Google, Facebook, Nike, Amazon... and Starburst: The company rebrands Elon Musk hopes to replicate as Twitter becomes 'X'

Twitter is now officially 'X' as the social media platform undergoes its most significant rebrand. And it's easy to see why that might be necessary right now.

Since Elon Musk took over the platform last year, Twitter has been on a downward spiral. Its year-on-year traffic had a 7.7% decline in March 2023 and also, ad sales were down a huge 59% - according to the New York Times.

So we can perhaps see the logic in Musk wanted a dramatic rebrand. And that's exactly what he's got with 'X'.

But Twitter isn't the only company to undergo a major rebrand or name change like this - particularly in the tech world. We look at who Elon Musk might be trying to emulate here.

Marathon/ Snickers

In 1990, Mars took the major decision to rebrand its Marathon bars as 'Snickers' and its undoubtedly one of those cases where the new name stuck and just made sense.

Retro-treat fans were also lucky to see limited edition Marathon bars return in 2019 and 2020 at select retailers.

Not all rebrands have been as successful as this one, however. Some failed rebrands can be found here.

Opal Fruits/Starburst

In 1998, another sweet-treat staple was also changed forever. Opal Sweets became Starburst as Mars once again looked to freshen things up.

The sweets were renamed so its name matched up globally.

BackRub/ Google

In the world of tech, it's hard to imagine our daily lives without Google these days - or calling the company by any other name.

But that was nearly the case. Larry Page and Sergey Brin initially settled on the name BackRub for their search-engine. The name stems from how their invention used the internet's back-links to establish how important a web page was.

And thus the story goes that following a spelling mistake, the name Google was born and quickly added to the dictionary as it became a common verb.

Facebook/ Meta

As we await Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg to square up in a cage fight, the pair are going at each other in different ways. From Zuckerberg launching Threads to rival X, Musk has followed in his counterpart's footsteps with the rebrand.

Of course, back in 2021, Zuckerberg himself dramatically changed Facebook's name to Meta. This is said to have done because he wanted to move the company away from just being a social media business and into the metaverse where Meta has released new products to capture a market. This includes the Meta Quest VR Gaming headsets.

Cadabra/Amazon

The final tech company on our list. Amazon is a name familiar to all nowadays - but it nearly wasn't.

In fact, Jeff Bezos originally wanted to call the company 'Cadabra' but it's thought his opinion changed after looking up the definition of 'Amazon'.

The fact that it started with an 'A' in alphabetical lists was also a major deciding factor for Bezos and Co.

Blue Ribbon Sports/ Nike

In its early, humble days before it became a sporting giant that the biggest athletes endorsed, Nike had a very different name.

Phil Knight, who founded the company, started with the name Blue Ribbon Sports before an employee suggested 'Nike; in 1971. The name comes from the Greek goddess of victory.

It's fair to say the rest is history and the brand accelerated its growth in the 1980s with endorsements from athletes like Michael Jordan.