A branded sign is displayed on a Vodafone store in London, Britain May 16, 2017. REUTERS/Neil Hall

LONDON (Reuters) - “The future is exciting. Ready?”, Vodafone is asking in a new campaign it hopes will capture a sense of optimism about technology, an association mobile operators have to some extent lost in recent years to the likes of Facebook, Google and Apple.

The slogan, which replaces “Power to You”, in use since 2009, will be deployed in all of the company’s 36 markets from Friday in the biggest ad campaign in its 33-year history, Vodafone said.

“Technology can be complex, can be overwhelming and can sometimes alienate people,” said Serpil Timuray, Vodafone’s chief commercial operations and strategy officer.

“But at the same time we know that digital innovations have significant benefits for individuals and for societies.

“In order to express this point of view, we will be repositioning the Vodafone brand on the theme of future optimism.”

The new strapline has echoes of “The future’s bright. The future’s Orange” - a slogan that helped Orange establish itself as a new rival to Vodafone when it launched in 1994.

Vodafone, the world’s second largest mobile operator, declined to say how much it was spending on the brand overhaul, which also includes a new visual identity based on its “speech mark” logo.