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 A telephone company, also known as a telco, telephone service provider, or telecommunications operator, is a kind of communications service provider (CSP), more precisely a telecommunications service provider (TSP), that provides telecommunicat ...

with headquarters in

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus ( legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

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

, and

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

, (with the Telecom Italia Tower) which provides

fixed telephony A landline (land line, land-line, main line, home phone, fixed-line, and wireline) is a telephone connection that uses metal wires or optical fiber telephone line for transmission, as distinguished from a mobile cellular network, which uses ...

and

DSL Digital subscriber line (DSL; originally digital subscriber loop) is a family of technologies that are used to transmit digital data over telephone lines. In telecommunications marketing, the term DSL is widely understood to mean asymmetric dig ...

data services. It is the largest Italian telecommunications services provider in revenues and subscribers. It was founded in 1994 by the

merger Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are business transactions in which the ownership of companies, other business organizations, or their operating units are transferred to or consolidated with another company or business organization. As an aspect ...

of several

state-owned State ownership, also called government ownership and public ownership, is the ownership of an industry, asset, or enterprise by the state or a public body representing a community, as opposed to an individual or private party. Public owner ...

telecommunications companies, the most prominent of which was Società Italiana per l'Esercizio Telefonico p.A., (known as ''SIP''), the former state monopoly telephone operator in Italy. The company's stock is traded in the

Borsa Italiana Borsa Italiana, based in Milan, is the Italian stock exchange. It manages and organises domestic market, regulating procedures for admission and listing of companies and intermediaries and supervising disclosures for listed companies.italy24.il ...

. Since 2017, the Italian State exercises on TIM the "Golden Power", which allows the government to take a number of actions when the strategic interests of the country are concerned.

History

1925–1964: Stipel and early mandatory phone tax

In 1925, the phone network was reorganised by the Benito Mussolini cabinet and the company Stipel was established in the same year. The original core of Telecom Italia included 4 companies: TIMO, Teti, TELVE and SET. Each of them operated in a specific geographical area. In 1964, these companies merged in one single group under the name of SIP.

1964–1994: SIP - Società Italiana per l'Esercizio Telefonico

In 1964, ''Società Idroelettrica Piemontese'' (SIP), a former energy company founded in 1918, ceased producing energy and acquired all of the Italian telephone companies, becoming ''SIP - Società Italiana per l'Esercizio Telefonico''. It was run by the Italian

Ministry of Finance A ministry of finance is a part of the government in most countries that is responsible for matters related to the finance. Lists of current ministries of finance Named "Ministry" * Ministry of Finance (Afghanistan) * Ministry of Finance and ...

. SIP was a

state monopoly In economics, a government monopoly or public monopoly is a form of coercive monopoly in which a government agency or government corporation is the sole provider of a particular good or service and competition is prohibited by law. It is a monopol ...

from 1964 to 1996 and Italian people had to pay the "Canone Telecom" (a line rental charge of about €120 per year, plus hardware rental and other minor costs) in order to have a phone at home.

1994–2005: Telecom Italia, Telecom Italia Mobile and DSL services

Telecom Italia was officially created on 27 July 1994 by the merger of several telecommunication companies among which SIP, Iritel, Italcable,

Telespazio Telespazio Spa is a European spaceflight services company founded in 1961. It is a joint venture owned by Leonardo (67%) and Thales Group (33%) headquartered in Rome. Telespazio provides services that include the design and development of space ...

and Sirm (companies owned by STET). This was due to a reorganization plan for the telecommunication sector presented by

IRI IRI or I.R.I. refers to: Businesses and organizations * Iringa Airport, an airport in Tanzania serving Iringa and the surrounding Iringa Region by IATA airport code * India Rejuvenation Initiative, an Indian anti-corruption organization forme ...

to the Minister of Finance. In 1995, the mobile telephony division was spun off as TIM (Telecom Italia Mobile). Interbusiness, Italy's largest Internet network, was created and in the same period with TIN (Telecom Italia Net) and the first

ISPs An Internet service provider (ISP) is an organization that provides services for accessing, using, or participating in the Internet. ISPs can be organized in various forms, such as commercial, community-owned, non-profit, or otherwise privatel ...

internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a ''internetworking, network of networks'' that consists ...

access became a reality in Italy. In 1996, TIM introduced a new prepaid rechargeable phone card ( GSM), and one year later launched short messaging service (

SMS Short Message/Messaging Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile devices exchange short text ...

