Vodafone brand may come as early as in September

The Hutch brand may be totally replaced by the Vodafone brand as opposed to the earlier idea of dual branding where Hutch and Vodafone co-existed for some time.

Also Vodafone Essar is expected to source low-cost Vodafone-only brand handsets from Chinese company ZTE. The handsets may be priced at around Rs.1200 levels but there may not be any reduction of tariffs for cheap handsets.

Vodafone Essar may also hive off its tower business into a separate subsidiary just like other telecom companies are presently doing.

However, the crucial question still remains unanswered – what will happen to Cheeka, the iconic Hutch pug. Hutch’s boy with the pug has been a successful brand campaign in India and it is expected that the pug is expected to follow the boy in Vodafone’s advertisements too.

Update: The pug has been replaced with Vodafone ZooZoo Ads.