ROME — As Finmeccanica edges closer to introducing its new divisional structure by year's end, CEO Mauro Moretti is about to finalize a management team that sources have said combines company veterans with staff he has brought with him from his previous stint running Italy's railway network.

The new lineup, which will be confirmed at a board meeting Nov. 3, is set to offer few surprises, but will give Moretti greater powers over established managers accustomed to more autonomy.

One big change that could come in the new year is a change of name for Finmeccanica's name. Speaking earlier this month, Moretti said: "We are changing the company and we will have to change the name."

Moretti added, "We need to strip Finmeccanica of everything that is traditional," he said, explaining that after selling off its bus and rolling stock units, "We will have a company in which two-thirds of the staff think and a third manufacture."

The idea of dropping the name Finmeccanica, considered to be unwieldy and hard to pronounce, has been considered by previous CEOs, but the change was never made.

As for the managers who will run the new firm, company sources said Daniele Romiti, the current head of helicopter unit AgustaWestland, would be confirmed head of the new Helicopters division, while Filippo Bagnato, current head of aircraft unit Alenia Aermacchi, will continue to run aviation operations.

Bagnato's domain will be split into two divisions, Military Aircraft and Aerostructures, which handles Finmeccanica's work on civil aircraft structures with partners Boeing and Airbus.

The likely candidate to take over the Aerostructures division is Alessio Facondo, an Alenia manager who has previously worked at fellow units Selex and AgustaWestland.

"The head of the Military Aircraft division will be known on Nov. 3," a source said.

Bagnato was brought in by Moretti to replace former Alenia boss Giuseppe Giordo, who is now carrying out consultancy work outside the defense sector.

Current Selex CEO Fabrizio Giulianini also will feature in the new setup overseeing , as overseer of a number of divisions, most of which mirror current sectors within Selex — Airborne and Space Systems, Security and Information Systems, and Land and Naval Defense Electronics.

The heads of those divisions are likely to be the current Selex managers running the equivalent Selex sectors — Andrea Biraghi for Security and Information Systems, Lorenzo Mariani for Land and Naval, and Norman Bone for Airborne and Space Systems.

But in addition to those three divisions, Giulianini will also oversee the Defense Systems division, which will group torpedo-maker WASS and naval and land cannon firm Oto Melara.

The merged entity comprising WASS and Oto Melara will be run by the current CEO of Oto Melara, Roberto Cortese, rather than Finmeccanica veteran Alessandro Franzoni, who is currently running WASS, a source said.

Also featuring in Moretti's new close-knit team will be current strategy chief Giovanni Soccodato and CFO Gian Piero Cutillo. Alongside them will be HR manager Domenico Braccialarghe and legal and compliance manager Andrea Parrella, who both worked alongside Moretti at the Italian railways, which he ran until he moved to Finmeccanica last year.

Also confirmed as head of internal auditing is Marco Di Capua, a former official with Italy's tax police and national tax agency, who Moretti has entrusted with ferreting out corruption at the company.

As he has settled on his team, Moretti has released a large number of veteran managers, many of whom have moved to work with smaller Italian aerospace and defense firms. One observer who attended a recent industry conference in Rome jokingly pointed out how Moretti was confronted by a room full of ex-Finmeccanica managers when he entered.

Some managers left before Moretti took over, including former Director General Giorgio Zappa, who now runs electronics firm Vitrociset. Former Alenia manager Carlo Logli, who was involved with UAV work and Finmeccanica's Superjet JV with Sukhoi, has moved to run Piaggio Aero, the Italian firm now owned by Mubadala, the Abu Dhabi-based strategic investment and development company.

Former Aermacchi veteran Massimo Lucchesini, who had joined Aermacchi in 1976 and was considered one of the engineering brains behind the M-346 jet trainer, has moved to engineering firm IDS following Moretti's shake-up. His exit prompted complaints that Finmeccanica was sacrificing crucial experience for the sake of renewal.

Ex-Aermacchi manager Carmelo Cosentino is now head of the industrial organization that coordinates aerospace firms in the northern Italian region of Lombardy.

Giovanni Bertolone, a former head of Alenia, joined Piaggio this year, while former Alenia manager Gian Carlo Anselmino is now at the Italian Ministry of Defence.

Former CEO Pierfrancesco Guarguaglini is now a consultant, while Simone Bemporad, the manager he sent to run Finmeccanica's operation in the US, is now head of external relations at Italian insurance firm Generali.

Email: tkington@defensenews.com

Tom Kington is the Italy correspondent for Defense News.

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