Altice may wipe out the names from Portugal Telecom and Meo
The French group Altice wants to embrace a global brand for all its markets. In Portugal, the group may only keep the brands Sapo and Moche.
Altice acknowledges they may extinguish the names of PT Portugal and Meo, the brands belonging to former Portugal Telecom, states the Portuguese newspaper Público. The newspaper also discloses that the company headed by Patrick Drahi is considering to take on a global brand which identifies the group in all its operating countries.
To Público, an official source from PT Portugal says no decision has yet been made, but mentions that embracing a global brand has been a possibility considered by Altice in their 2016 accounts report.
In the document, the French group mentions they are “currently evaluating the additional benefits that may accrue from the adoption of a global brand, which communicates more clearly Altice’s global strategy as an innovator, disruptor and a provider of superior next generation services to its customers”. That intention “may include harmonizing and changing existing brands in countries in which the Group operates to share a new global identity”. If a global brand is in fact adopted, Altice believes “this new brand strategy will be implemented by amending trademark license agreements in place across the Group or establishing new agreements”.
In Portugal, Meo and PT Empresas would be extinct. Excluded from the process would be Sapo and Moche, the communications brand targeting younger segments.
The solution could be adopting the name Altice for all the markets in which the market operates. It is stated in the newspaper Les Echos: “Regrouping everything under the same label is the most logic choice: it is an international name, easy to remember”.
