Italfrom Marche is reality

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11 Novembre 2024

Founded in 2010, Italfrom is a company highly specialised in the online marketing as well as the design and assembly of: fences and gates, shelving and industrial and commercial furniture, cottages and garden furniture, office and home furniture, street furniture and parks, construction and insulation, fixtures and fittings, and agriculture. An all-Italian excellence that has managed to assert its leadership in a highly competitive market thanks to a strategic vision and an innovative business approach, as Pepe Oto, the company’s Co-founder, explains in this interview.

Mr. Oto, with what mission was Italfrom born?
The Italfrom brand was born with the ambitious goal of becoming a reference point in the e-commerce market back in the days when online was still an unknown terrain full of unknowns. We are extremely satisfied with the important results achieved to date, which have come about above all thanks to the considerable energy and resources that we three brothers – with the constant support of our parents, in particular our father, who is still actively present in the company today – have invested over the years in the future of the brand, created and developed day after day with passion, intuition and tenacity. It is no coincidence that, in a very short time, Italfrom has experienced rapid growth both in terms of organisational structure and expansion (also thanks to the establishment of strategic partnerships with some of the most prestigious Italian and world economic entities) and has managed to assert its leadership in a sector that has subsequently become highly competitive, clearly distinguishing itself from its numerous competitors.

There were obviously many initial obstacles to overcome, but today you have undoubtedly become an excellence in your sector.

Exactly, even though there are still many challenges to face and goals to achieve! At the beginning, we suddenly found ourselves catapulted into a totally new world, still to be explored, with which we felt we had a considerable affinity and predisposition, but without having the experience and structure behind us necessary to face the many challenges imposed by a very dynamic and constantly evolving sector. What’s more, our company was born in a small town in the hinterland of Irpinia, to which we are so attached, but which is underdeveloped industrially and has very limited commercial outlets; This aspect has certainly not played to our advantage, and it has undoubtedly penalised us, making our work much more laborious, particularly in those early years when everything was still to be created and when even establishing a simple agreement or a new contract with a courier or transporter was an arduous undertaking and not at all taken for granted, especially since we were located in an area that was poorly served and therefore it was also difficult for most of them to offer us an adequate and competitive daily service. Throughout these years there have been many moments of discouragement; but fortunately in most of those moments, in a timely and ever-increasing manner, three fundamental and essential aspects came into play to calm these perplexities of ours: The gratifications that gradually came to us from Italy and in some cases even from further afield in Europe, confirming that we were on the right track. In fact, already in those early years of Italfrom’s life, to our amazement and satisfaction, we were awarded international recognition such as our selection in the FT1000 (compiled by the British economic-financial newspaper Finacial Times in collaboration with Statista; a list that included the top 1000 companies throughout Europe that had achieved the highest percentage growth calculated between 2012 and 2015). The other aspects were, the iron will not to destroy what had been built with so much effort; and lastly, the impressive speed with which the Internet and e-commerce travelled and emerged in those early years, which gave us no respite and left us no room and no time for second thoughts, since that would most likely have meant missing that fast-moving train, and we had to be on the ball every moment, non-stop, This constant ‘pressing’, however, has inevitably led us over the years, from the vast majority of successful and timely choices and decisions to a few less successful or delayed ones, with which we have subsequently had to reckon, sometimes paying rather high prices, Although some of those mistakes turned out to be useful in retrospect, as they served to teach us as well as strengthen us, in a way it helped us to make them in order to learn. Today Italfrom, thanks above all to our tenacity and determination, is an innovative and future-oriented company that aims to perfect its work and production processes with the help of automation and new technologies, and to internationalise its brand in European markets with the creation of new export portals.

And so, after the initial sacrifices, Italfrom has also grown significantly in terms of personnel. How important is human capital for you?
Very much! It is without doubt one of our most important resources. Since the second half of 2014, we have been hiring young people of our age and countrymen, with whom we have been training from the very beginning, considering that most of them were entering the world of work for the first time or came from experiences and worlds totally different from that of e-commerce; Today, we are proud and satisfied to see that those same employees, from young apprentices, are increasingly becoming expert professionals in the sector. For the company, being able to count today on a qualified and skilled team is a strong point with high added value for the future development of the brand.

