MILAN (Reuters) – The board of Telecom Italia on Sunday unanimously voted to give the phone group’s CEO and chairman a mandate to explore how “attractive and concrete” a possible takeover bid by U.S. fund KKR is, two people close to the matter said.
TIM CEO Pietro Labriola and Chairman Salvatore Rossi have also been tasked by the board of Italy’s biggest phone company with negotiating with the New York-based fund the scope of a due diligence KKR had requested when it first filed its bid in November, the sources said.
TIM, which lost its fourth CEO in six years a week after receiving KKR’s 10.8 billion euro ($11.8 billion) non-binding bid, has yet to officially respond to the fund’s approach.
KKR aims to secure control of the debt-laden former phone monopoly, delist it and attempt to relaunch it by carving out its network infrastructure assets, sources have previously said.
Labriola, whose appointment has been sponsored by TIM’s largest investor Vivendi which deems KKR’s initial offer as too low, has presented an alternative plan to KKR’s proposal also centred on separating network assets from TIM’s services arm.
(Reporting by Elvira Pollina; Editing by Valentina Za and Silvia Aloisi)
