New name for Wright Express

SOUTH PORTLAND — Wright Express, founded in 1983 as a fleet gas card provider, announced Thursday it will now be known as WEX Inc. to better reflect its burgeoning role as an international provider of information management services and processor of physical, digital and virtual corporate card payments, including purchase, payroll, prepaid and gift cards, in addition to its core gas card offerings.

Following recent acquisitions – including a majority share in Brazil-based UNIK in August for $21.9 million and Southeastern competitor Fleet One earlier this month for $369 million – WEX Inc. claims 350,000 customers, representing 6.5 million cardholders. Currently based in South Portland, the company has more than 1,300 employees in the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and Brazil, including 620 in Maine.

“People even here in the state of Maine don’t always understand what we do,” said CEO Michael Dubyak, noting that as Wright Express the company was often misidentified as a freight or trucking company. “The new logo moves away from the term ‘express’ because that probably causes people to think differently about who Wright Express.”

WEX hired Neubrand of Westport, Conn. to manage the rebranding effort, but declined to say how much it paid for those services. WEX was already a nickname for company among employees and customers, said Dubyak. The “precision point” in the ‘E’ on the new logs in meant to reflect “the precision with which we do business,” he explained, while the credit-card-shaped background is titled, “because we see things differently.”

WEX recently made local news recently when it came out that the company had hired corporate real estate company Jones Lang LaSalle, a Chicago-based firm, for a possible move from its corporate headquarters, at 225 Gorham Road in South Portland.

Although Thompson Point in Portland has been touted as a leading contender, Dubyak said WEX has researched “over 20 properties” including in Scarborough.

“We are a proud Maine-based company,” said Dubyak. “Clearly, we are committed to staying in Maine. We are doing a thorough research – we will be very methodical and very measured, with a lot of care in terms of where we end up.”

WEX is based out of 72,336-square-foot building built in 2002 and owned by Longcreek Properties, but it also maintains two satellite locations on Foden Road and Darling Avneue.

“Our goal is to have one campus, with an environment that reflects our culture and our energy,” said Dubyak following Thursday’s press event. “We are a company on the move and we want to make sure that’s embodied in terms of how we present ourselves, even in our building.”

Still, WEX, which has a TIF deal with the South Portland good through 2016, could remain in the city.

“It’s not about leaving South Portland and we don’t’ know yet if that’s what will happen,” said Dubyak. “We are looking at opportunities. That’s all I can say at this time. We are running a process to see what’s best for us and we should have an answer to that in the next number of months.”

WEX Inc. has a market capitalization that exceeds $2.7 billion, the company said. It will continue to trade on the NYSE under the symbol WXS, where its stock value has jumped more than 70 percent in the last year, trading midday Thursday at $71.06.