KKR-backed FiberCop ready to replace rival in Italy's lagging EU-funded fibre plan

By Elvira Pollina and Giuseppe Fonte

MILAN/ROME (Reuters) - KKR-backed fibre optic telecoms firm FiberCop has told the Italian government it is ready to take over the work assigned to rival Open Fiber to speed up a European Union-funded fibre network rollout plan, a letter seen by Reuters showed.

The request highlights the difficulties Italy faces in accelerating spending of EU COVID-19 recovery funds, with the latest government data showing it has invested roughly half of the money so far secured, below goals.

FiberCop and its smaller rival Open Fiber were entrusted with cabling more than 3 million buildings across Italy by the end of June 2026 under a 3.4 billion euro ($3.72 billion) programme aimed at rolling out ultra-fast broadband networks.

Funded via the so-called Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) created in 2020 to help economies recover from the pandemic, the fibre rollout plan is facing delays and could be downscaled under a final overhaul of the broader investment programme Italy is negotiating with the EU.

About 1.5 million of the currently targeted 3.4 million buildings were cabled by the end of February, government data showed, with Open Fiber, which has more buildings to connect, lagging behind FiberCop.

In a letter to Italy's government dated April 2, FiberCop said it was available to take over the whole of the fibre rollout project to help Italy meet targets agreed with the European Commission.

Officials from Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's office confirmed they had received the letter, but declined to comment further. FiberCop had no immediate comment, and Open Fiber declined to comment.

"In light of the most recent data on the performance of the lots, we ask for a favourable evaluation of the hypothesis of a fair and functional reallocation through a take-over process", FiberCop said in the letter.

Both FiberCop and Open Fiber are backed by the Italian state, and the government is considering a potential combination of their respective network infrastructures.

FiberCop was spun off last year from Telecom Italia (TIM) and sold to a KKR-led consortium including Italy's economy ministry under a deal worth up to 22 billion euros.

Open Fiber is 60% owned by Italian state lender Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (CDP), with Australian fund Macquarie holding the remainder.

Italy had already cut the number of buildings to be covered by the new fibre networks by 155,000 in 2023.

The country lags European peers in high-speed fixed-line internet coverage, with some 59% of households having access to ultrafast broadband against an EU average of 79%, according to the latest EU data.

($1 = 0.9141 euros)

(Reporting by Elvira Pollina and Giuseppe Fonte; Editing by Jan Harvey)