) capability. In 1997, under the chairmanship of Guido Rossi, Telecom Italia was privatised and was transformed into a large multimedia group. By 2001, the company was in debt and was acquired by

Marco Tronchetti Provera Marco Tronchetti Provera (; born 1948) is an Italian businessman. He was the chief executive officer of Pirelli & C. S.p.A. from 1992 to 2022 and its executive vice chairman since October 20, 2015. He is the chairman of Marco Tronchetti, Provera & ...

. The following year, the group released its

Flat service in Italy, Alice ADSL, with a download speed of 32 kbit/s and an upload speed of 8 kbit/s for €40/month plus a monthly based tax of €14.57, the "Canone Telecom", besides the mandatory monthly bills for home telephone numbers (a home telephone number was required for ADSL service). Telecom Italia Media, the group's multimedia company, was formed in 2003 from Seat Pagine Gialle, focussing its business on the television sector with

La7 La7 is an Italian free-to-air television channel owned by Cairo Communication. Until 2013 it was a pay-per-view channel owned by Telecom Italia Media and operated by Telecom Italia. Signal overspill means that parts of Albania, Croatia, S ...

and

MTV MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...

channels. After the reorganization of editorial activities, in 2005 Telecom Italia acquired Tin.it and

Virgilio Virgilio, the Italian and Spanish form of Virgil may refer to: *Virgilio, Lombardy, a ''frazione'' of the ''comune'' of Borgo Virgilio in the Italian province of Mantua * Virgilio.it, a website People with the given name *Virgilio Barco Vargas (19 ...

from Telecom Italia Media. The Telecom Italia Group also operates in

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the souther ...

; in Brazil as TIM Brasil, and in Argentina and Paraguay with

Telecom Argentina Telecom Argentina S.A. is the major local telephone company for the northern part of Argentina, including the whole of the city of Buenos Aires. Briefly known as ''Sociedad Licenciataria Norte S.A.'', it quickly changed its name, and is usually kn ...

Group. TIM Brasil has its local headquarters in

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the Rio de Janeiro (state), state of the same name, Brazil's List of Brazilian states by population, third-most populous state, and the List of largest citi ...

. Telecom Italia also had a 50% share in the Bolivian telecommunications company

Entel The ''Empresa Nacional de Telecomunicaciones'' (National Telecommunications Enterprise, or ENTel) was an Argentine state owned company which had the monopoly on public telecommunications in the country until its privatization in 1990. Overview It ...

until its share was nationalised by the Bolivian government in 2008.

2005–2014: Telecom Italia Spa acquired by Telefónica

Telecom Italia reported mounting debts in 2005, and, one year later, CEO

resigned. In 2007 the company was bought by Telco, a consortium of Telefónica and several Italian banks.

Telefónica Telefónica, S.A. () is a Spanish Multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications company headquartered in Madrid, Spain. It is List of telephone operating companies, one of the largest telephone operators and List of mobile network ...

owned 46% of Telco, the holding company that controlled 22% of Telecom Italia. In late 2013,

announced its intention to acquire the entirety of Telco by January 2014, potentially becoming Telecom Italia's largest shareholder. The plan, however, is being challenged by the Brazilian competition authority since Telefónica and Telecom Italia, with

Vivo Vivo or VIVO may refer to: Companies * Vivo (technology company), a Chinese consumer electronics company * Vivo (telecommunications company), a Brazilian mobile phone company * Vivo Class, a British company that sells a web-based rewards system ...

and TIM respectively, are the two largest telephone companies competing in Brazil.

