Russian First Deputy Prime Minister Vladimir Kadannikov, on a mission to win Italian investments, said he hoped to breathe new life into the big telecommunications deal that fell apart last year. On a five-day visit to Italy he said he would meet Stet SpA managing director Ernesto Pascale to discuss the Italian phone company’s interest in buying part of Russian telecom?munications holding company AO Svyazinvest. Stet won an investment tender for 25% of Svyazinvest last November (CI No 2,806), but the deal hit a stumbling block a month later when Stet failed to make an initial payment, saying it wanted all of the Russian firm’s 85 subsi?diaries re-registered first. If the deal had gone forward it would have been the biggest foreign investment in Russia and the biggest privati?zation in the country’s history. The minister warned the Italians not to miss the boat and told Stet its competi?tors in other western countries have woken up to opportunities in Russia and were investing massively.
