CenturyLink said that it would be re-branding by changing its name to Lumen Technologies. This change of name was implemented towards the end of the year 2020 which is a new stage for the company that has been offering telephony and internet connection services to its customers for years.
The History of CenturyLink
CenturyLink has been operating since 1968 and originated from the establishment of the Oak Ridge Telephone Company in Louisiana. In the subsequent five decades, Oak Ridge Telephone expanded significantly by acquiring many small LECs and ISPs geographically dispersed throughout the United States. It renamed itself CenturyTel in 2009 and kept on growing.
CenturyTel acquired Qwest in the year 2011 in what was one of the largest deals that year worth $22.4 billion. This merger formed the third-largest telecommunication firm in the United States with operations that span 37 states and catering to millions of customers. Soon after this large-scale acquisition, CenturyTel decided to modify the company’s name to CenturyLink to encompass a new national identity.
In the subsequent ten years, CenturyLink offered communications, entertainment, and information services to residential and business clients and networking and data hosting services to corporate clients. They also increased the fiber network density to over 500000 route miles across the world. Before it changed its name to Lumen Technologies, CenturyLink was one of the biggest telecommunications companies in America that had its headquarters in Monroe, Louisiana, and was listed in the S&P 500 index and provided services to millions of clients across the country.
Why CenturyLink Switched to Lumen?
In September 2020, after almost a decade as CenturyLink, the company announced it would be adopting a new name: Lumen Technologies. This rebranding was done to signify the company’s shift towards the provision of next-generation network solutions to enterprise organizations and to capitalize on new technologies such as 5G and edge computing.
Business customers’ needs changed over the years and, as a result, CenturyLink started focusing more on the aspect of advanced networking rather than residential services. Some of the areas they invested in were increasing their fiber routes, optimizing latency speeds, and expanding on edge computing services. The name “Lumen” signifies the company’s ability to offer services at the speed of light- as a provider of solutions that support the needs of the fourth industrial revolution networks.
This rebranding came with a new logo statement and vision for Lumen, which pointed towards their determination to enhance technology in their fiber network across the world. Managers said that this change had been under planning for two years and was more reflective of the future they saw for meeting enterprise requirements in the current technological environment.
How the Transition Unfolded?
In the period immediately following the rebranding announcement made in September 2020, CenturyLink slowly started to legally transfer operations, marketing, networks, and all customer relations with the new Lumen brand.
In a bid to celebrate the new brand of the company, CenturyLink performed the NYSE bell-ringing ceremony on the 10th of November in 2020. On the same day, the company’s New York Stock Exchange ticker symbol was also changed from CTL to LUMN in consonance with the new name.
In the rest of the year 2020 and stretching to 2021, customers started noticing the change of the CenturyLink name to Lumen across most of its operations. This encompassed website and mobile application interfaces, customer interfaces, marketing collaterals, service delivery vehicles, equipment, self-billed invoices, and other points of customer contact. Old email addresses and domains too started coming in shifts, as a part of the transition process.
The company wanted to keep the brand familiar to consumers but also let them know the company is shifting to a new model going forward. To close this gap with customers, when, for example, CenturyLink merged with Lumen, phrases such as ‘CenturyLink is now Lumen’ were frequently applied. Accounts, billing details, network service, etc. stayed first, which meant they only needed to rebrand the external aspect of the business units.
Almost every aspect related to operations that customers deal with is under the Lumen Technologies brand, even though the rebranding process was announced in early 2020. The CenturyLink brand might still be present in some aspects, but it is now entirely dedicated to fiber internet services and cloud computing for businesses such as Lumen. As the decades of history as CenturyLink now give way to this new chapter.
Conclusion
CenturyLink to Lumen Technologies in the last quarter of the year 2020 was a turning point at which this telecommunication behemoth sought to escape from its old tag. Years later after attaining national coverage and millions of residential customers through brands such as CenturyTel and CenturyLink, the company needed a new strategy.
Lumen captures the efficient adaptive networking and edge cloud solutions that they have shifted their focus on for the enterprise market in today’s digital world. This rebrand was synergistic for the business strategically in areas of high bandwidth fiber infrastructure and related digital enablers. While CenturyLink has fostered communication advancements in the last 50 + years, Lumen has started its new era of providing technological advancements for businesses in various industries globally.
Call (844) 340-6002 to get a new CenturyLink connection now!
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