Swedish commercial bank „Swedbank” maintained second-place while cellular telecom provider „Latvijas mobilais telefons” dropped to third after placing at the top of the list last year.
Among other prominent brand-names earning mention this year are the popular rye-bread bakery „Lāči” (up seven positions to fourth-place) and joint-stock company „ABLV Bank” (with this year’s most improved showing, up forty positions from last year). The rest of the top ten firms included, in consecutive order, phone and cable service provider „Lattelecom”, restaurant chain and food producer „Lido”, supermarket chain „Rimi”, commercial bank „SEB banka”, juice and sauce maker „Spilva” and pharmaceuticals firm „Grindeks”. Dropping off the top-ten this year was the energy utility „Latvenergo”, whose reputation faces a challenging controversial deregulation of the electricity market already postponed until next year.
The contest was founded in 2005 to promote a socially responsible corporate environment and introduce new criteria for the assessment of entrepreneurial activity in Latvia, with methodologies developed by the „Nords Porter Novelli” agency in cooperation with the Riga School of Economics and marketing research center „SKDS”.
