Reliance Jio second-strongest telecom brand in world, says report

Reliance Jio has climbed up to number two rank — up from fifth place last year — in a list of the top 10 strongest telecom brands in the world.

The list is by UK-based Brand Finance, a leading brand valuation company, and part of its latest global report on the world’s 150 most valuable telecom brands for 2023.

The rankings are based on a Brand Strength Index score which looks at various metrics that include evaluating marketing investment, stakeholder equity, and business performance. Brand Finance’s assessment of stakeholder equity incorporates original market research data from over 150,000 respondents in 38 countries.

Based on the scores, Reliance Jio is behind only Swisscom and ahead of Etisalat, MTC, and Singtel. Last year, it was fifth in the pecking order, behind Etisalat (in the top slot) Swisscom, PLDT, and MTN.

In 2021, Jio had hit the top spot but lost it in 2022.

The company has also seen its brand value climb sharply in 2023 to hit $5.4 billion, an increase of 6 per cent over the previous year. This has helped Jio to climb up from rank 32 in 2022 to 27 in 2023 in the list of the most valuable telecom brands in the world which was also released by Brand Finance.

However, Jio is still behind Bharti Airtel which is 21 in the list.      

An interesting development is that while Vodafone Idea might be facing serious financial challenges and losing subscribers at home, it is sixth in the list of global telecom companies which have seen the highest increase in their brand value, thanks to the government having converted part of Vodafone’s dues into equity.

Its brand value has gone up by 21.8 per cent in 2023 over the previous year. As a result, its ranking has jumped from 101 in 2022 to 89 in 2023.

Bharti Airtel chairman Sunil Mittal has won second place in the brand guardianship index of Brand Finance which measures how well the chief executives running telcos manage and grow their company brand.

Mittal was just behind Hatem Dowidar, the chief executive officer (CEO) of Etisalat, but well ahead of the CEOs of Deutsche Telekom and Telkom Indonesia, to name just two. As many as 250 telecom CEOs were ranked to choose the top ten.

Apart from these three Indian telecom companies, Brand Finance has also ranked Tata Communications —which has moved up one notch in overall rankings to 131. State-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited(BSNL) came in at 148, up one notch from last year.    

In the overall rankings of the most valuable telecom brands, though, India has a long way to go. The top ten list remains the same as in 2022 except that Vodafone Plc has dropped in ranking.

Verizon is top of the list with a valuation of $67 billion, followed by Deutsche Telekom ($62.9 billion), and AT&T ($42.9 billion).