AT&T Inc.
Formerly SBC Communications (born Southwestern Bell Co.)

New:  Identity, history, name and logo

Launched:  November 21, 2005

Story in brief:
The Baby Bell finally becomes the parent, by acquiring the remnants of AT&T and adopting its identity (significantly tweaked).

Starting life in 1984 as Southwestern Bell, the smallest of the seven 'baby Bells' from the breakup of AT&T mandated by Judge Greene, SBC outgrew its siblings in part by acquiring two of them, Pacific Telesis and Ameritech. By  then acquiring AT&T Corporation, it would surpass Verizon, the biggest other Bell descendant, to become America's largest telecom company.

Ed Whitacre has reason to be proud of this achievement.  And it was time to rebrand anyway, to become a more global player; Whitacre had dropped the provincial "Southwestern" for "SBC" in 1995 but never really escaped it, and with very few exceptions initials are a weak option. "AT&T" is one of those exceptions.

I'll bet Whitacre, once an AT&T employee, always wanted to be AT&T. When the acquisition was announced last January, he said "The AT&T brand is terrific, and I'm certain it will live on in a way that makes them proud and us proud." Brand-bloggers mostly agreed it was the better name choice, but debated whether the 1984 Bass Yager globe (or its 1999 shadow) should also survive, or whether it would be more honest and effective to design a truly new "AT&T." Whitacre, apparently, made the call. I imagine he might have said "The globe is the brand, and it says what we want to say, but let's have a change event and while we're at it, let's make it friendlier. I don't want to hear 'Death Star' any more."

Credits:
C.E.O. - Edward E. Whitacre, Jr.
Identity counsel and design - Interbrand

First Impressions:
Strategy: High Pass, but not Distinction. The name decision, I think, was a no-brainer. Even after split-outs like Lucent and NCR, spin-offs like AT&T Wireless and other diminutions, the AT&T name retained greater luster than "SBC." And SBC has performed well enough to have earned that luster, so that calling itself AT&T is not unduly deceptive. (But see Fred Burt comment below.)

But I would have preferred a more aggressive design decision... courageously, and more honestly, a new AT&T.

Execution: When we see the new advertising (and animation), I suspect this mark will start to look better; the first impression, though, is not strong. It's certainly not a death star; but is it a sliced apple? a candy ball? A bit too friendly, perhaps. I, for one, want my telecom/internet provider to be strong, reliable and technically sharp. 

"Transparency" is a feature of the new globe added "to represent clarity and vision." A nice thought but perhaps more verbal than visual. Visually, in too many applications the mottled and shadowed see-through patterns are more likely to effect muddiness and confusion.

If you look at the three globes side by side (I chose the 12-line version of the 1984 globe), I suggest the clarity, vision and graphic strength of the original are still hard to beat.  In the new mark, the widening of the white lines no longer effects a highlight; they are arbitrary fattenings that can be understood only as allusions to a remembered mark. 

Other Comments:
Actually, the name decision was by no means a no-brainer. Consider that we would be bolting a $50 billion SBC residential franchise onto an increasingly business-focused AT&T brand. Not easy, and a significant softening in AT&T personality would be required. The idea of transparency, too, would help renew a corporate promise of dependability.  Fred Burt, project director at Interbrand

In the double page launch ad, the 3.25" globe had a barely perceivable suggestion of transparency that would be invisible to the typical reader. I trust someone is working on adjusting the artwork. Achieving the transparent quality at smaller sizes will prove to be even more challenging. The original design required involvement of the viewer to complete the globe; the new globe simply waits for you to pick it up. Perhaps Picasso said it best: "To know what to leave out is art."  Jerry Kuyper, one of the team members at Bass Yager who designed the 1984 logo

Elaborate rationales (transparency etc. ) can never justify a poorly executed logo. Typographically, at&t is busier than AT&T (ampersand nicely tucked in). The original design symbolized a globe, the new one is almost like a picture of a globe with a bad highlight and pattern. Rand, Bass -- they knew the difference between a symbol and a picture. I really don't understand where the basic principles of logo design have gone.
Errol Saldanha

The similarities to Red Dot (a German design advocacy) are uncanny. I'm not implying plagiarism, and as a designer I understand the challenges that faced the team working on the at&t redesign.  [But] are we running out of shapes as well as names? Aaron Carambula

The AT&T of Death Star I is not the AT&T of today. Contemporizing a symbol of past glory smacks of classic merger compromise. What is the new AT&T about? I'm left to wonder.  William Agush