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Vodafone Italy is an Italian telecommunications company part of Fastweb + Vodafone, as a subsidiary of Italian telecommunications group Fastweb. The company's headquarters are in Ivrea ( TO) and Milan.

Founded in 1994 as Omnitel, in 2001, following the acquisition by the Vodafone Group, it changed its name to Omnitel Vodafone, in 2002 it changed again to Vodafone Omnitel, and then in 2003 it took on its current name.

On December 31, 2024, it was acquired by Swisscom. At the same time, the integration process with Fastweb began, and both companies started being managed by a single Executive Committee under the corporate brand Fastweb + Vodafone.

It has 30,153,000 mobile phone customers and 3,182,000 fixed phone lines, with respectively a market share of 28.5% and 16%.

Since taking over the company, Vodafone has introduced in Italy services like Vodafone live!, the 3G, 4G and 5G mobile networks, DSL, fiber-optic and FWA services, and Mobile Virtual Network Operators for other corporations.

Vodafone's main competitors are Iliad, TIM and Wind Tre.

History

In December 1995, Omnitel Sistemi Radiocellulari Italiani (founded on June 19, 1990, by Olivetti, Lehman Brothers, Bell Atlantic and Telia) and Pronto Italia (made up of Zignago Vetro, AirTouch, Mannesmann, Banca di Roma, Arca Merchant, Comeba, Ersel, Erg, Urmet TLC, Spal TLC, Site, Ponti Radio and Fergia) merged into Omnitel Pronto Italia, which launched a mobile telephony service, the second in Italy after TIM (formerly SIP). Olivetti, the original majority shareholder, through Omnitel and Infostrada (which dealt instead with fixed telephony), thus competed with Telecom Italia, which until then monopolized the entire telecommunications sector in Italy.

In 1999, Olivetti sold its interest in Omnitel and Infostrada to the German consortium Mannesmann, after Olivetti took control of Telecom Italia. By this time, Mannesmann had a majority stake in Omnitel with a 53.7% equity stake. The following year, Vodafone merged with Mannesmann thereby taking control of Omnitel. The merger led in 2001 to the change of company name to Omnitel Vodafone, and in 2002 to Vodafone Omnitel, and in the same year the registered office was transferred from Ivrea ( TO) to Amsterdam, thus passing from being a '' società per azioni'' (S.p.A.) legally registered in Italy to a '' naamloze vennootschap'' (N.V.) legally registered in the Netherlands

In 2004, the company launched UMTS services in 140 cities. Two years later, it lso launched HSPA services.

In 2007, Vodafone bought the Italian and Spanish branches of Tele2.

Following the acquisition of Tele2 Italia (in 2010 renamed TeleTu), in 2008, Vodafone launched in Italy XDSL services, offering Wi-Fi and VoIP to its customers, and between 2013 and 2014, launched also FTTX services.

In 2012 has enabled LTE technology services in Milan and Rome.

On 16 December 2013, following Verizon's sale of the entire share capital held in the company to Vodafone, it was transformed into a '' besloten vennootschap'' (B.V.).'

Between 2014 and 2015, started enabling LTE-A and VoLTE services to its mobile customers, and in 2017 launched LTE-A Pro services in Milan, Palermo and Florence.

On 23 November 2015, the company moved its legal residence in Turin, returning to be a joint-stock company legally registered in Italy.

On 23 January 2017, Vodafone launched the brand Ho Mobile, to provide low-cost mobile telephony services in competition with Iliad.

In 2019 launched 5G NR services in Milan, Rome, Turin, Naples and Bologna. Its ''GigaNetwork 5G'' is considered the evolution of the previous ''GigaNetwork 4.5G'', which has been re-used to launch the 5G service.

In 2021 the company shuts down its 3G network, in order to enhance the 4G and 5G ones.

