One of the two industries that have been slowest to recover from the financial crisis is automobile manufacturing. In 2006, the top car brand ranked 10th among all brands, with a brand value of $30.2 billion. In 2015 the top car brand ranked 30th, with a brand value of $29.9 billion. During that 10-year span, brand value among the world’s top 100 brands increased by 126%, from $1.4 trillion to $3.3 trillion.

Brand value is not the same as market value. Simply defined, brand value is the premium that a customer is willing to pay for the name on the product. Global research agency MillwardBrown has published a list of the top 100 global brands in each of the past 10 years and the changes to the list over that time have been significant.

Here are the 2006 and 2015 lists of the top 10:

2006			2015
Rank	Name	Value		Name	Value
1	Microsoft	$62.04 billion		Apple	$246.99 billion
2	GE	$55.83 billion		Google	$173.65 billion
3	Coca-Cola	$41.41 billion		Microsoft	$115.5 billion
4	China Mobile	$39.17 billion		IBM	$93.99 billion
5	Marlboro	$38.51 billion		Visa	$91.96 billion
6	Wal-Mart	$37.57 billion		AT&T	$89.49 billion
7	Google	$37.45 billion		Verizon	$86.01 billion
8	IBM	$36.08 billion		Coca-Cola	$83.84 billion
9	Citi	$31.03 billion		McDonald’s	$81.16 billion
10	Toyota	$30.20 billion		Marlboro	$80.35 billion

 
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Including the two telecom companies in the 2015 list, six of the top 10 are basically technology companies and three — Apple, AT&T and Verizon — reached their ranking on the strength of mobile technologies.

We have already noted that the top car company in 2006 ranked 10th for global brand value, and it fell to 30th place in 2015, and the dollar value of the brand remained essentially flat. Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) has been able to maintain the dollar value of its brand, but it and the other car makers are getting left further behind in brand value growth. Year over year, Toyota’s brand value fell by 2% and it dropped four places in the rankings.

The second-highest ranked carmaker is BMW in 34th place, with a brand value of $26.3 billion, up 2% year-over-year, but down two spots in the rankings.

At 43rd in the global ranking is Mercedes-Benz, with a brand value of $21.7 billion, up 1% year-over year and down one spot in the rankings.

Honda Motor Co. Ltd. (NYSE: HMC) ranked 78th among the top 100 brands and fourth among the automakers. Honda’s brand value totaled $13.3 billion, down 5% year-over-year and down eight spots in the ranking.

The only automaker to move up in the ranking was Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F), improving its rank by four spots to number 80 on the 2015 list. Ford’s brand value is tabbed at $13.1 billion, up 11% year-over-year.

The other carmaker among the top 100 global brands is Nissan, which ranked 93rd, down three spots year-over-year. The Japanese automaker’s brand value was listed as $11.4 billion, up 3% year-over-year.

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Neither General Motors Co. (NYSE: GM) nor Fiat Chrysler Automobiles N.V. (NYSE: FCAU) broke into the top 100 listing this year. That may be due in part to the way these two carmakers have promoted their brands, choosing to focus on nameplates like Cadillac and Jeep rather than on the overall brand name as Ford and the others do.

Can any automaker ever hope to reach the top 10 in brand value again? The top-ranked automaker, Toyota, would have needed to increase its brand value by nearly 2.5 times to reach the 2015 top 10. In the 10-year period from 2006 to 2015, Apple’s brand value rose by more than 1,400% and AT&T’s brand value rose by more than 1,200%, so it is theoretically possible. The 10th fastest-growing brand in this period was luxury clothing and accessories maker Hermès, which gained 292% in brand value.

Carmakers have gotten the message that being connected is a requirement in today’s world. Their products are already mobile, but connecting them to networks that will increase safety, convenience, and enjoyment is trickier. Here’s how MillwardBrown describes what is happening:

The challenge for auto manufacturers is that the auto market is unlikely to grow fast enough to generate the financial returns desired by old and new industry players alike. In consequence each manufacturer is attempting to carve out its own position in the connected world. Each is steering a complex path between efforts to protect its traditional, central role in the value chain, and opening up their platforms to third party technology and telecoms players that have their own powerful brand appeal for consumers.

The experts at MillwardBrown recommend that carmakers worry less about owning the customer and more about generating more customer value. They also tout flexibility in a rapidly changing environment and integration of the widest possible range of services. But, will automakers — and car buyers — pay the premium for having connectivity with the Apple or Google mobile ecosystem? That appears to be the key to growth in automakers’ brand value.

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