In recent years, you have made considerable efforts to intensify your presence in Italy as well: it is no coincidence that you have recently opened a new office in the Marche region. Can you tell us about it?
Our new headquarters of over 2500 square metres, completely renovated by us in the province of Ancona, is finally operational. The decision to invest in this region was not by chance but strategic in many respects, starting with the commercial and industrial development that this land offers, the proximity to the A14 Montemarciano toll gate, the commercial port, and the airport, but also and above all with the nearest northern Italy and northern Europe, where a very important slice of our business has developed since our inception. But the main reason that drove us to invest outside our home territory where we still operate with success and satisfaction, perhaps the most significant motivation, can be summed up in a phrase revived by some recent advertising slogans: ‘Marche, Italy in a Region’. What better land than what is known as ‘Italy in a Region’ could have acted as a forerunner for an ambitious desire for territorial expansion that we hope will gradually replicate itself over time in other areas of Italy, thus allowing us to get even closer to our customers and to further refine and increase our services in the territories. Having invested in this land has also allowed us to explore and deepen new strategic sectors, such as real estate, construction and renovation; to significantly increase our know-how and expertise; and to open up new avenues and future business prospects. It is in this direction that our new innovative platform – www.italfromrenovation.com – has been conceived. It will soon be online for the demand and best offer of real estate, services and renovations, construction, furniture, doors and windows, agriculture, vehicles, digital products, for companies, professionals and with limitations for private individuals, with the aim of intertwining online business with offline business in the territories through advanced and intuitive functionalities. With this platform, together with our other innovative platform, www.italfromplace.com, which is already online and operational for the best companies and professionals, with different dynamics and modalities, we set ourselves the same objective of continuing and increasing our successful path in the i-tech and online world that we started with our historical, consolidated and award-winning e-commerce site www.italfrom.com, which remains our fixed point in which we continue to invest more and more every day. All in all, we hope and trust that all this will, together and in its own way, in a few years’ time place our brand among the big names of the online market, a very ambitious and at the same time distant and very arduous dream that we set ourselves back in those early years when, in the tranquillity of the Irpinian hills, we were headlong shut up in a couple of rooms of a flat, hastily converted into offices, with no certainties and with the few tools we had at our disposal, everything seemed even further away, but with tenacity, far-sightedness, passion, compactness and many sacrifices from that pair of closed rooms we somehow managed to open up to the whole world, taking our brand beyond our borders and beyond all expectations over the years, and today that dream that seemed so far away is certainly closer than yesterday.

In the dynamism of a globalised world, the Roman Rota continues to be an important reference in the pathologies of the matrimonial institution

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Imbimbo

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11 Novembre 2024

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Globalisation and the consequent advent of new innovative technologies are speeding up and facilitating the dissemination of rotary jurisprudence, which is the ‘teacher of life’ for those peripheral realities spread all over the world and which need, however, continuous interconnection in order to make the tried and tested interpretative responses in the matrimonial field taken up in the individual Catholic nations their own. Luciano Smaldino, a Rotal lawyer qualified to practice before the Supreme Court of Cassation, the Roman Rota and the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, spoke on the subject.
by Roberta Imbimbo

Lawyer Smaldino, has the revolution brought about by globalisation found the ecclesiastical procedural legal structure of marriage celebrated in Church and regulated by the Canonical Code unprepared?
Certainly not! In fact, not everyone knows that the father of globalisation is an unknown 16th-century Spanish explorer, the Augustinian friar Andres de Urdaneta. So, at least chronologically, the one who invented the content of globalisation was a close member of the Catholic Church. Today, technological innovations push towards more uniform and convergent models of legal production, that is, towards the nullity or validity of marriage. For more than 500 years, the Rota Romana has advised the lower ecclesiastical courts, with its authority and authority, on the unequivocal interpretation of the canonical code in the case. To be more precise, it is since 1331, the year of its institution with the ‘Ratio iuris bull’ of 16 December issued by John XXII, that the Rota Romana has continued to achieve that globalisation that is a sign of apostolic ecumenicality, in the application, to the changing human reality, of the divine norms on the one hand and the human ones on the other, governing the institution of marriage. It ends up collecting, in its archives, cases, questions and interpretative solutions concerning the matrimonial realities experienced in every Catholic nation in the course of time. The Sacra Rota is therefore the bulwark of defence of the institution of the family, especially in the profound crisis of our time.

