The long-delayed privatization of state-controlled Italian telecommunications company Societa Finanziaria Telefonica per Azioni, or Stet, is one step closer after the upper chamber of the Italian parliament passed the privatization bill yesterday. It now need only be approved by the lower house. Romano Prodi, the prime minister, said that if everything went according to plan, Stet would be a private company by the autumn. Stet’s privatization process began a few years ago, but in fact it only took off when the Italian government transferred ownership from the industrial holding company IRI to the treasury last January, in order to merge it with Telecom Italia.