2015–present: Rebrand

In 2015, Telecom Italia Group started a rebranding process of the telephony and mobile businesses under the single TIM brand. In the same year, the Board of Directors approved the new company's division, the ''Infrastrutture Wireless Italiane'', or

INWIT Infrastrutture Wireless Italiane S.p.A. or, in abbreviated form, INWIT S.p.A., is an Italian company headquartered in Milan, which operates in the wireless network infrastructure sector. With over 11 thousand towers, INWIT is currently Italy's ...

, which operates 11,500 wireless towers. It was revealed in October 2015 that shareholders

Vivendi Vivendi SE is a French mass media holding company headquartered in Paris. Widely known as the owner of Gameloft, Groupe Canal+, Havas, Editis, Prisma Media, Vivendi Village and Dailymotion, the company has activities in television, film, video ...

would raise their stakes further in the company from its current level of 15.49%. As of May 2017, Vivendi owns 24.6% of the company with Vivendi's CEO Arnaud de Puyfontaine becoming Executive Chairman of Telecom Italia. Amos Genish is the new CEO since 28 September 2017 and he has been criticized to have fired 4500 Telecom Italia employees in June 2018. He has been substituted by Luigi Gubitosi that became the new CEO on 18 November 2018.

TIM

TIM, formerly Telecom Italia Mobile, is an Italian

telecommunications Telecommunication is the transmission of information by various types of technologies over wire, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic systems. It has its origin in the desire of humans for communication over a distance greater than tha ...

company owned by Gruppo TIM. Founded as a

mobile telephony Mobile telephony is the provision of telephone services to phones which may move around freely rather than stay fixed in one location. Telephony is supposed to specifically point to a voice-only service or connection, though sometimes the ...

company in 1995, since 2015 it has become a brand that provides mobile,

, and

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a ''internetworking, network of networks'' that consists ...

services. 4G is available in 6,849 cities (96.3% of the country). 4G+ has speeds of up to 180–225 Mbit/s exploiting the 4G carrier aggregation which is now available in more than 600 cities including: Rome, Milan, Turin, Naples, Florence, Genoa, Palermo, Catania, Bari and Venice. 3G 42.2 Mbit/s is available in 4,282 cities (84.2%). TIM sponsors

Serie A The Serie A (), also called Serie A TIM for national sponsorship with TIM, is a professional league competition for football clubs located at the top of the Italian football league system and the winner is awarded the Scudetto and the Copp ...

. TIM has a subsidiary in

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

, known as TIM Brasil, with 72.6 million customers. The brand covers over 114 million customers worldwide.

Legal problems

Telecom Italia Mobile illegal charging money for "free" Internet providing renewals

Telecom Italia Mobile illegally charged money for Internet providing renew subscriptions for 5 years to its customers during the "free" subscription renewals.

Fraud in Brazilian prepaid mobile lines

On 8 August 2012, TIM Brasil became involved in a massive scandal in Brazilian news after the release of report by the Brazilian National Telecommunications Agency Anatel. The report points that on TIM's prepaid voice plan (24.7% market share), called "Infinity" (in which the user pays roughly US$0.12 for each unlimited time call), the calls were intentionally dropped by the company, forcing the customers to make (and pay for) new calls to keep talking. In just one day, 8.1 million calls were dropped and the total profit was approximately $2 million. Upon release of the report, the Public Ministry of the Paraná State filed a lawsuit against TIM asking that it stop selling new mobile lines in Brasil and pay a multimillion-dollar fine for the damages against consumers.

Operations

The Telecom Italia Group provides phone landline services and mobile services in Italy, GSM mobile phone services in Italy and Brazil through its TIM subsidiary, ( TIM Brasil), and

internet and telephony services in Italy and

San Marino San Marino (, ), officially the Republic of San Marino ( it, Repubblica di San Marino; ), also known as the Most Serene Republic of San Marino ( it, Serenissima Repubblica di San Marino, links=no), is the fifth-smallest country in the world an ...

