Vodacom chief officer of corporate affairs Portia Maurice

Vodacom will soon have a fresh new brand and marketing image, TechCentral has learnt.

Though details are sketchy, it’s believed a new — or, at the very least, tweaked — corporate logo and identity are in the offing.

Vodacom has become synonymous with its green and blue branding and analysts says it will be instructive to see how much the group changes its brand. Could it adopt parent Vodafone’s bright red identity?

There are no plans — at least not yet — to change Vodacom’s name to Vodafone, says Portia Maurice, chief officer for corporate affairs at the SA cellphone group.

UK-based Vodafone, one of the world’s largest mobile phone groups, increased its stake in Vodacom last year when it acquired a further 15% of its equity, taking its shareholding to 65%.

Maurice says Vodacom management is planning to “rejuvenate” the organisation “across the board” next year, and this includes a refresh of the brand.

She declines to say if Vodafone’s branding will play a bigger role in the group’s branding identity.

For some time, Vodacom has offered Vodafone-branded services like Vodafone Live.

The plans to refresh the brand come in the wake of significant marketing investments in 2010 by Vodacom’s principal rivals — MTN, with Ayoba, Telkom’s 8ta with Heita, and Cell C‘s high-profile campaign with Trevor Noah.

Marketing and advertising guru Chris Moerdyk says “it’s natural” for Vodacom to refresh its brand and he believes the time is right for it to do it, to “put them in front of the consumer again”.

“Every now and then a big company like Vodacom has to do something to stay relevant,” Moerdyk says. “This is especially the case if you’re the top of the heap. You can’t afford to rest on your laurels.”

He says Vodacom is right not to change its name to Vodafone in one fell swoop. Even if that is the intention ultimately, it’s something that the group needs to consider carefully. “They’d need to take it slowly and make it a seamless transition. Vodacom is almost a generic word for cellphones. You don’t mess with a powerful brand like that.” — Duncan McLeod, TechCentral