Wanadoo was the

Internet service provider An Internet service provider (ISP) is an organization that provides a myriad of services related to accessing, using, managing, or participating in the Internet. ISPs can be organized in various forms, such as commercial, community-owned, no ...

division of

Orange S.A. Orange S.A. (; formerly , stylised as france telecom) is a French multinational telecommunications corporation founded in 1988 and headquartered in Issy-les-Moulineaux, near Paris. ''Orange'' has been the corporation's main brand for mobile, ...

It operated in

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

, the

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, the

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Morocco Morocco, officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It has coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to Algeria–Morocc ...

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Lebanon Lebanon, officially the Republic of Lebanon, is a country in the Levant region of West Asia. Situated at the crossroads of the Mediterranean Basin and the Arabian Peninsula, it is bordered by Syria to the north and east, Israel to the south ...

and

Jordan Jordan, officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, is a country in the Southern Levant region of West Asia. Jordan is bordered by Syria to the north, Iraq to the east, Saudi Arabia to the south, and Israel and the occupied Palestinian ter ...

. It ceased to operate as a worldwide brand on 1 June 2006, when it was rebranded as Orange. The origin of the name Wanadoo is subject to some controversy, as some maintain it came about in the late 1990s when many internet companies chose to compete by creating "

Yahoo! Yahoo (, styled yahoo''!'' in its logo) is an American web portal that provides the search engine Yahoo Search and related services including My Yahoo, Yahoo Mail, Yahoo News, Yahoo Finance, Yahoo Sports, y!entertainment, yahoo!life, and its a ...

"-sounding names. However, it might be that the name Wanadoo first appeared in an internal project at France Télécom, much in line with a number of other such projects such as

France Animation MoonScoop S.A. also known as the MoonScoop Group was a French television production company and animation company that created and published animated television series. Its corporate headquarters were located in Paris, France, along with offices ...

until 2003, Intranoo, Tatoo, Netatoo and @noo. Wanadoo was floated on the stock market on 18 July 2000. In 2000, Wanadoo also took over the major British ISP

Freeserve Freeserve was a British Internet service provider, which was founded in 1998. At its height, the company became a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index, before merging into the Wanadoo group in 2001. It then became a subsidiary of France Telecom, ...

, which had previously been part of the Dixons Group. Following the buy-out, Freeserve maintained its own branding for a while before finally changing to the Wanadoo name on 28 April 2004. In the early 2000 Wanadoo expanded into the games industry by purchasing Index+. Wanadoo integrated Index+ into its new games division, Wanadoo Edition. On 30 September 2003,Adventuregamers.com
Microids takes over Wanadoo's games division Wanadoo Edition was integrated into MC2 France and from this deal Wanadoo also became a 12% shareholder of

Microïds Microids (formerly Microïds) is a French video game developer and publisher based in Paris. Founded in 1985 by Elliot Grassiano, it attained early success with games published through Loriciel in France and other partners (including Activisio ...

Orange rebranding

Wanadoo changed to

Orange Orange most often refers to: *Orange (fruit), the fruit of the tree species '' Citrus'' × ''sinensis'' ** Orange blossom, its fragrant flower ** Orange juice *Orange (colour), the color of an orange fruit, occurs between red and yellow in the vi ...

on 1 June 2006 to simplify branding by France Télécom: this merging of companies has created a single brand offering mobile telecommunications and internet services.

References

External links

Wanadoo
(Archive) {{Authority control Companies formerly listed on the London Stock Exchange Companies formerly listed on Euronext Paris Internet service providers of France Orange S.A.