Square, the finance behemoth, is changing its name to Block as of December 10. The company’s numerous businesses — including music streaming service Tidal, Cash App, TBD, and, of course, Square — will be unified under the new name, which has been in the works for almost a year.
This news comes only days after Jack Dorsey, the founder and CEO of Square, stepped down as CEO of Twitter, which he also co-founded.
We’re changing our company name so we can give the full @Square brand to our Seller business. So now we need a name to tie @Square, @CashApp, @TIDAL, and @TBD54566975 together into one. That name is “Block.” Why? https://t.co/vVSKNnMUU3
— Square (@Square) December 1, 2021
“We built the Square brand for our Seller business, which is where it belongs,” said Dorsey in a press release. “Block is a new name, but our purpose of economic empowerment remains the same. No matter how we grow or change, we will continue to build tools to help increase access to the economy.”
Block is also a homage to the company’s expanding interest in blockchain and cryptocurrency. Spiral will also be the name of the existing Square Crypto product.
“Block references the neighborhood blocks where we find our sellers, a blockchain, block parties full of music, obstacles to overcome, a section of code, building blocks, and of course, tungsten cubes,” the company wrote in a Tweet.
Of course, Square isn’t the first large tech firm to rebrand this year. As the business faced growing criticism in the press and in Congress, Facebook updated its corporate branding to Meta just over a month ago. However, like Square, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg believed that the Facebook brand didn’t adequately represent the company’s expansion to include products such as Instagram, WhatsApp, Horizon, and Quest.
In their announcement, Square even alluded to the time of the rebrand: “Not to get all meta on you … but we’re going to!”
Afterpay and Square decided to join earlier this year. Tidal’s Cash App recently expanded to allow minors aged 13 to 17 to establish accounts with parental supervision, and the firm is gearing up for a shift toward direct artist royalty payments in the coming year.
SQ will continue to be Block’s NYSE ticker symbol. There will be no organisational changes at this time, according to the corporation.
