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BT is to sell its remaining stake in its Italian unit to local telco Retelit, the Financial Times has reported today
Financial details of the deal have not been disclosed, but the unit sold generated revenues of approximately €160 million in 2024.
The “expansion will further strengthen Retelit’s coverage of the Italian corporate market, providing a more comprehensive suite of ICT infrastructure and services to support the innovation and the digital transformation of Italian enterprises,” said Retelit in a press release.
Speaking to the Financial Times, Karen Egan, Head of telecoms at Enders Analysis, explained that the unit has been “quite a thorn in the side of BT over the years” and that Kirkby “will be very pleased to have a deal done to sell it”.
BT CEO Allison Kirkby is focussing BT’s attention on the UK market in an attempt to cut costs.
Last May, the company said it had hit its target to save £3 billion by 2025 a year early, with much of this total being driven by the company’s ongoing job cutting programme that will see 55,000 jobs eliminated by the end of the decade.
Kirkby now says it will aim to repeat this, cutting a further £3 billion in costs by 2029.
In addition, the latest UK budget posed new hurdles for BT. The government’s decision to hike employers’ National Insurance contributions could cost BT an additional £100 million annually. In response, CEO Allison Kirkby outlined several measures to mitigate this impact, including potentially passing costs on to mobile and broadband customers. She also said that cost-cutting initiatives through automation and AI would be accelerated.
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