Converting PDF to HTML removes italics

Hello, I am creating a self publishing site for an author. His formatting is very important to him, and so I am trying to be sure to preserve as much as possible. I am using acrobat to export to HTML, but the italics is lost. In other tools, such as cloudconvert.com, this isn't happening. Is there something I am doing wrong or is Acrobat not able to preserve the italics? 

Even just an <em> tag around the italicized text would be good, or even a custom <span class="italicize-me"> would be acceptable.

Sincere thanks for your assistance!