by Elvira Pollina and Giselda Vagnoni
MILAN (Reuters) – Telecom Italia (TIM) board chairman Salvatore Rossi will not seek a new term as head of the telecommunications group when his current term expires next year, the executive said to Reuters on Wednesday.
Salvatore Rossi’s decision comes after TIM approved the sale of its fixed telephone network for 19 billion euros to the American fund KKR, an operation opposed by TIM’s main investor, the French group Vivendi, which is expected to challenge it in court.
Former head of the Central Bank of Italy, he will inform administrators of his plans on Thursday, according to a source familiar with the matter.
The outgoing board of directors will then begin to establish a list of candidates which will be put to a shareholder vote at the company’s annual general meeting in April.
Aged 74, Salvatore Rossi, who has chaired the board of directors of TIM since 2019, faced opposition from Vivendi on governance issues. The French group has sought to replace him on several occasions.
Vivendi, which owns a 24% stake in TIM, has described as illegal the sale of TIM’s landline network, backed by the Italian government and presented by chief executive Pietro Labriolade as a historic operation aimed at reducing the company’s debt. band.
The French group is expected to file a complaint with a Milan court on Friday to challenge the deal, said two other sources, who declined to be named because the deliberations are confidential.
According to Vivendi, shareholders who are not satisfied with the network sale agreement should be compensated and the finalization of the transaction should be suspended until judges rule on the case, the sources said.
(Reporting Elvira Pollina and Giselda Vagnoni; French version Diana Mandiá, edited by Blandine Hénault)
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