Openreach is the UK-based digital network business that builds and maintains the country’s largest broadband infrastructure, operating as part of the BT Group while serving all communications providers equally.[1] Its visual identity has undergone two significant transformations since 2017, each tied directly to the company’s changing relationship with parent BT and its evolving strategic purpose.
Design and History
Until 2017, Openreach operated under a combined “BT Openreach” identity. That year, following an Ofcom ruling that required Openreach to become a legally separate company, the business began removing the BT element from its logo.[2] The revised mark kept the same purple wordmark and typeface for “Openreach” while dispensing with the BT name and a colourful swirl that had appeared beneath it.[3] Clive Selley, then chief executive, described the change as “a visual sign to reflect how we deal with everyone on equal terms.”[4] The company deliberately kept the distinctive typeface and name for consistency and recognition.[2]
Openreach became a legally separate company from BT in October 2018, with its own board and strategy.[5] Over the following two years, the business removed thousands of BT logos from vehicles, uniforms and buildings, updating 27,907 vehicles, 42 offices, 33,479 pass cards and 1,531 web pages, completing the transition a year ahead of its Ofcom commitment.[5]
A second, more substantial rebrand began quietly in late 2022 and started appearing on engineering vans in early 2023.[6] The new identity shifts focus to the “O” of “openreach,” presenting it as a large letterform split by wavy lines, typically rendered in bold dark green or blue.[6] The colour choice on vehicles reportedly relates to how the van is powered, with electric fleet vehicles carrying the green version and diesel fleet vehicles the blue.[6] The rebrand also introduced a new strapline, “The people that make the net work,” intended to make the company’s role in UK digital infrastructure easier to understand.[6]
Openreach’s own research had indicated that customers, the general public and stakeholders were not clear enough about the company’s strategy or purpose, which prompted the change.[6] The new colours were adopted to work “digital first” and to meet accessibility standards, replacing a scheme that had been designed for print.[6]
Meaning and Symbolism
The creative agency Smarts, which led the brand refresh, described creating the “O-Zone” by using the “O” of Openreach “as a fantastic portal to connect what Openreach did and the everyday situations they did it in.”[7] The agency also introduced Openreach’s first sonic brand, a sound designed to embody “the digital future of connectivity.”[7] Scott Room, Openreach’s Director of Brand and Digital, credited Smarts with delivering “a complete refresh our brand identity, giving us bold and ownable assets, and a brand platform to position us brilliantly for the next decade and beyond.”[7]
In 2018, Openreach temporarily changed its logo in support of Pride in London, a move the company said was intended to make a statement that its people “should be free to be who they are at Openreach.”[8]
Logo Index is an independent educational archive covering logos, visual identities and graphic design history. All trademarks and brand assets remain the property of their respective owners.
