Re-branding of AIG

Extract from a 23/3/09 Reuters article By Lilla Zuill.

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A spokesman said the company had decided to replace the large AIG sign -- outside the entrance to its property-casualty offices -- as part of its plan to change that operation's name to AIU Holdings Ltd.

The AIG name has become even more tarnished in the past week, after a scandal erupted over bonuses to executives of a controversial financial products unit that caused much of the $100 billion in losses over the past year.

A rebranding to distance the giant insurer's sprawling operations across 130 countries away from the AIG name are likely to continue.

"I think the AIG name is so thoroughly wounded and disgraced that we're probably going to have to change it," Liddy told a U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee last Wednesday.

Since AIG's bailout last September, other of the company's businesses have also rebranded, in most cases returning to earlier names.
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The AIG name used to carry a lot of brand equity. It has since become pariah, with many of its units disassociating from it and dropping the use of its name. In Singapore, AHA (American Home Assurance Compnay) has decided to use its own registered name, without any more reference to its parent AIG, or rather AIU Holdings Ltd.

My view is that they should use a totally unrelated name altogether; much like the renaming of Citiraya to Centillion Environment and Recycling" here in Singapore. Now, how many people in Singapore would remember that Centillion was actually Citiraya?