Mercedes-Benz first among the most valuable brands again in the automobile industry

Ferrari has the highest brand strength of all brands worldwide

Tesla’s value increased the most year over year among all brands worldwide

For a few years now, Brand Finance has been releasing its report on the world’s most valuable brands, as well as the world’s strongest brands, and once again, Mercedes-Benz has topped all other automobile manufacturers on the list.

Brand Finance was set up in 1996, helping companies and organizations figure out how to elevate their brands in the eyes of consumers around the world. It publishes an annual report on the top 500 brands, and Amazon (USD$220.8 billion) has retained its first-place position, making history as the first brand to exceed USD$200 billion value mark. Google ($159.7B) leapfrogged Apple ($140.5B) for second place, while Microsoft ($117.1 billion) and Samsung ($94.5B) round out the top five. Positions six through ten are occupied by ICBC ($80.8B), Facebook ($79.8B), Walmart ($77.5B), Pingan ($69.0B) and Huawei ($65.1B).

In 11th place sits Mercedes-Benz, which climbed two spots compared to last year’s most valuable brands ranking with $65B value. As far as automobile manufacturers go, it beat Toyota (15th place, $58.1B), Volkswagen (25th place, $44.9B), BMW (30th place, $40.5B), Mitsubishi Group (35th place, $37.7B), Porsche (41th place, $33.1B) and Honda (45th place, $33.1B) on the top 50 list.

While most carmakers moved up or down a few spots, the biggest year-over-year improvement in brand value belongs to Tesla, which rocketed from 264th to 147th place thanks to a 64.9% value increase—the most of any brand evaluated by Brand Finance. Meanwhile, Mitsubishi Group’s value climbed by 42.8% and Honda’s value jumped 28.6%, which helped them both hit the top 50 ranking.

The research company also evaluates brand strength, of “the efficacy of a brand’s performance on intangible measures, relative to its competitors.” In that regard, Ferrari is once again the strongest brand on the planet, rising above Disney, WeChat, Sherbank, Deloitte, Coca-Cola, Tencent, Rolex, PWC and PayPal on the top 10 list.

Brand Finance also conducts a Sector Reputation Analysis in its most valuable brands study, which compares brands across different sectors. This year, the automotive industry came out on top with a score of 6.9/10, edging out tech (6.8/10), apparel (6.6), restaurants (6.6), airlines (6.6), retail (6.5), insurance (6.4), utilities (6.3), banks (6.1) and telecoms (6.0).

Last but not least, Brand Finance publishes a Brand Guardianship Index, which is basically a ranking of the best CEOs. Toyota is the best automobile brand in the ranking, with Akio Toyota at the helm. Takahiro Hachigo (Honda) ranked 15th, Martin Lundstedt (Volvo) ranked 62nd, Herbert Deiss (Volkswagen) ranked 87th and Guenter Butschek (Tata Motors) ranked 88th. The research company deplores the fact that there are only four women among the top 100—one of those being General Motors CEO Mary T. Barra in 79th place.