Apple tops the list of world’s most valuable brand

London, May 9: With a brand value of $153 billion, Apple has usurped Google as the most valuable brand in the world. Apple now costs double of its capitalization, as per the annual BrandZ study of the world"s top 100 brands by global brands agency Millward Brown, ending a four-year reign by the Internet search leader,

Apple emerged as the world's most valuable brand in the 50 top valuable brands list of the Forbes magazine last year. Apple"s popular consumer goods pushed it to the top past Microsoft to become the world's most valuable technology company.

Peter Walshe, global brands Director of Millward Brown, says, "Apple's meticulous attention to detail, along with an increasing presence of its gadgets in corporate environments, have allowed it to behave differently from other consumer-electronics makers."

"Apple is breaking the rules in terms of its pricing model. It's doing what luxury brands do, where the higher price the brand is, the more it seems to underpin and reinforce the desire", he further added.

The report, released on Monday, May 9, was dominated by the technology and telecoms companies by capturing six spots in the list of top 10 brands. Apple is followed by Google and IBM respectively. While McDonald"s rose two places to number four, both Coca-Cola and Marlboro slipped one place each to number six and eight respectively. Last year"s second spot holder Microsoft stood at number five, AT&T at number seven and China Mobile at number nine. General Electric was number 10.

Interestingly, nineteen of the top 100 brands came from emerging markets, up from 13 last year. Popular social networking site Facebook also entered the top 100 at number 35 with a brand valued of $19.1 billion. On the other hand, Chinese search engine, Baidu, rose to number 29 from 46.

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