France Telecom (NYSE: FTE) as a corporate brand may soon be no more as France's incumbent telco may change the name completely to Orange as early as the summer of 2012.
Citing an internal memo, a La Tribune report revealed that France Telecom intends to become known by the Orange brand at a corporate level by the time they hold their annual general meeting. Right now, the telco is in the process of changing all of its staff e-mail to the orange.com address.
If and when it does change the name to Orange, it shouldn't be all that surprising. Already, France Telecom rebranded its Internet, TV and wireless services from France Telecom to Orange in many of its territories in 2006. Later, in March 2009, France Telecom's then-CEO Didier Lombard said Orange would also be extended to the corporate name.
While Lombard did not specify a specific date as to when a name change would happen it was outlined on France Telecom's three-year 'Orange 2012' strategy plan.
For more:
- TeleGeography has this article
Related articles:
France Telecom, Deutsche Telekom establish telecom equipment purchasing partnership
France Telecom, Free enter rural FTTH pact
Cogent and Orange France fight over interconnection issues
France Telecom considers developing relationship with Google