A new survey shows that Google has ended Apple's reign as the most valuable global brand and is now Number One with a value of about 159 billion US dollars. Meanwhile, China's Tencent is emerging as the world's fastest rising brand. Martina Fuchs reports.

Today's 2014 BrandZ top 100 most valuable global brands report says that Google easily passed Apple to end the company's three-year reign as king of the business hill. Google now is worth about 159 billion US Dollars. That's an increase of 40 percent year-on-year. Apple, meanwhile, saw its value diminish 20 percent to 148 billion dollars.

Tencent, the Chinese social network and internet portal, led theBrandZ list of fastest risers with a 97 percent jump in brand value. Tecent also overtook China Mobile as Asia's most valuable brand and almost doubled its value to $54 billion as it rose to No. 14 globally.

Search engine Baidu appreciated 46 percent, indicating the growing influence of Chinese brands. And globally, Facebook was the second fastest riser with its brand value jumping by almost 70 percent.

The combined brand value of the BrandZ Global Top 100 has almost doubled in eight years, since its launch in 2006.

The 2014 edition reveals that the total 100 brands increased 12 percent in value to $2.9 trillion, following a 7 percent rise last year.

The report by global research agency Millward Brown is based on data from 150,000 interviews with consumers from around the world.

Among categories, apparel led in overall brand value growth with a 29 percent rise. The Top 10 apparel brands include such names as Uniqlo, Nike and Adidas.

China now has 11 brands in the top 100, and continues to have the largest representation in Asia. But the report says, Chinese brands should not be complacent because the competition is surely not sleeping. Especially, big SOE brands should become more market-oriented.

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