Il Messaggero said that Vivendi, the French media company that owns almost 24%, and Elliott Management, the second largest, wanted Genish’s resignation at a board meeting called for 6 December.
TIM denied the report, though said there is a board meeting planned for that date.
Vivendi told the Bloomberg news agency that it fully supports Genish, who is a former senior executive of the group.
Only two months ago Vivendi was saying it was “deeply concerned by the disastrous management of Telecom Italia” since a shareholders’ meeting in May elected a group of directors nominated by Elliott, though left Genish in place.
According to Sunday’s Il Messaggero, TIM chairman Fulvio Conti is considering two possible successors. One is Alfredo Altavilla, who left Fiat Chrysler in July after he failed to get the top job in the group. The other is Rocco Sabelli, a former Telecom Italia executive who was later CEO of the airline Alitalia.
As Capacity reported last month, TIM has hired Rothchild, the investment bank, to advise on the future of Sparkle, its international wholesale arm. Last week TIM reported that Sparkle’s revenues fell by 7.6% in the first three quarters of the year.
Meanwhile the company is talking to rival carrier Open Fiber about collaboration on fibre-to-the-home networks.
