MTN (brand value up 49% to US$4.0 billion) has retained the number one place on the ranking of the most valuable African brands in the world. Apart from telecommunications, the leading brand has diversified its services into fintech and mobile money across Africa. MTN’s Mobile Money (MoMo) application is performing exceedingly well and overtook its competition M-Pesa (brand value up 32% to US$246 million) by Safaricom in terms of volume of financial transactions through the application with a loyal customer base of 57 million active users.

African brands have benefited significantly from adapting to uncertain business conditions caused by COVID-19 by leveraging technological disruption to tackle supply chain issues and national lockdowns.

Brands from diverse sectors including banking, telecommunications and food & beverage found innovative ways to connect with the customers online.

This digital transformation helped the top brands in Africa achieve a 28% increase in aggregate brand value to US$50.1 billion. Building strong brands across Africa fuels growth in the economy which is creating more dynamic jobs in the long-term.