One of the benefits of being at a well-known business school is that you have the opportunity to hear real stories from people in real companies. Today's real person was Guillaume Van Gaver, and today's real company was Orange.
Guillaume is the Business Development Director for Orange France, and came to speak about the challenges of creating (excuse me, "architecting") and implementing a continent-wide brand. Seems that "France Telecom" didn't play too well outside of France, so after buying Orange they decided to rebrand everything and flush the existing portfolio of mobile brands down the tubes. They had spent several years and billions of euros supporting an array of brands (Itineris, Ola, Mobicarte, France Telecom Mobile, etc.). All gone in six months.
This branding exercise is taking place against a backdrop of a crushing debt load of Euro 70 billion, resulting primarily from the France Telecom's Euro 50 billion purchase of Orange, in cash. Unbelievable. 50 billion in cash. The French taxpayers should be up in arms, because they are subsidizing Orange's rollout, but I digress.
I learned a lot in the presentation, because I know nothing about marketing, so much so that I am continually amazed that some company is worth 200 billion dollars from selling sugar water to the masses. The most important learning was that they wanted to move from being a "GSM operator" to a "Communication Lifestyle Facilitator". In other words, they didn't want to sell technology or hardware, but rather the promise of a better life. This is in line with other companies that we have studied and is something I find incredibly interesting. I will have to think of other places where this can/should be applied.
Guillaume said several really interesting things. He spoke about the relationship between Orange and Nokia: currently in the midst of a row because Nokia wanted only their brand on the Orange phones. Orange said no. Per Guillaume, "I hate Nokia. I hate what they stand for." This is a typical skirmish in the customer ownership battle between operators and handset manufacturers. It's a fascinating, raw, intense power struggle.
Interestingly, the only way that Orange could get a handset that didn't have a logo on it? Partner with Microsoft. Which doesn't come without risk: "Microsoft, it is like the devil. You don't know if it's good for you in the long run."
The most interesting question that anyone asked was about the name Orange itself. The student asked about their marketing strategies in the two places where one would expect some difficulty: the Netherlands, and Ireland. You probably won't see the Orange brand used in these locations.
11:11:08 PM 
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