That gives AT&T the world's seventh most valuable brand among all company types and the most valuable telecom service brand, according to the survey, with China Mobile Ltd. (NYSE: CHL), Vodafone Group plc (NYSE: VOD) and Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE: VZ) next in line (see table below).
Table 1: The Most Valuable Telecom Provider Brands 2011
| Telecom service ranking | Brand | Value in $ millions | Global ranking among all brands |
| 1 | AT&T | 69,916 | 7 |
| 2 | China Mobile | 57,326 | 9 |
| 3 | Vodafone | 43,647 | 12 |
| 4 | Verizon | 42,828 | 13 |
| 5 | Deutsche Telekom | 29,774 | 19 |
| 6 | Movistar | 27,249 | 21 |
| 7 | Orange | 17,597 | 36 |
| 8 | NTT Docomo | 15,449 | 48 |
| 9 | O2 | 11,694 | 74 |
| 10 | Telecom Italia | 11,609 | 75 |
| 11 | Telcel | 11,558 | 76 |
| 12 | MTS | 10,883 | 80 |
| 13 | China Telecom | 9,587 | 91 |
| 14 | TIM | 8,838 | 95 |
| Source: Millward Brown | |||
The global list of all brands puts Apple Inc. (Nasdaq: AAPL) in top spot followed by Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) and IBM Corp. (NYSE: IBM). You can see the full list plus background information by checking out this link.
Other brands of interest that appeared in the Top 100 include Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT) (5th place), HP Inc. (NYSE: HPQ) (18th), Oracle Corp. (Nasdaq: ORCL) (22nd), Blackberry (25th), Cisco Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: CSCO) (44th), Samsung Corp. (67th) and Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK) a surprisingly lowly 81st in the ranking.
According to Millward Brown, Nokia's brand has devalued by 28 percent during the past year.
Surprisingly, Skype did not make the Top 100.
— Ray Le Maistre, International Managing Editor, Light Reading
I wonder if airtel might make the Top 100 next year following its move into so many African markets.
But given that China Mobile ranks so highly, which must be because there are 1.3 billion people in China who recognize and trust the brand, it's interesting to note that airtel or Reliance or Tata, for example, aren't in the ranking, given the 1.2 billion folk in India and the level of brand awareness of those mobile players even in rural areas.