Brandtree

Brandtree in numbers

127 companies own half of the 3,368 brands on Brandtree. The other half is spread across 420 owners.

Every figure below is computed from the 3,368 brands on Brandtree whose owner is verified from a filing, as of . These are statistics about this dataset, not the whole market. Brandtree adds a company when its filings list its brands, so large owners are better covered than small ones, and shares here will run higher than a census of every brand would find. Licensed brands and minority stakes are not counted as ownership. The numbers are recalculated on every update.

Headline findings

How concentrated ownership is

127 of the 547 ultimate owners on Brandtree account for half of its brands. The ten largest own 10% between them.

OwnerBrandsBrands, as a bar
Unilever 🇬🇧 55
Mars 🇺🇸 42
Procter & Gamble 🇺🇸 38
Nestlé 🇨🇭 33
PepsiCo 🇺🇸 30
Mondelēz 🇺🇸 28
Coca-Cola 🇺🇸 24
Heineken 🇳🇱 24
Diageo 🇬🇧 23
Ferrero 🇮🇹 23

Brands owned from abroad

947 of 3,368 brands (28%) belong to a company headquartered outside the country the brand comes from. Countries with fewer than 25 brands on Brandtree are left out of the table.

Brands fromBrandsForeign-ownedShareShare, as a bar
🇬🇧 United Kingdom 264 155 59%
🇮🇹 Italy 75 42 56%
🇸🇪 Sweden 40 22 55%
🇳🇱 Netherlands 31 17 55%
🇪🇸 Spain 44 21 48%
🇳🇬 Nigeria 29 14 48%
🇲🇽 Mexico 48 22 46%
🇫🇷 France 119 54 45%
🇩🇪 Germany 98 42 43%
🇨🇦 Canada 57 23 40%
🇨🇭 Switzerland 45 18 40%
🇦🇺 Australia 63 23 37%
🇦🇷 Argentina 38 10 26%
🇺🇸 United States 1110 274 25%
🇩🇰 Denmark 31 7 23%
🇿🇦 South Africa 46 7 15%
🇧🇷 Brazil 37 5 14%
🇨🇴 Colombia 31 3 10%
🇹🇭 Thailand 30 3 10%
🇮🇳 India 62 5 8%
🇨🇳 China 73 5 7%
🇵🇱 Poland 41 3 7%
🇹🇷 Turkey 28 2 7%
🇯🇵 Japan 151 7 5%
🇰🇷 South Korea 62 2 3%
🇮🇩 Indonesia 60 2 3%
🇵🇭 Philippines 32 0 0%
🇰🇪 Kenya 27 0 0%

The largest cross-border links

  1. 56 British brands owned from the United States
  2. 51 American brands owned from the United Kingdom
  3. 28 American brands owned from France
  4. 28 American brands owned from Canada
  5. 24 American brands owned from Switzerland
  6. 23 American brands owned from the Netherlands
  7. 21 American brands owned from Japan
  8. 21 American brands owned from Italy
  9. 15 Canadian brands owned from the United States
  10. 14 Nigerian brands owned from the Netherlands

Where foreign owners are based

  1. 🇺🇸 United States: 162 brands from other countries
  2. 🇬🇧 United Kingdom: 96 brands from other countries
  3. 🇫🇷 France: 83 brands from other countries
  4. 🇳🇱 Netherlands: 70 brands from other countries
  5. 🇨🇭 Switzerland: 50 brands from other countries
  6. 🇯🇵 Japan: 43 brands from other countries
  7. 🇨🇦 Canada: 38 brands from other countries
  8. 🇮🇹 Italy: 36 brands from other countries
  9. 🇩🇪 Germany: 32 brands from other countries
  10. 🇧🇪 Belgium: 26 brands from other countries

Brands that changed owner in the past year

83 brands have a different ultimate owner from a year ago. A brand counts as moved when it is sold on its own and also when the company above it is bought, merged or split off. Where the dataset records no owner a year earlier, the list says so rather than calling the brand independent.

