The old line “pure” tech giants, pioneers of the digital revolution in the 20th century and thriving in this one, are showing rising tech stars the way when it comes to building and sustaining a strong corporate reputation, according to the 2019 US Tech RepTrak®️ study released by Reputation Institute.

Reputation Institute, a global technology-driven provider of reputation measurement and management services, measured the reputation of 43 nominated companies that are part of a technology macro segment, which includes technology device and product manufacturers, technology software and service providers and tech-enabled information and telecommunications companies. The companies were measured in the seven drivers of reputation: Products/Services, Innovation, Workplace, Governance, Citizenship, Leadership, and Performance.

Marketing Technology News: Nintex Drawloop DocGen and Adobe Sign Power Digital Document Workflows

“The largest and oldest tech companies understand that building and sustaining a strong reputation is a marathon and not a sprint,” said Isadora Levy Corbella, senior research manager at Reputation Institute. “While all of the companies in the top 10 of this year’s study have suffered their share of reputational setbacks over the course of their history, all have demonstrated the ability, time and time again, to take the steps necessary to recover and thrive.”

As measured in the 2019 US Tech RepTrak, which calibrated more than 4,900 individual ratings from an informed general public, the top tech companies leading the way in reputation are (in alphabetical order):

Adobe Inc.
Dell Technologies
Garmin
HP Inc.
IBM
Intel
Microsoft
Netflix
Samsung Group
Texas Instruments

While not yet in the top 10, a number of next-generation companies earned strong or average ratings in the study. Among these are GoDaddy, LinkedIn, Pandora Music, and Spotify.

2019 US Tech RepTrak Highlights

• With the exception of Netflix, the most reputable tech companies in the strong range of reputation are “pure” technology companies vs telecom or information companies.
• Microsoft not only improved year-over-year by nearly eight overall reputation points, more than any other company in the study, but it also achieved the highest rating in Leadership performance.
• Dell improved significantly as well, improving by 5.6 overall reputation points over 2018 in addition to leading all companies in the reputation drivers of Governance, Citizenship, and Workplace — the three pillars of Corporate Responsibility.
• Texas Instruments, best known for its heritage in calculators and education technology, led the way in the Products/Services category and had an 8.2-point increase in Innovation.
• BlackBerry, a leading smartphone supplier before the advent of the iOS and Android platforms, is working its way back up the reputation scale as it showed the biggest year-over-year improvements in Innovation and Leadership.

Marketing Technology News: True Influence® Launches Intent Data Feed for B2B Marketing and Sales

“It’s no surprise that Products and Services and Innovation account for over 33 percent of reputation in technology,” Levy Corbella said. “However, what we learned from the reputation decline observed between 2017-2018 is that tech companies benefit when they do a better job of tying what they sell to improvements in corporate governance. Ongoing issues around cybersecurity, employee activism, the gender pay gap, and labor changes have to be addressed with more transparency if the tech sector is going to continue to elevate its reputation.”

Marketing Technology News: MiQ Releases First-to-Market Real-Time Retargeting Capabilities Through Bolstered Partnership With Inscape