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.[2]
In 1999, Olivetti sold its interest in Omnitel and Infostrada to the GermanconsortiumMannesmann, 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, Vodafonemerged 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.[9]
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.
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 January 2017, Vodafone launched the brandho-mobile, to provide low-cost mobile telephony services in competition with Iliad.[12]
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 15 March 2024, Swisscom purchases 100% of Vodafone Italy for 8 billion euros, thus merging it with its subsidiary Fastweb. As part of the agreement, Vodafone Group will continue to provide certain services, such as branding, to Fastweb for up to 5 years.[13][14][15][16][17][18] The operation was completed on 31 December 2024 with the birth of Fastweb + Vodafone. The company's three brands (Fastweb, Vodafone and ho-mobile) will temporarily continue to operate independently.[3][19][20][21]
Vodafone Italy has signed international roaming agreements with 731 operators in 241 countries.[citation needed] As of June 30, 2016, about 150 of these operators in 100 countries allow customers to reach 4G LTE coverage.[citation needed]
