By Elvira Pollina and Giuseppe Fonte

MILAN (Reuters) – The board of Italian state investor CDP is because of meet in a while Sunday to approve a multi-billion euro non-binding supply for the fastened community of former cellphone monopoly Telecom Italia (BIT:), three individuals with information of the matter mentioned.

CDP has teamed up with Australian infrastructure fund Macquarie to bid for Italy’s most necessary telecommunications infrastructure, for which U.S. funding agency KKR has already offered a proposal.

One of many individuals acquainted with the matter mentioned that CDP board members had been set to satisfy at 3 p.m. (1400 GMT) to approve the supply.

In current weeks, sources have informed Reuters that CDP-Macquarie and KKR have each set an 18-billion-euro ($19 billion) enterprise worth for TIM’s grid.

CDP’s supply would additionally contain TIM’s smaller fibre-optic community rival Open Fiber, which is owned by CDP and Macquarie and can be folded into TIM’s grid down the highway.

KKR’s proposal, which rises to twenty billion euros when together with a 2 billion euros earn-out, has given contemporary impetus to efforts to revamp TIM after the failure of extended talks involving the federal government and TIM’s prime two shareholders – CDP and France’s Vivendi (OTC:).

Each figures are under the 31 billion euro price ticket Vivendi has set to again promoting the grid, for which TIM itself has indicated a valuation of 25 billion euros.

The grid’s sale to chop TIM’s 25 billion euro debt pile and offload half of its 40,000 home workers is a predominant plank of CEO Pietro Labriola’s push to reshape the group.

The federal government of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has repeatedly mentioned it needs to win management of TIM’s community whereas defending jobs, however there isn’t any frequent floor inside the administration on the right way to proceed.

Below Italian guidelines, Rome has the ability to dam undesirable curiosity for property of strategic significance akin to TIM’s grid.

CDP’s bid is welcome as a result of it makes the sale course of extra clear, a senior authorities supply mentioned, but it surely leaves a number of eventualities open.

In its method, KKR has left the door open to involving a state-run entity as a minority shareholder in TIM’s grid, but it surely opposes CDP taking part in such a task because of antitrust points.

($1 = 0.9406 euros)