. It also operates in international telecommunication services for other operators and corporations, through its subsidiary Telecom Italia Sparkle. In 2013, the total amount of the company's debt was about 26 billion €. Telecom Italia has 66,025 employees. Telecom Italia also controls

Olivetti Olivetti S.p.A. is an Italian manufacturer of computers, tablets, smartphones, printers and other such business products as calculators and fax machines. Headquartered in Ivrea, in the Metropolitan City of Turin, the company has been pa ...

, a manufacturer of computer peripherals and mobile phones. On March 31, 2014, Telecom Italia led both the direct fixed access lines market with a 62% share, and the mobile postpaid segment with a 45% market share. In the mobile “ prepaid” segment Telecom Italia owned a 31.5% market share together with

Vodafone Vodafone Group Public limited company, plc () is a British Multinational corporation, multinational Telephone company, telecommunications company. Its registered office and Headquarters, global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It ...

. After the merger of

Wind Wind is the natural movement of air or other gases relative to a planet's surface. Winds occur on a range of scales, from thunderstorm flows lasting tens of minutes, to local breezes generated by heating of land surfaces and lasting a few ...

and

3 Italy Wind Tre S.p.A. (formerly H3G S.p.A.) is an Italian telecommunications company of the CK Hutchison Holdings Limited group, which offers mobile and fixed telephony services. It began as a mobile telephone operator in 1999, with the name ''And ...

, approved on August 6, 2015, Telecom Italia is now the country's second largest carrier with 30 million customers, followed by

with 25 million customers. Telecom Italia has preserved its leadership on the direct fixed access lines market and the mobile postpaid segment.

High Debt Issue

Telecom Italia Spa deals with a total debt of 27 billion Euro as of the end of 2019. Moody rated the debt with a B1 grade negative outlook in 2015.

Environmental practices and initiatives

In 2002, Telecom Italia subscribed to the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmonizi ...

corporate responsibility Corporate responsibility is a term which has come to characterize a family of professional disciplines intended to help a corporation stay competitive by maintaining accountability to its four main stakeholder groups: customers, employees, shareh ...

initiative Global Compact. It is also member of a number of stock market indexes which include companies focused on corporate social responsibility, including the

Dow Jones Sustainability Index The Dow Jones Sustainability Indices (DJSI) launched in 1999, are a family of indices evaluating the sustainability performance of thousands of companies trading publicly, operated under a strategic partnership between S&P Dow Jones Indices and Ro ...

es and those administered by

FTSE Group FTSE International Limited trading as FTSE Russell ( "Footsie") is a British provider of stock market indices and associated data services, wholly owned by the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and operating from premises in Canary Wharf. It operat ...

's FTSE4Good. Its part-owned Brazilian subsidiary, TIM Participações, is listed in the

Bovespa B3 S.A. - Brasil, Bolsa, Balcão (in English, ''B3 - Brazil Stock Exchange and Over-the-Counter Market''), formerly BM&FBOVESPA, is a stock exchange located in São Paulo, Brazil, and the second oldest of the country. Its current form can be tra ...

's ISE (Índice de Sustentabilidade Empresarial) index. Telecom Italia promotes a

sustainability Specific definitions of sustainability are difficult to agree on and have varied in the literature and over time. The concept of sustainability can be used to guide decisions at the global, national, and individual levels (e.g. sustainable livin ...

strategy including both environmental and social issues: in June 2014 it signed an agreement with A2A to buy energy only from

renewable sources A renewable resource, also known as a flow resource, is a natural resource which will replenish to replace the portion depleted by usage and consumption, either through natural reproduction or other recurring processes in a finite amount of ti ...

References

External links

* * {{Authority control Mobile phone companies of Italy Telecommunications companies of Italy Companies based in Rome Telecommunications companies established in 1994 Italian companies established in 1994 Companies formerly listed on the New York Stock Exchange Privatized companies of Italy Italian brands Vivendi Bolloré