Delleani has not yet replied to a LinkedIn message sent on Saturday.
One former Sparkle employee told Capacity: “If I can count right this new one should be the eighth CEO in nine years. I’m not really sure what’s happening, although I expect an overall more positive outlook with this new governance at TIM group level. I guess we have to wait and see to figure out their plans.” TIM has a meeting of shareholders on 29 March, when strategy might become clearer, this ex-employee suggested.
According to Sparkle’s brief Friday night statement, the unit’s board met under the chairmanship of Stefano Siragusa, and elected Di Mauro as new CEO. The statement made no reference to Delleani, who spent 30 years at the TIM group and had been CEO and then chairman of Sparkle before becoming head of Olivetti, the former typewriter company that is now TIM’s IT and systems integration arm, until he returned to Sparkle last year to replace Alessandro Talotta.
Delleani told Capacity earlier this year: “I was asked to rejoin Sparkle and my friends. … I very much liked the idea of seeing what Sparkle was like six years ago and now.” Now, it seems, he has moved on.
Di Mauro is also a long-server at TIM, the former Telecom Italia. His LinkedIn entry shows that he has been with the group since 1998, when his role involved the development of TIM’s Latin American subsidiaries.
He became EVP of strategic projects in 2013 and then chief strategy and innovation officer the following year. Di Mauro became chief innovation officer in January 2019 and has already updated his LinkedIn entry to show his new role at Sparkle – and Delleani has not updated his LinkedIn entry to reflect that he has lost the role.
Di Mauro spoke to Capacity last year about his innovation role: “We try to anticipate what would be the service of the future. We have several trials, not only technology trials, but new business models. We felt the need to deploy open innovation for the 5G programme.”
