Milan runs, but how much really? And how much is he able to give back to the country? We tried to answer these and other questions during the second edition of Manifatture Aperte 2019, the Milanese event dedicated to SMEs. “Milan is there and the SMEs in its area are Italian excellence. Yet even here there is, paradoxically, a brain drain”, commented Raffaele Zingone, Head of the Central Affairs Department of the Banca IFIS Group, who for the occasion has packaged a special edition of his Market Watch Pmi, entirely dedicated to the area Milan subway. An integrated urban area which, with over three million inhabitants, 133 municipalities over an area of 1.575 square kilometers and a dense network of small and very small businesses, it is the third most populated area in Europe after London and Paris.
Banca IFIS of the Milanese SMEs analyzed the financial statements, the business and the capacity for innovation and it came out that, although revenues have slowed down, they have returned to growth investments: +3,53% year on year for 7,66 billion euro. In fact, Lombardy is the first region for funding approved by the law in Nuova Sabatini, while Milan is in the first three provinces for the number of applications to the Guarantee Fund for SMEs. The two leading sectors, which represent a quarter of the SMEs in Greater Milan, are technology (15,9%), a real excellence, and chemistry-pharmaceuticals (8%). The presence of the construction sector is more contained than the Italian average (36,5% against the national 42,3%). In any case, SMEs in Milan demonstrate above-average revenues, albeit slowing down (5,6 million euros on average against the 4,6 million for the Italian average).
Businesses, which demonstrate good ability to repay financial debts, know how to combine the ability to invest with an intense use of subsidized finance instruments. “In a rapidly evolving and extremely competitive market – added Zingone during his speech at the round table «How to finance new manufacturing» – where the product, including banking products, has become a commodity, the real difference is made by the distribution models , timing but above all that invisible thread that binds men and which is called trust. This is why Banca IFIS has decided to enrich its constant dialogue with SMEs, supporting companies not only with credit but with a continuous osmosis of information, providing new perspectives useful for guiding strategic decisions and consequently the business".
Finally, three macro-trends also emerged from the Big Data analyzed by Banca IFIS's SME Market Watch. As regards technological innovation, training and sustainability, Milan turns out to have a higher attention than the Italian average: high-tech incubators and prototypes are concentrated in its metropolitan area, the metropolitan area is also recognized as a lively hub for training and research into eco-sustainable solutions and is the new driver of development. With regard to this last "topic", the web recognizes and values the commitment of the administration but strongly asks SMEs to play a leading role. Waste management, eco-sustainable products, zero waste and low impact production cycles: this is the mission.
