Apple is world's most valuable brand, Samsung up to 8th

Tech companies dominate a new list of the world's most valuable brands, with Apple taking the top spot from perennial champ Coca-Cola in the respected Interbrand global survey.

The half-eaten apple is worth a staggering $98.3bn to the Californian company, according to Interbrand's analysis, up a whopping 28 per cent on last year. But Google is snapping at its heels in the number two spot, up 34 per cent to $93bn.

Other tech giants in the top 10 include IBM at 4, Microsoft at 5, Samsung at 8 and Intel at 9. HP, somehow, is at 15, losing just 1 per cent of its brand value, while Amazon is at 19, up a stonking 27 per cent to $23bn.

Samsung's also a robust riser, up 20 per cent to $39.6bn and climbing one place to 8, on the back of a slew of successful phones led by the Galaxy S4.

Sony's travails with Internet security have seen it slump from 40 last year to 46, losing 8 per cent of its brand value -- although it can expect to see a sizeable bump next year, after its PlayStation 4 goes on sale.

Nokia, however, took the biggest tumble, slumping from 19th biggest brand in the world last year to 57th. It lost 65 per cent of its brand value, down to a relatively meagre $7.4bn.

Despite much doom-mongering in the financial and tech press, Apple seems to have more than survived the death of Steve Jobs, it's clearly thriving. A spectacular 9 million new iPhones -- mostly the iPhone 5S -- were sold in the first three days it went on sale, up from 5 million last year. Not bad for a relatively minor update.

It's the first time Coke has been knocked off the top spot since Interbrand launched the list in 2000. The list is compiled by analysing how much money the brand makes and how important the brand is in generating demand, which is measured by surveys and "expert panels". Various financial criteria exclude privately held companies such as Mars, public organisations such as the BBC, and one-country companies such as BT.