World’s top social media giant Facebook Inc is preparing to rebrand itself with a new name next week, the Verge reported on Tuesday, quoting a source with direct knowledge of the subject. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg intends to talk about the name change at its annual Connect conference on Oct. 28, but the Verge published it could be uncovered sooner.
In response, Facebook said it does not comment on “rumour or speculation.”
The news comes at a time when the firm is facing increasing U.S. government scrutiny over its business practices. Lawmakers from both parties have denounced the company, illustrating the rising anger in Congress with Facebook. Today, a group of United States lawmakers said Facebook Inc cannot be trusted to manage cryptocurrency and asked the social media platform to discontinue immediately a small pilot of its cryptocurrency wallet called Novi, which was started on October 19.
“Facebook is once again pursuing digital currency plans on an aggressive timeline and has already launched a pilot for a payments infrastructure network, even though these plans are incompatible with the actual financial regulatory landscape,” the senators wrote in a letter to Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg.
“Facebook cannot be trusted to manage a payment system or digital currency when its existing ability to manage risks and keep consumers safe has proven wholly insufficient,” the senators wrote. The rebranding would place Facebook’s social media app as one of many products under a parent company, which will also supervise groups like Instagram, WhatsApp, Oculus and more.
It’s not unusual for companies to change their names in the Silicon Valley as they bid to expand their services.
Google founded Alphabet Inc as a holding company in 2015 to extend beyond its search and advertising businesses, to manage several other ventures varying from its independent vehicle unit and health technology to giving internet services in remote areas.
The move to rebrand will also exhibit Facebook’s focus on building the so-called metaverse, an online world where people can use different devices to move and interact in a virtual environment, according to the report.
Facebook has funded heavily in virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) and aims to connect its nearly three billion users through specific devices and apps.
On Tuesday, the company also stated plans to create 10,000 jobs in the European Union over the next five years to help develop the metaverse. Zuckerberg has been speaking up metaverse since July, and the buzzy word, first coined in a dystopian novel three decades earlier, has been referenced by other tech businesses such as Microsoft.
If you are not aware, many famous companies changed their name later with time. For instance, Instagram was first called Burbn. Google was first introduced as BackRub, Amazon called Cadabra, and FoodieBay later renamed as Zomato.
