Vittorio Amedeo Colao (born 3 October 1961) is an Italian manager who has been serving as Minister for Technological Innovation and Digital Transition in the

government A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is ...

Prime Minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister i ...

Mario Draghi Mario Draghi (; born 3 September 1947) is an Italian economist, academic, banker and civil servant who served as prime minister of Italy from February 2021 to October 2022. Prior to his appointment as prime minister, he served as President of ...

from 2021 to 2022. From 2008 until 2018, he was the chief executive officer at

Vodafone Group Vodafone Group plc () is a British multinational telecommunications company. Its registered office and global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It predominantly operates services in Asia, Africa, Europe, and Oceania. , Vodafon ...

Early life

The son of an officer in the

Carabinieri The Carabinieri (, also , ; formally ''Arma dei Carabinieri'', "Arm of Carabineers"; previously ''Corpo dei Carabinieri Reali'', "Royal Carabineers Corps") are the national gendarmerie of Italy who primarily carry out domestic and foreign polic ...

, Colao was born in

Brescia Brescia (, locally ; lmo, link=no, label= Lombard, Brèsa ; lat, Brixia; vec, Bressa) is a city and ''comune'' in the region of Lombardy, Northern Italy. It is situated at the foot of the Alps, a few kilometers from the lakes Garda and Iseo ...

. He received a business degree from

Bocconi University Bocconi University ( it, Università Commerciale Luigi Bocconi, ) is a private university in Milan, Italy. Bocconi provides education in the fields of economics, finance, law, management, political science, public administration and comput ...

and an MBA from the Harvard Business School.

Career in the private sector

Colao started his career at

investment bank Investment is the dedication of money to purchase of an asset to attain an increase in value over a period of time. Investment requires a sacrifice of some present asset, such as time, money, or effort. In finance, the purpose of investing i ...

Morgan Stanley Morgan Stanley is an American multinational investment management and financial services company headquartered at 1585 Broadway in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. With offices in more than 41 countries and more than 75,000 employees, the fir ...

in London. He joined the

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...

office of

McKinsey & Co McKinsey & Company is a global management consulting firm founded in 1926 by University of Chicago professor James O. McKinsey, that offers professional services to corporations, governments, and other organizations. McKinsey is the oldest and ...

in 1986, where as a Partner he worked on media, telecommunications and industrial goods sectors and was responsible for office recruitment. In 1996 Colao joined Omnitel Pronto Italia, rising to chief operating officer before its take over to become

Vodafone Italy Vodafone Italia S.p.A. (formerly Vodafone Omnitel N.V.) is an Italian telephone company, subsidiary of Vodafone Group Plc. It has 30,153,000 mobile phone customers and 3,182,000 fixed phone lines, with respectively a market share of 28.5% and 1 ...

. He became regional CEO, Southern Europe in 2001 and joined the main board in 2002. After missing out on the CEO's job, taken by his friend Arun Sarin, and having a purchase of a Bulgarian mobile company blocked, he left Vodafone for Italian publishing company

RCS MediaGroup RCS MediaGroup S.p.A. (formerly Rizzoli-Corriere della Sera), based in Milan and listed on the Italian Stock Exchange, is an international multimedia publishing group that operates in daily newspapers, magazines and books, radio broadcasting, n ...

, where he became CEO in July 2004. After shareholder criticism of the publishing group's strategy and governance, he resigned from RCS MediaGroup following the company's board meeting in September, rejoining Vodafone in October 2006 as CEO Europe and succeeding

Sir Julian Horn-Smith Sir Julian Michael Horn-Smith (born December 1948) is a British businessman who is a member of the boards of a number of international corporations and an advisor to others. He was deputy chief executive of Vodafone until July 2006. Horn-Smith ...

as deputy CEO. Commenting to the Italian press in 2007 that he had no interest in taking the CEO's job at

Telecom Italia Gruppo TIM, legally TIM S.p.A. (formerly Telecom Italia S.p.A.), also known as the TIM Group in English, is an Italian telecommunications company with headquarters in Rome, Milan, and Naples, (with the Telecom Italia Tower) which provides fixed ...

, Colao succeeded Vodafone CEO Arun Sarin on 29 July 2008.. During his time in office, Vodafone sold out of the United States with a $130 billion exit from a joint venture with

Verizon Verizon Communications Inc., commonly known as Verizon, is an American multinational telecommunications conglomerate and a corporate component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The company is headquartered at 1095 Avenue of the Americas ...

and bought the German and eastern European cable networks of Liberty Global for $18 billion (turning Vodafone into Europe's largest broadband provider). In May 2018, Colao announced that he would step down as Vodafone CEO effective October 2018, and was succeeded by the finance director Nick Read. In July 2019, he became a special adviser of

General Atlantic General Atlantic (also known as "GA") is an American growth equity firm providing capital and strategic support for global growth companies, headquartered in New York, United States. The firm was founded in 1980 as the captive investment team for ...

Political career

In April 2020, Colao was appointed by the Italian government led by

Giuseppe Conte Giuseppe Conte (; born 8 August 1964) is an Italian jurist, academic, and politician who served as prime minister of Italy from June 2018 to February 2021. He has been the president of the Five Star Movement (M5S) since August 2021. Conte ...

as the leader of a special task force to handle the 'Phase 2' of the emergency for the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...

. He submitted a proposed plan in June 2020 that was largely ignored by the government. In February 2021, he was appointed Minister of Technological Innovation and Digital Transition in Mario Draghi's government.

Other activities

Corporate boards

, Senior Advisor (since 2019) *

, Member of the Board of Directors (since 2019) *

Unilever Unilever plc is a British multinational consumer goods company with headquarters in London, England. Unilever products include food, condiments, bottled water, baby food, soft drink, ice cream, instant coffee, cleaning agents, energy dri ...

, Non-Executive Member of the Board of Directors (since 2015)

Non-profit organizations

, Member of the International Advisory Council * European Round Table of Industrialists (ERT), Member

Personal life

Colao has been married since 1992. His wife and two children reside with him in South Kensington, Greater London.The MT Interview: Vittorio Colao of Vodafone, managementtoday.co.uk
/ref> Colao is a reserve officer in the

References

External links

Bio at Forbes.com

Bio at Bloomberg.com
{{DEFAULTSORT:Colao, Vittoro Amedeo 1961 births Draghi Cabinet Living people Businesspeople from Brescia Bocconi University alumni Harvard Business School alumni Vodafone people McKinsey & Company people