Source: China IP News

Brand Finance, a British independent brand valuation and strategy consultancy recently unveiled the Nation Brands 2017 (an annual report on the world's most valuable nation brands). According to the report, with a value of US$21.055 trillion, the United States remains the most valuable nation brand in the world. China is second only to the US with a value of US$10.209 trillion. It is noted that China's nation brand value increased significantly by 44% year on year.

According to the Nation Brands 2017, China's nation brand value grew by US$3.122 trillion compared with last year. This figure is close to the entire nation brand value of the United Kingdom (US$3.129 trillion). Now, Chinese companies make up 50 of the Global 500 most valuable brands, increasing from 8 in 2008.

Li Shunde, a researcher of Research Institute of Law at Chinese Academy of Social Sciences commented, "Nation brand is a comprehensive reflection of a country's technological, economic and culture strength. Economic and technological power of a nation is closely related to its enterprises' innovative capability and brand development. Nation brand and brand building of companies go hand in hand."

Li's view was in accord with the contents in Nation Brands 2017. As Chinese companies constantly improved brand value, they picked up the speed of "going out". With more and more Chinese brands going out, China's nation brand value increased accordingly and had positive feedback on the building of national image and brand reputation of domestic companies.

The report found that in a virtuous circle, Chinese brands and the transformed national image of China as an emerging global power are reinforcing each other. China officially launched a working plan on China Made brand on October 12 this year. It will conduct work such as brand agglomeration, promotion, protection and enhancement with the help of global 57 trade facilitation networks. Chinese government is committed to promote the brands of Chinese companies to go global by using the nation brand.

In May 2015, the release of Made in China 2025 aims to constantly increase corporate brand value and overall image of "Made in China". China, in June 2016, also proposed an annual "Chinese Brands Day" dedicated to publicizing and improving the influence and recognition of famous self-reliant brands. "In recent years, a series of policies on brands have had positive effect on brand building and development of Chinese companies which is also conducive to their going out strategy. China's nation brand value won more recognition with more and more Chinese companies showcasing their brands in the global arena. In the future, China needs to improve its trademark legal system and policies on brands, promote the construction of an IP powerhouse in alignment with national innovation-driven development strategy so as to push the brand building of enterprises to a new high, "added Li.