion and its South Korean rival at close to $79 billion.

Apple has been ranked number one in the reportBrand Finance Global 500 – for three years in a row.

With Google and Microsoft taking the next two spots, the top four was unchanged from last year’s study. Verizon, in fifth, jumped five places since 2013, while tenth-placed IBM slipped four.

Brand Finance calculated brand value by determining the royalties a company would have to pay to license its brand if it did not own it, known as the “royalty relief” method.

David Haigh, chief executive of Brand Finance, said what sets Apple apart is its ability to monetise its brand, generating “multi-billion dollar revenues across a range of product categories”.

“Some of those categories it is largely responsible for creating,” he said. “For example, though tablets were in use before the iPad, it was the application of the Apple brand to the concept that captured the public imagination and allowed it to take off as a commercial reality.”

Tech brands have tightened their grip at the top of the rankings, with Walmart the only non-tech company in this year’s top 10.

“Once the world’s most valuable brand, it now sits in ninth, having been overtaken by Amazon,” said the report. “The usurpation of the world’s biggest retail brand by the biggest online retailer represents yet another coup for tech brands over ‘real-world’ businesses.”

Ferrari, despite being ranked 350th, was named the world’s most “powerful” brand, scoring highly on a wide range of measures such as desirability, loyalty, consumer sentiment and visual identity.

Haigh said: “The prancing horse on a yellow badge is instantly recognisable the world over, even where paved roads have yet to reach. In its home country [Italy] and among its many admirers worldwide, Ferrari inspires more than just brand loyalty; more of a cultish, even quasi-religious, devotion, its brand power is indisputable.”

Overall, banking ($633.1 billion), technology ($615.8 billion) and telecoms ($500.1 billion) were the most valuable industry sectors, while the US scored the highest rating of any country – nearly $2 trillion.

The report is available here.

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