BrazilADNOC bumps Etisalat as most valuable Middle East brand
The Abu Dhabi National Oil Company has been assessed as the Middle East’s most valuable brand on Brand Finance’s 2019 Global 500 list.
Bumping Emirati telco Etisalat as the Middle East’s most valuable brand, the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company – better known as ADNOC – has this year been determined as MENA’s regional number one in brand valuation and strategy consultancy Brand Finance’s annual Global 500 rankings for 2019. A new entrant on the list, ADNOC was assessed at a brand worth of $8.9 billion to claim the 208th spot.
One of just five Middle Eastern entities to make the list, ADNOC has pipped last year’s regional leader Etisalat – which rose in its valuation from $7.7 billion last year to $8.3 billion this, yet nevertheless fell eleven spots from 217th to 228th – while 2017 regional leader Emirates remained reasonably flat at 329th. Splitting the latter pair was Saudi telecom STC, coming at 284th – a 30-place drop – with Qatar National Bank (QND) rounding out the local contingent in 403rd.
The first regional energy company to feature on the list, the state-owned ADNOC was cited by the report for its recently announced plans to increase oil production to 4 million barrels per day by the end of next year, as well as for having entered the capital markets for the first time two years ago – with the largest IPO listing on the Abu Dhabi stock exchange over the past decade. As it stands, ADNOC is the world’s twelfth-largest oil company by production.
“As ADNOC leverages the opportunities being created by the evolving energy market, its brand value has demonstrated significant growth,” said Brand Finance CEO David Haigh. “Its debut in our ranking of the world’s top 500 most valuable brands, and as the most valuable Middle East brand, is a testament to its on-going commitment to becoming the National Oil Company brand of the future and its role as a powerful catalyst for economic growth, diversification, in-country value creation and foreign direct investment into the UAE.”
Topping the list globally this year was once again Amazon, with Apple and Google holding on to their second and third spots and Microsoft climbing from sixth to fourth ahead of Samsung which rounded out the top five. The biggest mover was Huawei, which jumped from 25th to 12th; however it’s not clear what the future brand impact will be with respect to recent international events, with the US bringing criminal charges against the company overnight.
Altogether, tech firms claimed six of the top ten spots, and accounted for nearly a quarter of the overall list with a combined brand worth of $1.6 trillion – with Amazon alone assessed at value of nearly $180 billion. Meanwhile, Big Four professional services giant Deloitte has shot into the ‘Strongest Brands’ top-ten list – from 17th to 3rd – in what is a measure of the ‘efficacy of a brand’s performance on intangible measures relative to its competitors’. PwC dropped two places to tenth, with Ferrari topping the list.
Again, it is unclear what the brand impact will be from overnight events, with Deloitte issued a fine of around $535,000 by the Malaysian regulators for its failure to immediately report irregularities in respect to the scandal-ridden 1MDB case. The firm, now the biggest of the Big Four by revenue, this year climbed from 57th to 46th on the overall brand value list – pegged at a worth of nearly $30 billion – while consultancies Accenture, PwC and Ernst & Young followed to all place within the top 65.