What are the grounds for nullity of marriage today?
Canon law recognises an exhaustive list of grounds: impotence, incapacity to contract for causes of a psychic nature, lack of ‘discretion’, ‘insufficient use of reason’, error in a person or on the person’s qualities, malice, simulation, fear, and lastly, when the celebrant does not meet the formal requirements.

Can ‘online’ adultery be an object of examination in order to make a request for a declaration of the nullity of a marriage celebrated by concordat rite?
Online’ adultery is becoming more and more common, as a cause for unrest, even among married people who, now in irreversible crisis, turn to the ecclesiastical courts to know whether their marriage is null and void. For the Rota Romana, it is important to focus on the moment of the nuptial declaration: if the bride and groom sincerely promise each other, without reservation, exclusive love (i.e.: fidelity) – love connected with the so-called ‘bonum coniugum’, which binds them to achieve the physical and spiritual good of the other – their marriage will be valid. Commitment, mind you, which must be effective and continuous. Otherwise, it will be null and void. And so: if, in the course of the marriage, the commitment to exclusivity (fidelity) and the physical and spiritual well-being of the other (‘bonum coniugum’) is broken, all that remains is to examine, by means of a special expert’s report, whether the obligation actually assumed was, for the person concerned, impossible to assume and/or fulfil. In that case, if the judge considers that incapacity to be serious, the marriage will be declared null and void.

Technological innovation, state-of-the-art machinery and highly specialised know-how: these are the strengths of Nova Tek Srl

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Imbimbo

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6 Novembre 2024

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foto William Zambelli per Panorama — William Zambelli

Founded in 2004 in Casaloldo (MN), from the far-sighted idea of entrepreneur William Zambelli, then involving his father Dante Zambelli and his brother Fabio Zambelli, Nova Tek is a company highly specialised in the processing of sheet metal products for third parties; an all-Italian excellence that has managed to impose its leadership in a highly competitive market thanks to a strategic vision and highly specialised know-how. Serena Marignoni, the company’s Commercial Director, explains the reasons for such success.
by Roberta Imbimbo

Dr Marignoni, with what mission was Nova Tek born?
Nova Tek was founded in 2004 with the ambitious goal of becoming an important reference point in the field of sheet metal working for third parties; a challenge that was won thanks to a strategic vision and an innovative business approach, high added-value peculiarities that have allowed it to grow considerably both in terms of organisational structure and geographical expansion. Today Nova Tek is an innovative and future-oriented company in Casaloldo, which addresses its offerings to the most diverse product sectors (the household appliance market, heating, cooling, automotive, earth-moving, solar and automatic warehousing, the distributor sector, etc.).

What kind of market is it in which you operate? What are your strengths compared to your competitors?
It is a highly competitive market, dominated by a few well-structured incumbent players; Nonetheless, Nova Tek has managed to differentiate itself from its numerous competitors thanks to the experience gained in 20 years of history, the specialised know-how acquired by a highly qualified team (our technical department, for example, is absolutely capable of assisting the customer at 360 degrees, even in the initial management of complex new projects), the automatic and technologically advanced machinery, which allows us to meet the individual needs of our customers and to be in line with the increasingly rapid production times dictated by a very fast and dynamic market. Nonetheless, our flexibility, our decision to diversify our commercial development and to operate in several distribution sectors, identifying some advantageous niches in which to assert our consolidated expertise, have allowed us to grow steadily over all this time, brilliantly overcoming some crises that have hit certain product sectors, which in the past were hard hit by the pandemic. With the intention of increasing our sales force, we have decided to expand our production site: construction work will begin shortly and the final goal will be to have a total production area of around 7000 and 1000 square metres of office space. This is yet another strategic choice that will allow Novatek to grow further in the market (by increasing our production capacity we will in fact be able to attract larger and larger customers). So much effort that we have been recognised with the prestigious CRIBIS award; ‘The CRIBIS Prime Company is a very valuable award given that only 5% of the more than 6 million Italian companies are awarded it each year. It is attributed using the CRIBIS D&B Rating, a synthetic indicator that, on the basis of a statistical algorithm, measures the probability that a company generates serious commercial insolvencies; numerous variables are analysed, such as balance sheet ratios, payment experience, presence of negative information as well as, obviously, personal data and data relating to legal form, geographic area, size and company seniority. The CRIBIS Prime Company award is therefore the highest level of assessment of an organisation’s commercial reliability and is only and exclusively awarded to companies that consistently maintain a high level of economic and commercial reliability and are virtuous in their payments to suppliers.’
Novatek, moreover, is one of the close circle of companies that has received the award, for two consecutive years.

