Murotan went up and when I saw her reaction, I was like "yup, that's the one I was expecting...but aww, she's so happy she cried"
Maho went up, and just made me like her even more

Yeah, I don't get the name change either..."secure the future of S/mileage" yet "change the name when we add new members"
I hope the name change is minor, like S/milecharge スマイルチャージ or S/mileageShin スマイレージ新 (could be a play on with Shin meaning new but sumaire-Jishin meaning smiling + self confidence? maybe too vague)
Maybe what AyaKanon want is just to have some sort of distinction aside from "gen 1, gen 2, gen 3" etc and that they want to officially establish a group that's definitely going to be generational.
But starting over at Gen 1 feels is eh...
I dont know, I hope they and the staff planned this out well...it'd be a waste if they dont have a group name that can somehow connect back to the original group.