The conversion was started in 1942 originally under the name Falco but was never completed, and the ship was never delivered to the Regia Marina (Royal Italian Navy).

[1] MS Augustus and her sistership, were a group combined ocean liner and cruise ship built in 1927 for Navigazione Generale Italiana.

The Royal Italian Navy (Regia Marina)[2] then began the process to convert them both to aircraft carriers, which would begin with their seizure in 1941.

The project resumed the one developed by the Colonel of the Naval Engineers Luigi Gagnotto and the transformation works began in September 1942 in the Ansaldo Shipyards in Genoa.

[1] The hull was captured shortly after by the neoestablished National Republican Navy of the Italian Social Republic, a German puppet state.