While the average age for companies in the top 50 was 90 years old, search engine Google is just ten years old and online auction site eBay, which was in at number 43, only launched in the UK in 2000.

With the internet becoming an increasingly powerful tool both in terms of work and leisure, internet providers are likely to become a permanent fixture in the top brands list. According to the national statistics office, almost 15 million UK households – around 61 per cent – had an internet connection in 2007, and 84 per cent of these had broadband.

Co-founded by students Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google was first incorporated as a privately held company in 1998. Its revenues rose 56 per cent to $16.6 billion (£8.4 billion) in 2007 compared with 2006, while the company’s net income was up 25 per cent year-on-year to 4.2 billion.

Other companies reaching the top ten in the Superbrands list include Microsoft (second place), BBC Worldwide (fourth place) and British Airways (eighth place).

And, although the BBC has slipped from first place last year, chairman of the Superbrands Council, Stephen Cheliotis, says: “British business opts for what it knows and trusts and as we head toward economic slowdown this is only going to become more important,” commented.

“The next year will put even the strongest brands to the test as they defend their organisations from the challenges that await,” he warns.

The Superbrands Top 500 list is compiled by a council of senior business representatives and an independent survey of 1,500 professionals.

© Fair Investment Company