A unit of EDF said it wants to triple its Italian customer base and buy Eni’s retail base.
The boss of Edison, Marc Benayoun, said if the firm could make a deal with Eni, it would be ready to sell a 20-35% stake in its capital to long-term Italian investors in order to finance the deal.
Edison has about 1.2million retail customers in Italy.
It hopes to grow its customer base to between three and four million as it aims to benefit from the opening of the Italian energy market in 2018.
Benayoun has also said Edison could return to profitability in 2018.
He expects the firm will be close to break-even in 2017 and book a small net loss this year.