Consolidation over time: owner changes by year and how the largest owners built their portfolios →

Concentration by category

The share of each category's brands held by its three largest owners. Categories with fewer than 40 brands or 10 owners are left out.

CategoryBrandsOwnersTop threeTop three share, as a barLargest owners
Automotive 55 12 45% Stellantis (11), Volkswagen Group (9), Geely (5)
Pet care 47 16 43% Mars (11), RCL FOODS (5), Central Garden & Pet (4)
Restaurants & foodservice 52 19 42% Jollibee Group (12), Inspire Brands (6), Darden (4)
Consumer health 61 20 34% Krka (8), Reckitt (7), Kenvue (6)
Personal care & beauty 296 61 26% Unilever (34), Procter & Gamble (23), L'Oréal (21)
Home, garden & DIY 120 41 26% Corporación Favorita (16), Wesfarmers (8), Jerónimo Martins (7)
Media & entertainment 97 24 26% Disney (10), Warner Bros. Discovery (8), Paramount Skydance (7)
Internet & digital 193 56 17% Alphabet (13), Kaspi.kz (10), Expedia Group (9)
Home care 214 62 15% Arçelik (13), Procter & Gamble (11), Clorox (8)
Beverages 636 127 11% Heineken (24), Coca-Cola (23), Diageo (23)
Apparel, footwear & accessories 322 91 11% LVMH (13), Gildan (12), Richemont (11)
Food 1242 222 6% Mars (31), Mondelēz (26), Ferrero (23)

How old the brands are

A founding year is recorded for 2,400 brands. The median was founded in 1972, and 298 date from before 1900. The oldest:

  1. 1590 Cēsu Alus, now owned by Olvi
  2. 1615 Grolsch, now owned by Asahi Group
  3. 1629 Tyskie, now owned by Asahi Group
  4. 1664 Kronenbourg 1664, now owned by Carlsberg
  5. 1703 Mount Gay, now owned by Rémy Cointreau

Who the owners are

Brands by the kind of company at the top of their ownership chain.

Ultimate ownerBrandsShare
Publicly listed281984%
Privately held2778%
Family-owned1795%
Cooperative491%
Private-equity201%
Holding13<1%
Trust-owned11<1%

Deals

Brandtree records 287 completed deals and 12 that have been announced but not closed. Deal values are shown in the currency the filing gave; they are not added together or converted, because that would need an exchange rate at each deal's date.

Largest completed deals priced in US dollars

  1. $71.3 billion Disney: 20th Century Studios and National Geographic (Mar 2019)
  2. $68.7 billion Microsoft: Activision Blizzard (Oct 2023)
  3. $63 billion Bayer: Roundup (Jun 2018)
  4. $57 billion Procter & Gamble: Gillette and Oral-B (Oct 2005)
  5. $55 billion PIF, Silver Lake and Affinity Partners: EA (Aug 2026)

Largest in each other currency

Most frequent buyers

  1. Unilever: 17 completed deals
  2. LVMH: 12 completed deals
  3. Mars: 9 completed deals
  4. Volkswagen Group: 7 completed deals
  5. Richemont: 7 completed deals
  6. L'Oréal: 6 completed deals
  7. PepsiCo: 6 completed deals
  8. Authentic Brands: 6 completed deals

Waiting to close

Merger-control decisions

OutcomeDecisions
Cleared with remedies10
Cleared5
Under investigation4
Blocked2
Remedies varied1

All decisions →

What the numbers rest on

954 cited documents.

Source typeDocumentsAs a bar
Annual reports and exchange filings315
SEC filings306
Other official documents232
Company press releases77
Regulator decisions and court filings24

Download the dataset and check any figure →

Figures are also published as JSON. Quote them freely under CC BY 4.0, keeping "on Brandtree", or the equivalent, with the number.