Telecom Italia has announced the acquisition from AOL of a broadband business in Germany, a signal that the new management will continue on the path set by Marco Tronchetti Provera, who resigned as chairman on Friday night.

Mr Tronchetti quit amid a breakdown in relations between TI, Italy’s dominant telecommunications company, and the centre-left Italian government of Romano Prodi. The prime minister had expressed shock at the abrupt U-turn announced by the company last week to split into three, a move that could lead to the sale of important assets such as its mobile arm and network infrastructure.

However, TI stressed that under Guido Rossi, the new chairman, the board had pledged to follow the restructuring plan. Mr Tronchetti wanted the company to focus more on the growth potential of broadband and media services.

TI was well advanced in the bidding for AOL’s German broadband business but Mr Rossi could this weekend have chosen to drop out of the deal negotiations at such a sensitive time.

Mr Prodi is under pressure from Italy’s centre-right opposition to resign over its handling of the TI affair, and from left-wingers in the ruling coalition who want to renationalise part of the company, which was privatised in 1997.

Mr Rossi, who served briefly as TI’s chairman in 1997 during Mr Prodi’s first premiership, vowed not to submit to pressure for the company’s partial return to state control.

“Ten years ago the Prodi government called on me to privatise Telecom Italia. Now it falls to me to save it from many dangers, including the risk of a creeping renationalisation,” he said.

In a statement issued in Beijing, where he was leading an Italian business delegation, Mr Prodi said yesterday he was ready to let government ministers responsible for the telecoms sector face questions in parliament over the affair.

TI is paying about €675m ($854m) for the business, which adds 2.5m customers to its broadband business in Germany. AOL is retaining its internet portal.

TI was advised by Dresdner Kleinwort and Deutsche Bank. Neither the company nor its advisers commented on Sunday.