Vodafone dropped Goldman Sachs and UBS as its corporate brokers this week, severing of one of the longest-running advisory relationships in the City.

Vittorio Colao, Vodafone’s chief executive, and the phone group’s board have chosen JP Morgan Cazenove and Citigroup as advisers, underlining how power is shifting away from traditional mergers and acquisitions groups to specialist brokers.

Vodafone built itself through a series of gung-ho deals around the turn of the decade with the advice of Scott Mead, who used to work for Goldman Sachs, and Warren Finegold, then at UBS, which culminated in the blockbuster £101 billion takeover of Germany’s Mannesmann. During that time, the two banks also acted as the company’s brokers, in a relationship that dates back, uninterrupted, to the 1990s.

However, under Mr Colao, Vodafone is pursuing an organic-growth, deal-light strategy, meaning that its relationship with its house brokers, who provide day-to-day advice on how the company is perceived by investors, is more important.

Goldman Sachs and UBS technically remain Vodafone’s advisers for mergers and acquisitions, with the relationships now handled by Simon Dingemans at Goldman and Simon Warshaw at UBS. But, in the absence of deals, the relationship will amount to little more than a consolation prize.

The company’s only pending transaction is its takeover of South Africa’s Vodacom. Vodafone is paying R22.5 billion (£1.7 billion) to take its holding from 50 to 65 per cent; it is being advised solely by UBS.

Of the two banks, UBS’s residual position is stronger because Mr Finegold, a former employee, works at Vodafone, as head of business development, running its in-house corporate finance team.

But there is no guarantee that UBS or Goldman will be used in future; in the past Vodafone has turned to other banks, such as Lehman Brothers, to complete deals despite the official relationship.

The new brokers are Charles Harman at JPMorgan Cazenove and Nigel Mills, a City veteran who built his career at Hoare Govett, before defecting to Citigroup.

Times Recommends

• Toyota recalls 437,000 cars including Lexus
• Myners says bonuses are bleeding pension funds
• Japanese company faked safety reports on seats