Fiat, IBM form Italian IT company

MILAN: Italy's Fiat group and International Business Machines Corp. on Friday

announced the joint creation of a new IT services company that capitalize on

Fiat's IT assets and IBM's distribution network.

The Turin-based Company, named Global Value, is 50 per cent owned by IBM

Italia and 50 per cent owned by Business Solutions, the technology unit of the

Fiat group. The company will be split into three units dealing with IT solutions

and resource planning, Internet and other service providers, and services and

outsourcing of projects.

Global Value expects sales of 700 million euro in 2001 pro forma, of 1.2

billion euros in 2005 and 1.4 billion euros in 2007. The projections are in line

with growth of the IT sector in Italy, which is expected to have annual growth

of 12 percent over the next four years. The new firm will have 2,600 employees,

of which two thirds come from Fiat and one third from IBM. The agreement has

received the go ahead from the European anti-trust authority.

(C) Reuters Limited 2001.