The Tim network, the surprise offer from Kkr and the government’s moves – Corriere.it

Over $400 billion under management, nearly 1,500 employees and consultants, supported by an army of 470 analysts operating in 20 cities in 16 different countries and producing nearly $200 billion in revenue annually. Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., better known as Kkr, one of the strategic hubs of big stars and stripes finance. The US fund does not have offices in Italy but has a light on our country and has had Tim in its sights for some time. In 2021, FiberCop, Tim’s secondary network, entered the operation, taking over 37.5% with the aim of proceeding with the replacement of copper with optical fiber. The deal was managed from London by Alberto Signori, managing director of KKR in charge of the infrastructure business for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Since then, the US fund has continued to dialogue with the telephone group. In November of the same year he came forward with a proposal to acquire 100% of the telephone group’s capital, but Tim’s board managed to reject it by proposing an alternative plan which envisaged the division of the telephone group’s activities between the network (NetCo) and services (ServCo). Plan set up by a new CEO, Pietro Labriola, called in the running to replace Luigi Gubitosi, who entered a collision course with Vivendi, Tim’s first shareholder who suspected a role for the manager behind the US fund’s offer. Who moves in Italy with the advice of Vittorio Grilli, former Minister of the Economy of the Monti government today under Jp Morgan, who would have studied together with the Signori team the offer on the network that today the council of the telephone group will examine for go and see the papers and find a definitive solution to sell the infrastructure.

The negotiation between Vivendi and Cdp

Kkr’s move came as a surprise while Cassa Depositi e Prestiti and Vivendi were looking for an agreement to proceed with the reorganization of Tim, of which the former has 10% and the latter 24.3%, with the direction of the government interested in create a national network under the control of CDP. It is the classic case of the two litigants, between whom the US fund slipped. The negotiations between the two major shareholders of the group went on for a long time, on two different tables. The first started in May last year with the signing of a memorandum between Tim, Cdp and the Kkr and Macquarie funds, which failed in November when faced with the impossibility of reaching an agreement on the sale price of the network to the Cassa. To find a square in December last year the government had entered the field by opening a new table at the Ministry of Industry and Made in Italy in which CDP and Vivendi were involved. There have been discussions with Kkr to probe the willingness of the US fund to support Cdp in a consortium created ad hoc to present an offer for the Tim network. The US fund had not given the availability. The talks between the two large shareholders of the telephone group went on until last week, but the solution did not seem close. And Kkr has therefore seized the opportunity to come forward with the offer for the Tim network.

Government moves

Reconstructions say that the government was notified of the Kkr offer on Wednesday evening. However, someone says that signals would have arrived a few days earlier and that Kkr would have knocked on the door of the Ministry of Economy led by Giancarlo Giorgetti to announce the offer, which instead would have taken the Ministry of Enterprises of Made in Italy by surprise, director from the table between Cdp and Vivendi on the net. What is certain is that the government has not stopped the offer that arrived on Wednesday evening on Tim’s table, which at this point cannot be considered hostile. It is also true that the work of the CDP, indicated by Minister Adolfo Urso as the subject under which to create the national network, was taking too much time and that in eight months of negotiations the Cassa had not yet managed to find an agreement to present the offer on Tim’s network. It is unlikely that he will now be able to return to the field. Various voices say that in order to safeguard the strategic interest in the network, the government may place another entity alongside Kkr. The names of Poste or F2i are mentioned, the infrastructure fund participated among others by banking foundations.