How much do you invest in technological innovation?
Very much! In an era of great technological progress – today, digitalisation shapes our world by rationalising obsolete processes and creating new operational possibilities – Novatek has for some time now been focusing on modernising its machine park, with the aim of increasing speed and precision of execution. The company has therefore decided to adopt increasingly efficient and automated machining models, integrating machines, systems and people. These investments in technological innovation (every year we invest 15% of our turnover in the purchase of new machinery and software) have disruptively revolutionised the way we operate, allowing us to make production processes more efficient, to constantly monitor the various operational processes, and to create increasingly precise and high-performance products. But in a digital and interconnected world, where machines will work more and more closely with humans, people will be required to have increasingly specific technical and mechanical skills. This is why Novatek is investing heavily in its human resources, including through ad hoc training processes aimed at increasing the knowledge of a young and motivated professional group, which includes many women. This confirms our commitment to building a cutting-edge working environment in an innovative multicultural context.

Future goals?
Novatek is a company with a green heart which is now aiming to obtain environmental certification by 2025. This is an important recognition for a company which, since 2010, has been using a photovoltaic system with polycrystalline silicon panels with a power of 170kw to obtain the energy needed to run its machinery. Thanks to the choice of harmonising economic growth objectives with environmental policies – thus combining innovation, productivity, competitiveness and respect for the environment – over the years we have managed to become an example of best practices for the entire sector. An extraordinary achievement for a company that aims to grow further in new strategic markets!

For more info (http://www.novatek-srl.com)

F.M.T. shines in the market for professionalism and innovation

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Imbimbo

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6 Novembre 2024

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Founded in 1992 in Fiano Romano, F.M. Trasporti S.r.l. is a logistics and transport company operating nationally and internationally, which has managed to impose its leadership in a highly competitive market thanks to the high quality of its services. In this interview, President Corrado Rabbia, reveals the reasons for such success of a company that aims to conquer new strategic markets by investing more and more in the diversification of its offer, human capital and technological innovation.
by Roberta Imbimbo

Dr. Rabbia, with what mission was FM Trasporti born?
The company was founded in 1992 with the ambitious goal of becoming an important reference point in the logistics and transport market; a challenge won thanks to a strategic vision and an innovative business approach aimed at customer centrality. Today, F.M.T. is a dynamic and future-oriented reality, with a strong vocation for technological innovation and the enhancement of human capital, which has managed to impose its leadership in a highly competitive market thanks to some high added-value peculiarities that have allowed it to experience exponential growth both in terms of turnover (+39.10% in the period 2019-2022) and geographical expansion, becoming a qualified and reliable partner for national and international companies that rely on its experience and professionalism with confidence.

More specifically, what are the distinguishing features that have allowed you to differentiate yourself from your competitors?
Right from the start, we wanted to anchor all our strategic choices to precise corporate values, such as the quality of the service provided (the operations centre is active 7 days a week, 24 hours a day precisely to guarantee punctuality, efficiency and maximum safety and to intervene promptly in the event of disruptions), technological innovation (the average age of our vehicles is barely 4 years) the valorisation of human capital (our 350 employees are undoubtedly our most important resource on whom we invest considerable resources in terms of safety and training), economic, financial and environmental sustainability (in order to control CO2 emissions, 60% of our fleet is powered by alternative fuels), and transparency towards customers and all stakeholders. These peculiarities, over time, have proven to be rewarding, allowing us to increase our brand reputation in the reference market and, consequently, to clearly differentiate ourselves from other market players. As proof of the quality of our work, ISO 9001, ISO 14001, ISO 45001 and the TAPA TSR1, Trucking Security Requirements, certification for transport security, which is now the highest certification in this sector on the global market, and important recognitions, such as the inclusion of F.M.T. in the Financial Times’ ranking of the top 1000 companies in Europe for growth, soon arrived.

