International newspapers have also devoted significant space to the Poste–TIM transaction, starting with the Financial Times, which headlines: “Poste Italiane launches €10.8 billion bid for Telecom Italia.” The article reports that Poste “has unveiled a €10.8bn cash and stock bid for Telecom Italia that could transform the country’s telecoms industry. The company said it was offering €0.167 in cash plus 0.0218 newly issued Poste Italiane shares for each Telecom Italia share. This represents a 9 per cent premium to Telecom Italia’s closing share price on Friday.” the FT concludes. France’s Le Figaro reports in its headline that “Poste Italiane launches a €10.8 billion takeover bid for historic operator TIM,” adding that “nearly three decades after its privatisation, the Italian State is preparing to regain full control of the historic telecommunications operator TIM.” Thus, “thanks to a takeover bid launched by Poste Italiane, which is under its control and had already become the main shareholder in the telephone operator following the agreement reached with Vivendi in 2025, the Italian government is safeguarding the national future of the group, which feared it might fall into foreign hands.”
Poste’s expansion
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung analyses that “after the acquisition, the combined group is expected to have more than 150,000 employees and generate revenues of nearly €27 billion. Earnings before interest and taxes are estimated at €4.8 billion. According to Poste, the transaction would represent ‘a natural development of its strategy’.” As elsewhere, traditional postal traffic has declined in Italy as well – FAZ observes – but “Poste Italiane has expanded particularly aggressively into other sectors. Today, in an Italian post office it is possible, for example, to sign electricity and gas contracts, apply for a residence permit, obtain insurance and other financial services, as well as become a mobile telephony customer. As an operator without its own network, Poste had previously partnered with Vodafone. However, at the end of February it shifted its partnership to TIM – a sign of the imminent acquisition of the Italian telecommunications group.”
Analysts’ views
Finally, the German business daily Handelsblatt reports analysts’ comments, stating that “according to Mediobanca Research, the transaction is ‘in line with Poste’s long-term strategy’ to build an integrated operator leading in financial, insurance, logistics, telecommunications and digital services. The platform model would be strengthened through integration with TIM, fostering synergies between networks and cloud and opening up new growth opportunities. Analysts at Bank of America also consider the expected synergies realistic: Poste records higher margins in the corporate segment and in services for the public sector than TIM, almost double. This factor explains much of the revenue synergies, together with cross-selling and the migration of Poste Mobile’s five million customers onto TIM’s infrastructure.”
