MUMBAI: Hughes Electronics has announced that it has changed its company name to The DirectTV Group. In addition, the Company has changed its ticker symbol on the New York Stock Exchange to "DTV," from the current "HS" symbol. It has started trading under the new name and symbol.

The company's president and CEO Chase Carey was quoted in a company release saying, "The future of this company is centered on Directv. Directv will drive both our strategy and shareholder value going forward. Our new name better reflects our commitment to building our business around Directv which is the established leader in digital multichannel television service in the US. With more than 12.2 million customers, the Directv name and brand resonates with consumers and this name change reaffirms and reinforces that our future lies with this business."

The company's business units Directv, Hughes Network Systems, DirecTV Latin America and satellite operator Panamsat will remain units of The DirecTV Group. In conjunction with its name change, The Directv Group will have a new corporate logo. In addition, the company's Web site URL has changed to directv.com. Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation has a 34 per cent stake in the company.