Vivo (telecommunications company)

Vivo (Portuguese for 'Alive'), is a brand of Telefônica Brasil, a subsidiary of Telefónica and the largest telecommunications company in Brazil. It is headquartered in the Brooklin Novo neighborhood of São Paulo.

Not to be confused with Vivo (technology company), a Chinese technology company.
Telefônica Brasil S.A.
TypeBrand of Telefônica Brasil
IndustryTelecommunications
Founded1993 (launched as Telesp Celular)
13 April 2003 (launched as Vivo brand)
HeadquartersSão Paulo, Brazil
Key people
Christian Gebara (CEO)
Casseim Yusri (30 Oct 2019)
ProductsFixed, mobile, Internet, Television
OwnerTelefônica Brasil (subsidiary of Telefónica)

History

The company was originally formed as part of Telebrás, the state-owned telecom monopoly at the time. In 1998, Telebrás was demerged and privatized. Telefónica bought Telesp, the São Paulo division, and rebranded it to Telefónica. On 15 April 2012, all Telefónica services were rebranded again to Vivo, using the same strategy of unifying all its services in a unique brand, like Movistar (Hispanic America and Spain) and O2 (rest of Europe).

Merged companies

The following operators merged to form Vivo:

Owned by Telefónica

Owned by Portugal Telecom

Acquired by the joint venture

New operations in the Northeast region

Vivo brand
Vivo building in Rio de Janeiro.

The Vivo brand was launched on 13 April 2003, as a mobile phone service provider. It's the largest provider in Brazil with over 76 million users.[1] It originated from the merger of several Brazilian mobile phone operations under a joint-venture owned equally by Portugal Telecom (PT) and Spain's Telefónica. Until 2006, the group was composed of six holding companies which, as announced in November 2005, merged into a single holding company, "Vivo Participações". The operation was concluded on 22 February 2006. In July 2010, Telefónica bought PT's shares.[2][3]

Today Vivo operates an UMTS, 3G networks and band 7 4G LTE in major cities. Initially, the network was based on analog AMPS (IS-95) and parts (resulting from acquisition of other companies), using TDMA (IS-136). These are all being converted to GSM since 2006, when, after years being the only CDMA network, Vivo announced a GSM network, and that it would operate in both CDMA and GSM.[4] The CDMA network was gradually converted to CDMA2000 in the major cities. The CDMA network was discontinued in November 2012.[5]

Vivo brands
Vivo Store in Rio de Janeiro.

Vivo owns the following brands:

  • Vivo Móvel (mobile service)
  • Vivo Fixo (landline service, formerly Telefônica)
  • Vivo Internet
    • Vivo Internet Fixa (ADSL broadband, formerly Speedy)
    • Vivo Internet Plus (Cable broadband, formerly Ajato and Vivo Speedy)
    • Vivo Internet Fibra (FTTH broadband)
  • Vivo TV (satellite television, formerly Telefônica TV Digital)
    • Vivo TV Plus (cable television, formerly TVA)
    • Vivo TV Fibra (FTTH television service)

See also

References
  1. "Com 763 milhões de cliente, Vivo lidera mercado com 288 de participação". Folha de S.Paulo (in Portuguese). 20 May 2013. Archived from the original on 27 May 2017.
  2. Woolls, Daniel (28 July 2010). "Telefonica: new deal with PT to buy Brazil's Vivo". The Seattle Times.
  3. Paul Tobin; Anabela Reis (28 July 2010). "Telefonica Agrees to Buy Vivo Stake for $9.8 Billion". Bloomberg.
  4. "O que muda com a ida da Vivo para o GSM" (in Portuguese). Retrieved 18 May 2007.
  5. "Comunicado Vivo". Vivo (in Portuguese). 2013-12-25. Archived from the original on 25 December 2013. Retrieved 2019-04-03.
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