The Italian Treasury has submitted a bid for Telecom Italia's (TIM) submarine cable unit, Sparkle.

Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed by the Italian Finance Ministry, which announced the offer yesterday.

TIM said separately that its board of directors would examine the Treasury's offer at a meeting on February 7.

Sparkle's subsea cables link countries including Israel and the US, with the unit owning and managing a network of more than 600,000 kilometers (373,000 miles) of both terrestrial and sub-sea fiber.

These cables span Europe, the Mediterranean, and the Americas.

The government's bid for Sparkle has been expected, following reports last year that it wished to control the unit.

Earlier this month, the Italian government approved TIM's planned sale of its fixed line network to KKR, worth €22 billion ($23.92bn).

TIM agreed to sell its landline grid network to US investment firm KKR in November.

The deal, which has been on the cards for some time, has been supported by Giorgia Meloni's Italian government since 2022, which plans to take a 20 percent stake.

TIM approved the deal without making it conditional on a vote by shareholders, with the board voting 11-3 in favor of the deal.

KKR valued the assets at €18.8bn ($20.5bn), but the overall value of the deal is as much as €22bn ($23.92bn) based on what can be earned if the grid is merged with that of small rival Open Fiber SpA.