Feature: Italian startups step up thanks to university collaboration, improved legislation

Building a start-up in Italy is not an easy job amid rampant bureaucracy and slow-moving legislation, but some successful examples point to a recent boost to the sector.

In its first year of commercial activity, Biotechware, a start-up which develops and sells cloud technology devices for the tele-medicine market in Italy, has made sales worth some 200,000 euros (213,000 U.S. dollars).

NISO Biomed, operating in gastroenterology and tumor prevention, has started operating in Italy and Britain and is considering joint ventures in the United States and Japan.

Another Italian start-up named Safen, selling an electro-mechanical device that reduces compressed air consumption used to move pneumatic cylinders, has successfully entered the market.

All of these start-ups were launched by the Innovative Enterprise Incubator of Turin Polytechnic (I3P), the leading Italian university-based incubator, which reports a solid balance sheet with total revenues in 2013 amounting to over 1.3 million euros.

"University-based incubators are active all over the world, but in Italy they have particularly focused on strengthening exchanges of resources and expertise," I3P president and president of the Italian association of university incubators PNICube, Marco Cantamessa, told Xinhua.

In a departure from the global trend, Italy's start-ups often create physical rather than digital products, he noted. "They combine high quality and good technology with low cost. I think there will be a lot of nice surprises in the coming years," Cantamessa added.

Economic newspaper Il Sole 24 Ore, citing a government report, said start-ups in Italy have been increasing in recent times to the tune of more than 100 every month.

At the beginning of March, there were nearly 3,400 start-ups in the country, of which more than 70 percent were active in the service sector with joint stocks of less than 50,000 euros.

"The Italian legislation has also made some progress in streamlining bureaucracy in the process of building a start-up," Cantamessa said.

For example, he said, the government launched a start-up visa program last year giving special permits for entrepreneurs with innovative ideas from outside the euro zone. This was later extended to foreign students who receive a degree in Italy and want to start a business.

"Incubators provide fundamental help in offering networks of consultants, professionals and investors during the process that leads from the initial idea to a successful company," said Luca Lagomarsino, brand manager of Circle Garage, a start-up incubated at I3P. His firm was awarded by national and international committees for introducing a wearable computer.

Lagomarsino acknowledged that Italy had taken steps to simplify bureaucracy. "However, building a start-up in Italy is still too costly compared to other European countries. Besides a minimum required starting capital of 10,000 euros, you have to pay an average of 3,000 euros for a notary and every year 5,000 euros for an accountant. Then taxes are very high, proportionally equal to what is paid by big companies," he told Xinhua.

For many Italian start-ups, overseas markets represent an important path for development. Such as the start-up Alyt, which developed a low-cost security and home automation system based on an open Android platform.

"We have opened an office in China's Shenzhen and hired local personnel. We wish that our product will be further developed in the Chinese market that is a strategic move for us," Mirko Bretto, co-founder of Alyt, said. Endit