Government breaks up corporate behemoth, smaller companies fight during their mad-dash for market share, companies start buying one another and soon the founding member is no more…or is it? Gather round, my children, for another story from “American Capitalism: TelCo Edition.”
SBC Communications (currently awaiting federal approval on its January announcement that it would snatch up telecommunications pioneer AT&T) announced today that it realized the name SBC Communications is incredibly boring will take AT&T’s name once the merger goes through.
Yeah yeah, so it’s just a stupid name, right? Not really. AT&T is a serious brand, born as a subsidiary of telephone inventor Alexander Graham Bell’s Bell Telephone Company. Ma Bell’s innovations include the first transcontinental phone call (1915), the first demonstration of television in the U.S. (1927) and the invention of cellular telephony and the solid state amplifier (both 1947). Perhaps it’s stupid to develop some childish level of comfort with a brand, but there’s no need to argue about the value of a such a thing. Companies spend scads of cash every year promoting their identities, and SBC is getting an American brand recognized by millions, giving them an advantage right out of the gate, in addition to the company’s business partnerships, markets, technologies, etc. etc.
[From The New York Times]
sargent mayers you are tired