1921–1940s: Company beginnings The origins of Italtel trace back to the
Società Italiana Siemens per Impianti ("Siemens Italian Company for Electrical Plants"), the Italian branch of German
Siemens AG, founded in
Milan on 5 December 1898. After
World War I, on 21 July 1921, the company name changed to
Siemens Società Anonima (Siemens S.A., "Siemens Anonymous Society"), with Giovanni Giamminola as the first CEO. Siemens S.A. is usually considered the first incarnation of Italtel. In 1942, Isaria, OLAP and other small companies were merged with Siemens S.A. into
Siemens Società per Azioni (Siemens S.p.A., "Siemens joint-stock company"), with over 3000 employees.
1948–1970s: Expansion during the economic boom and
Marco Zanuso At the end of
World War II, the German-owned Siemens S.p.A. was impounded to the Ministero del Tesoro (Department of the Treasury). Engineer Aganippo Brocchi, who was put in charge of the company in 1948, and managed to bring it back to its pre-war prosperity. In 1950, the company was jointly acquired by
SIP and
STET, the
financial services arm of the
IRI (Istituto per la Ricostruzione Industriale, "Institute for Industrial Reconstruction") a public holding company established to support the survival and development of industrial assets in Italy.
1980s: Leadership of Marisa Bellisario In the early 1980s, SIT-Siemens was the largest telco manufacturing company in Italy, but was also experiencing financial difficulties. In 1981,
Marisa Bellisario, formerly head of
Olivetti Corporation of America, was chosen as the new CEO. Bellisario was an appreciated,
self-made entrepreneur who also had strategic connections to the government (most notably
Bettino Craxi, leader of the
Italian Socialist Party and
Italian Prime Minister in 1983–1987). She changed the name of the company to "Italtel" and actuated a thorough renovation process, which included replacing 70% of the management, and the establishment of several partnerships with other companies, including
CIT-Alcatel,
Siemens and
Apple. Bellisario and Craxi also envisioned merging Italtel with
Telettra, another major Italian telco manufacturing company, to form "Telit", a corporation that would supposedly have the potential to face up with the largest telco companies worldwide, however Bellissario died in 1988 and the plan was never implemented. In the early 1990s, the
state monopoly on telephony was abolished, and the state-owned operator SIP was turned into a private company,
Telecom Italia. At the same time, as a consequence of the privatization of SIP/Telecom, Italtel lost its position as SIP's privileged equipment provider; the alliance between Italtel and AT&T proved to be unsuccessful for both partners, and was canceled in 1994. In 1995, STET initiated a joint venture with Siemens for the control of Italtel through a newly funded company called "Telsi". In this process, Siemens Telecomunicazioni was merged into Italtel. In the late 1990s, Italtel ceded to Siemens all its
radio and
mobile-related activities, and in turn Siemens sold its 50% share of Telsi to Telecom Italia, which thus ended up owning, either directly or indirectly, 100% if Italtel. All these events severely weakened Italtel, which went through another major restructuring and downsizing process. The company shifted its
core business towards
voice over IP and
network convergence technologies, and was forced to look for new customers, including so-called OLOs (Other Local Operators), foreign markets,
public administration, and enterprises. Its number of employees fell to under 20.000.
Into the 21st century After this, in 1999, Italtel Tecnoelettrica (design, production and retail of circuits for telecommunications, computers and automation) is given to Lares Cozzi in 1990. The
multimedia activities (research, production and fixing of decoders for
Stream TV and telephones, maintenance and fixing of the commutation centrals in the structure of Santa Maria Capua Vetere) are sold to Finmek-Access Media; Italtel Systems (project, maintenance and installation of telecommunications systems for Italtel) is sold to a group of companies guided by Tecneudosia. The workforce is reduced to slightly more than 3,200. Italtel proceeds to acquisitions linked to IP networks and multimedia services. These purchases include One Ans for IT consulting and Securmatics for system security. After 1999 product offering focuses on telephony over IP base with the i-SSW product, at first implemented on a proprietary hardware and on
ATCA standard. When the partnership ends in 1999, Italtel S.p.a. becomes 100% owned by
Telecom Italia, which in 2000 sells a majority stake to
Clayton, Dubilier & Rice and Cisco Systems. In 2000, Italtel transfers a big part of the voice traffic of the operators on IP network and starts designing, developing and manufacturing products and other solutions for new generation networks and telecommunication services. On 27 July 2017, Exprivia S.p.A., a company listed on the Milan Stock Exchange (XPR.MI), took over 81% of the company's ordinary share capital after two years of negotiations. The remaining 19% of the capital to Cisco System.[11] The transaction was completed at the end of 2017: from 2018 coordinated budgets and from 2020 the progressive integration of the structures. The brands will be diversified. In January 2021, in light of the closure of the shareholdings of the outgoing Exprivia and Cisco, a new negotiation began with the PSC S.p.A. group, which in April 2022 became Italtel's controlling shareholder at 54%, in coordination with the TIM Group[1] and the Clessidra Capital Credit Fund. The Board of Directors of the new Italtel appoints Benedetto Di Salvo as CEO and confirms Claudio Calabi as chairman. In June 2024, the Nextalia SGR fund acquired PSC's stake, becoming Italtel's new majority shareholder. On 13 February 2025, The Board of Directors of the new Italtel appoints Carlo Filangieri as CEO. ==Products==