On March 15, 2024, Swisscom announced its intention to acquire 100% of Vodafone Italia for €8 billion, with the closing expected to take place in the first quarter of 2025, integrating it with its subsidiary Fastweb. As part of the agreement, Vodafone will continue to provide certain services to Fastweb, including brand licensing, for up to five years.

In September 2024, the Antitrust Authority published a notice of investigation and launched an inquiry. Swisscom announced that the European Commission had approved the acquisition of Vodafone Italia under the Foreign Subsidies Regulation. The transaction was subsequently approved by AGCOM and AGCM in November and December 2024, respectively.

In October 2024, CoopVoce signed an agreement with Vodafone to extend mobile network coverage and implement 5G.

On November 15, 2024, Sabrina Casalta, the company's Chief Financial Officer, was appointed interim CEO, replacing Aldo Bisio, who remained a non-executive board member until the completion of the transaction with Swisscom.

On December 31, 2024, Swisscom completed the acquisition of Vodafone Italia, giving rise to Fastweb + Vodafone.

Ho Mobile

Ho Mobile (stylized as ho. or ho-mobile) is an Italian sub- brand of Vodafone operating as a Mobile Virtual Network Operator. It was created to compete with Iliad in the mobile telephony market.

It was founded on 23 January 2017 to operate as a low-cost operator of Vodafone, but the launch of the service took place on June 22, 2018, a few weeks after Iliad arrived in Italy.

Although it received authorization from the Ministry of Economic Development to operate as a Full MVNO and only under the 379-1 prefix, the operator was launched as an ESP MVNO, adopting the 377-08 and 377-09 prefixes. Later the area codes 379-1 and 379-2 were introduced.

Brand identity

Evolution of the company brand and logo:
File:Old Omnitel logo.png, 1994-1996
File:Omnitel logo.png, 1996-2001
File:Omnitel Vodafone logo 2001.png, 2001-2002
File:Logo vodafone omnitel.png, 2002-2003
File:Vodafone logo 1997.png, 2003-2006
File:Vodafone logo 2006.png, 2006-2017
File:Vodafone logo 2017.png, 2017-present

* In 1994 the company debuted on the market with the Omnitel brand.
* In 2001, following the takeover of Vodafone Group as shareholder, the brand became Omnitel Vodafone.
* In 2002 the brand was changed to Vodafone Omnitel, to symbolize the progressive transition from Omnitel to Vodafone.
* In 2003, the Omnitel brand was definitively abandoned in favor of Vodafone.

Network and coverage

Mobile network

As of March 31, 2022 Vodafone Italy's mobile network is made from 21,785 physical sites, including:
* 21,000 base transceiver stations LTE ( 4G);
* 1,300 base transceiver stations NR ( 5G).

The national mobile network covers:

International roaming

Vodafone Italy has signed international roaming agreements with 731 operators in 241 countries. As of June 30, 2016, about 150 of these operators in 100 countries allow customers to reach 4G LTE coverage.

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Fixed network

Vodafone Italy's fixed network includes 1,254 sites ULL, 326 sites SLU and 19,000 ONU (cabinet) in fiber-optic ( FTTC).

Customers

Mobile telephony

18.17 million mobile lines (for a market share of 23.3%)
: 14.69 million consumer mobile lines (21.6%) and 3.43 million business mobile lines (34.4%)
: 15.43 million prepaid mobile lines (22.3%) and 2.71 million subscription mobile lines (30.7%)

Fixed telephony

3.18 million of total fixed lines (for a market share of 16%)
: 447.400 fixed broadband lines (for a market share of 10.1%)
: 2.60 million fixed ultra-broadband lines (for a market share of 18%)

M2M

11.98 million SIM (of which 47% is used in applications of info-mobility and Smart card)

See also

* Fastweb
* Swisscom
* TeleTu
* Vodafone Group
* Verizon

References

External links

*

{{Authority control

Vodafone
Companies based in Milan
Telecommunications companies established in 2003
Mobile phone companies of Italy
Italian companies established in 2003
2024 mergers and acquisitions