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Opera Software ASA rebrands to Otello Corporation

Martin Brinkmann
Dec 18, 2017
Opera
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11

Opera Software ASA, the part of Opera Software that remained after the company sold the web browser and other bits of the consumer business to a Chinese consortium, announced today the rebranding to Otello Corporation.

A group of investors from China made an offer for the whole company back in February 2016 for $1.2 billion US Dollars but the deal did not get regulatory approval. The deal was changed, as is the case often when that happens, and a Chinese consortium of investors, Golden Brick Capital Private Equity Fund, announced in July 2016 that it wanted to acquire the Opera Software consumer business for $600 million US Dollars instead.

The deal was approved on October 2016, and ownership of all Opera consumer products, most notable the Opera browser, Opera Mini, but also other apps, as well as the Opera brand name, were now owned by Golden Brick Capital Private Equity Fund.

Opera Software ASA was not part of the deal which more or less meant the company's advertising business and other corporate assets. Opera Software ASA had to change the name of the company after a transition period as it was part of the deal with the Chinese consortium.

Today, Opera Software ASA announced the change of the company name to Otello Corporation on the official Opera Twitter account and elsewhere.

Otello Corporation is an advertisement and mobile company that runs Adcolony and the mobile application company Bemobi.

Opera Software AS, the company that makes the Opera desktop and mobile web browser, and the Opera web browser, will keep the names. Nothing changes for users of the Opera web browser name-wise.

The name change was part of the deal, and removes the association with the Opera brand. An indirect association remains however, as Otello is an opera by Guiseppe Verdi based on Shakespear's Othello.

The move does not change the fact that Opera Software AS's parent company is the Chinese consortium. Opera Software AS is headquartered in Oslo, Norway.

Now You: What's your take on the development?

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Article Name
Opera Software ASA rebrands to Otello Corporation
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Opera Software ASA, the part of Opera Software that remained after the company sold the web browser and other bits of the consumer business to a Chinese consortium, announced today the rebranding to Otello Corporation.
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Ghacks Technology News
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Comments

  1. Kubrick said on February 17, 2018 at 10:18 am
    Reply

    @jamesB
    Just out of curiousity,who do you trust with your data and why.?

  2. JamesB said on February 10, 2018 at 5:52 pm
    Reply

    Trust a Chinese company with my data? No way.

  3. Mike said on December 21, 2017 at 2:15 am
    Reply

    While I think it is more than fair to be cautious regarding the privacy of Opera (as you should be cautious with ANY close-sourced browser), I think it is also fair to assume that the browsers new owners did not spend over half-a-billion dollars to simply ruin the browser by injecting malware or similar shady tactics (even with QiHoo 360 being involved). I think as long as Opera is still being built/headquartered in Europe and a fair amount of suspicion is associated with it on the user’s part, 99% of users will be fine. Would I choose Opera over Firefox or Brave or other open-source browsers? No, but I don’t think using Opera opens you to any privacy risks that are not also associated with Chrome, Edge, Safari, etc.

    What I do think will happen soon enough is Opera shuttering it’s extension store. I have noticed that fewer and fewer extensions that are housed on the Opera store are being updated (uBlock Origin is at 1.14.16 compared to 1.14.22). Additionally, Opera has updated their “install Chrome extensions” add-on and pushed it to the forefront of their store (next to their adblocker) and on social media, Opera has been pushing the ability to install Chrome extensions with nary a mention of the Opera add-on store. Maybe I am reading too much into recent actions, but I would not be surprised if 2018 spells the end of the Opera store.

  4. jegg said on December 20, 2017 at 1:06 am
    Reply

    so who is going to play Iago?

  5. chad said on December 18, 2017 at 7:17 pm
    Reply

    Probably not good, although the new owner may have the resources to keep the browser at the cutting edge of new technology. The potential bad news is that they may inject a lot of ads into the browser

    1. chesscanoe said on December 20, 2017 at 1:30 am
      Reply

      The EULA for Windows 10 desktop Opera Version: 49.0.2725.64 (PGO) has not changed yet, but its chromium code is still back level to Chrome, so I will continue to use Chrome as my default browser.

  6. Jan said on December 18, 2017 at 5:45 pm
    Reply

    As long as they stay within Norway and Poland they need to apply to the countries law. But as always for every software you need to have a look what the future brings.

  7. crambie said on December 18, 2017 at 5:35 pm
    Reply

    It’s hard to know where to stand with Opera with the parent company having done some dodgy things in the past.

  8. viking teacher said on December 18, 2017 at 5:11 pm
    Reply

    Yes, Opera user for many years. It’s still the best browser, and I’ll keep a close eye on security and adware issues; I’ll jump ship if I have to. Vivaldi is coming on well but not quite what I want yet, and Firefox has improved with Quantum but I’ve been worried by one or two things I’ve read about recently.

    1. Luzandro said on December 19, 2017 at 9:02 am
      Reply

      I feel exactly the same way

  9. Jan said on December 18, 2017 at 4:39 pm
    Reply

    As long as there are no security issues I keep on using Opera.

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