"Smart Apulia”. The opening of Elite's first regional hub has been announced in Milan.

“Smart Apulia”. The opening of Elite's first regional hub has been announced in Milan. Delli Noci: "Puglia becomes a" North ". With Elite we will strengthen the skills and development of our businesses"

Date: 06/12/2023

The new collaboration agreement between the Puglia Region, Puglia Sviluppo and Elite (Euronext Group/Borsa Italiana) will be signed in the next few days in Bari, aimed at opening the first regional Elite hub. It will be called "Elite Puglia Hub" and will have the task of strengthening the competitiveness and international development of the Apulian production system through actions that aim to support and consolidate the technical and managerial skills of companies. This was announced by the Councilor for Economic Development of the Puglia Region Alessandro Delli Noci on the sidelines of the event "Smart Puglia: investments, innovation and development", organized by the Puglia Region and Puglia Sviluppo, in collaboration with Il Sole 24 Ore, which is currently taking place in Milan in the Giorgio Squinzi Auditorium of Assolombarda. In a room crowded with entrepreneurs from Lombardy and in the presence of representatives of large groups such as Bip Consulting, De Nora, Edison, Exprivia, Fincons. Leonardo, Rina, Siemens and Tim, Delli Noci spoke about the results achieved by Puglia and the challenges of the immediate future. “Puglia is the first Italian region for spending capacity of the structural funds. But the time has come to make the leap in quality. To do this, in the next programming our tools will be aimed only at those who innovate. We aim to be for once a "North", as the first gateway to Europe for logistics, but also for the circular economy and as a national and international energy hub". “The growth of Puglia's competitiveness and the attraction of investments – he said on the sidelines of the event – represent a primary objective of our policies. It was for the programming cycle which is about to end and it will be even more incisive in the 2021-2027 programming. The Apulian production and innovation ecosystem in which companies, institutions, universities, polytechnics and research centers collaborate, driven by our facilitation tools, has led us to a demand for investments of 8 billion euros, of which more than 1 billion for foreign investments, over 1.7 billion for research, development and innovation and new jobs for more than 40 thousand units". “So the competitiveness and attractiveness of Puglia – he underlined – have grown a lot in recent years, guaranteeing a very strong resistance to the financial crisis first, to the health crisis after and finally to the repercussions generated by the war in Ukraine. 2022 ended with all economic indicators growing, from 60,000 more employees to exports growing by 14.8%. to GDP in 2021 which marked a +6.6%. But we are ready to do more. The agreement with Elite which I am announcing here and which we will present in Bari at a dedicated event, goes precisely in this direction, providing within the Elite Program an environment expressly dedicated to companies in the Apulian area which will help to achieve their cultural and dimensional growth . Thus Puglia will be more competitive and even more attractive for investments”. The proceedings were opened in the early afternoon also by speeches by the director of Sole 24 Ore Fabio Tamburini, by the Vice President of Organisation, Development and Marketing of Assolombarda Alvise Biffi, who reserved a thought for Silvio Berlusconi, by the president of Puglia Sviluppo Grazia D' Alonzo, of the Director of the Economic Development Department of the Puglia Region Gianna Elisa Berlingerio. The round table entitled "Smart Puglia: the axis with Lombardy on the road to digital transition" is underway: interventions by Francesco Moretti, Group Deputy CEO & CEO of International Fincons Group, Claudio Pellegrini, Sales Local Government & Health Director by Tim, Gianni Sebastiano, Director of Strategy & Compliance, Investor Relator of Exprivia, and Marco Taisch, President of Made – Competence Center Industry 4.0. The following focus is dedicated to the Digital Transformation in Apulian manufacturing, a topic on which Giuseppe Biffi, Business Development Manager Digital Enterprise Digital Industries Siemens intervenes in dialogue with the Sole 24 Ore journalist Alberto Grassani. The work of "Smart Puglia" continues with two moments of in-depth analysis: the first dedicated to the theme of the growth of Apulian SMEs on the financial markets, on which Antonio De Vito, General Manager of Puglia Sviluppo, Alessandro Sannino, CEO of Gelesis, and Marta Testi, CEO of Elite Group Euronext; the second centered on the role of research, training and tutoring for the skills of the future, a topic that is explored with the Rector of the Lum University Antonello Garzoni, Francesco Giordano,