Tim opens the dialogue with Kkr: the board appreciates the offer but asks for an improvement

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Last year it was (also) the inaction of the board of Telecom to scupper the possibility of a takeover bid by the American fund Kkr on the telephone operator. This time the board chaired by Salvatore Rossi and led by Pietro Labriola wanted to avoid a repeat of the same situation and, while waiting for Palazzo Chigi to settle a line, in this afternoon’s meeting decided to ask Kkr to improve its offer. From an economic point of view, of course, since the current one, writes the board of directors, “does not reflect the value of the asset”. The response in the evening from the fund was not long in coming and through its spokesperson it declared that it was ready to dialogue with the board “in compliance with Tim’s strategic objectives”. What does this question and answer mean? That after an infinite push and pull, a negotiation on the former monopolist’s network infrastructure began. That the parties are about to sit down at a table where the stone guest is the government, with its prerogative to use the Golden Power and the weight of the minority stake in the capital it owns through CDP.

In recent days, it was precisely the Kkr who had asked to be able to extend the validity of his offer by four weeks to give the government more time to evaluate its moves, but the Telecom board was still called upon to provide an initial evaluation in the interest of its shareholders, primarily the French Vivendi which is the reference shareholder. Well, the choice was to proceed with caution a a half opening towards the US fund, which is granted the possibility of accessing some “information elements” on the situation of Telecom in exchange for further information to better understand the economic part of the proposal. In short, if it is not really the start of a due diligence, we are close.

What is the government doing about all this? The formal start of a negotiation between Telecom and Kkr does not exclude the possibility of reaching a solution extended to a role of the state-Cdp in the management of the network asset, without prejudice to European and Antitrust restrictions. However, something has moved and for the complicated Telecom dossier it is the beginning of a new phase.

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