BBH faces a new threat to One 2 One ads

One 2 One’s creative agency Bartle Bogle Hegarty (BBH) may lose its grip on the mobile phone company’s &£35m advertising account, following the rebranding of the network as T-Mobile.

Holding company Deutsche Telekom is understood to be considering using one agency to handle the brand on a global scale. Deutsche Telekom appointed Saatchi & Saatchi Frankfurt to handle the global advertising account for T-Mobile in July (MW July 12), but it is unclear whether the agency’s work will be used in the UK.

The German telecommunications giant acquired One 2 One last year. It also owns VoiceStream Wireless in the US, as well as Austria’s max.mobil. It operates a mobile network under the name T-Mobile in Germany.

Each market has its own roster of agencies, with One 2 One in the UK using BBH and media agency Starcom Motive.

A spokesman for One 2 One says that he did not know whether Deutsche Telekom would use the services of a global agency for the rebranding of One 2 One as T-Mobile in the UK. He says: “We have not been directed to use certain agencies.”

Marketing Week first revealed that Deutsche Telekom was considering rebranding One 2 One last year (MW November 9, 2000).

One 2 One is to phase in the T-Mobile brand from the beginning of next year.

Rival Vodafone is rebranding its mobile networks with the Vodafone name and France Telekom has plans to establish Orange as a global brand. On Monday, BT Wireless announced that the consumer brand for its mobile network BT Cellnet will be O2 and that the company will be known as mm O2, once it splits from BT.