The Group, which is led by Pietro Salini, and is active in nearly 50 countries, has acquired a majority stake in Cossi from Società Italiana per Condotte d'Acqua, which is under the control of a government-appointed administrator. Salini Impregilo will take a 63.5 per cent stake in the company, which will still have among its shareholders the Cossi family and the bank Banca Popolare di Sondrio, each with an 18.25 per cent stake.

The transaction will see the company recapitalised by banks by renouncing a large part of the €24 million (US$27 million) debt owed to them. Salini Impregilo will give it a loan of €12 million to help safeguard current activities and temporarily finance net working capital.

Cossi Costruzioni was founded by the family of the same name in Valtellina in 1976 to specialise in tunnelling. The company now has 170 employees and, through its subsidiaries, LGV and Mosconi conducts most of its activity in Italy and Switzerland.

With clients such as AlpTransit Gotthard, Cossi has been involved in strategic projects such as the renovation of the Mont-Blanc Tunnel after the fire, sections of highways in Italy and Switzerland, the base railway tunnel of Monte Ceneri in Switzerland, as well as the construction of the ‘Variante di Morbegno' highway in Valtellina.

In the tunnelling sector, Salini Impregilo has a vast experience earned from projects throughout the world. They include the Brenner Base Tunnel - where it is working on the Tufles-Pfones section in Austria and a second one under the Isarco River in Italy - and the Abu Hamour hydraulic tunnel in Doha, Qatar. In the United States, it is involved in the excavation of hydraulic tunnels to help cities manage the overflow from heavy rainfall, such as the Three Rivers Protection & Overflow Reduction Tunnel (3RPORT) in Fort Wayne, Indiana; the Dugway Storage Tunnel in Cleveland, Ohio; the Northeast Boundary Tunnel (NEBT) in Washington, D.C. Completed projects include the intake hydraulic tunnel in Lake Mead, Nevada, and the Anacostia River Tunnel in Washington, D.C., part of the city's Clean Rivers Project.