Having consolidated a dominant Internet presence in
Latin America and Spain, the country’s digital conquistador has spent this month selling its new name: Terra Networks, S.A.
Terra, which means Earth in Portuguese, is an all-encompassing name meant to fuse the transatlantic interests of Telefónica Interactiva S.A. into one recognizable entity. The new company will continue to offer voice, video and data services to its 700,000 Spanish and Portuguese-speaking customers in Spain and Latin America.
“Until now we’d had great local brands names, yet lacked a global symbol of identity that would make us stick out on the Internet–a world with its own rules–as the leading company in the Spanish and Portuguese-speaking market,” stated Juan Perea, president of Terra Networks.
The Terra logo appears alongside those of Telefónica S.A.‘s Internet subsidiaries worldwide. Despite their Terra affiliation, services like Teleline in Spain,
Zaz in Brazil, Infosel in Mexico,
Telefónica.Net in Chile and Infovía in Guatemala will continue to use their existing names.
“The corporate image we’ve designed for Terra has three main strong points:
to demystify the Internet, appeal to diversity and, at the same time,
promote integration,” stated Thomas Gerlack, project director and general
manager at FutureBrand in Madrid.
Since the name change was first announced on September 30, a wave of Terra
television commercials has followed a similar approach, appealing to the
diversity of the Spanish and Portuguese-speaking world while vying to unite
more than a half-billion potential clients into one Internet family.
In addition to its country-specific portals for Argentina, Colombia,
Uruguay and Venezuela, the company plans to launch a service geared toward
the U.S. Hispanic community by year’s end.