Not everyone, it seems, would like to buy the world a Coke – for the first time in 14 years, Coca-cola dropped from the number one spot on Interbrand‘s annual global brands ranking.
It was bumped out by Apple, which rose in brand valuation 28% to $98.3 billion. Right behind Apple was another digital juggernaut, Google, which rose 34% to $93.3 billion, forcing Coca-cola into third place.
The rankings, released Monday by global brand consultancy firm Interbrand, evaluate brands using a methodology that takes into account their financial performance, influence over consumers and ability to demand premium prices.
Interbrand credited Apple’s rise to a consumer-focused approach that lead to reaching customers through a variety of channels.
Apple CEO Tim Cook “has assembled a solid leadership team and has kept Steve Jobs’ vision intact – a vision that has allowed Apple to deliver on its promise of innovation time and time again,” Jez Frampton, Interbrand’s global CEO, said in a release.
IBM, Microsoft, GE, McDonalds, Samsung, Intel and Toyota also made the top 10, in that order.
Tech was the big winner this year, with seven of the top 10 companies from the tech sector.
Yahoo! and BlackBerry, however, both fell off the top 100 this year. BlackBerry’s departure leaves only one Canadian-bron brand on the list – Thomson Reuters, which dropped from 44th to 47th place.
The overall valuation of the top 100 brands rose by 8.4% to $1.5 trillion. Apple, Facebook, Prada, Google and Amazon were the fastest-rising brands.