How important is technological innovation for you?
Very important. As I said, we wanted to invest in a latest-generation fleet, subject to very strict maintenance protocols, precisely to ensure high standards of safety and efficiency. The safety of the people who work for us, who are the beating heart of our company, is absolutely a priority to be preserved at all costs. On the other hand, thanks to these huge investments in technological innovation, today we are perfectly able to offer a high quality service, strictly tailored to the needs of each individual customer.
So many achievements to date. Future goals?
To retain our current clientele and to continue to grow in new strategic markets, always having at heart the maximisation of customer satisfaction, also by being able to proactively anticipate the needs of an ever-changing market.

The benefits and challenges of digital transformation today

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Imbimbo

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24 Ottobre 2024

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by Roberta Imbimbo
Digital Transformation is one of the hottest and most topical issues today, even for the most sceptical entrepreneurs who are finally realising that digitalisation is the only winning strategy to increase their company’s competitiveness in an increasingly digitalised and evolving global market. It is now a fact that digitally transformed companies are much more agile and able to adapt quickly to market changes; that process automation and the adoption of intelligent systems not only improve efficiency and productivity but also reduce time and costs; that data collection and analysis enable a better understanding of customer needs, personalise offers and improve customer satisfaction. ‘Competing today and especially in the next few years means transforming and innovating not only production and operating systems, but also the internal or-ganisations of people,’ says Nunzio Vernarzzani, owner of COMED S.r.l., an all-Campania excellence founded back in 1994 with the aim of asserting its leadership in the ICT market by offering high-quality Management Software Solutions and Global Services. ‘Industry 4.0 projects have so far focused solely on the world of manufacturing; today, however, there is a need to broaden the audience of SMEs to be involved in future innovative projects. A significant change of mindset is also required: to effectively manage innovative digital solutions, SMEs must focus on the radical transformation of all their organisational assets and invest in the training of the entire workforce. The journey towards digital transformation, however, also imposes significant challenges on enterprises: implementing new technologies may, for instance, lead to integration problems with existing systems. It is therefore important to carefully plan the migration and ensure compatibility between the different platforms. Managing, analysing and effectively utilising the large amount of data that digitisation brings with it also requires a well-defined data management strategy. In conclusion, digital transformation is not an option, but a necessity for companies that want to remain competitive in today’s market. However, it is a complex process that requires strategic vision, targeted investment and careful management.

For more info (www.comed.it)

Effenove shines on the market for experience and innovation

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23 Ottobre 2024

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Founded in Potenza with the ambitious goal of becoming a major reference point in the field of 3D computer graphics, Effenove is an all-Italian excellence that has managed to assert its leadership in a highly competitive market thanks to a strategic vision and huge investments in technological innovation. ‘Over the last ten years, we have adapted quickly to technological changes in order to keep the quality of our work high and to remain at the forefront,’ says Michele Scioscia, the company’s CEO, in this lengthy interview.

Mr Scioscia, with what mission was Effenove born?
Effenove is a cultural and creative industry in Potenza that works in the field of 3D computer graphics, interactivity, and digital museum layouts. It is an all-Italian excellence born from the desire to combine technology and cultural heritage; two worlds that we and Marica Berterame, co-founder of the company, have always found fascinating. The goal was to create experiences that could engage the public using 3D computer graphics: interactivity and digital museum displays. When we started, telling a heritage story often meant resorting to the methods of classical cinematography. In recent years, however, we have witnessed a radical transformation. Today, storytelling has become interactive, thanks to technologies such as gaming, Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality. These tools not only allow audiences to engage in new ways, but also offer the possibility to explore cultural content in a more immersive and personalised way. Examples of this type of approach are ‘Aosta Digitale, l’innovazione per la storia’ (Digital Aosta, innovation for history), which aims to tell the story of the city’s cultural heritage through Augmented Reality integrated in an interactive map for smartphones; the Parco Museo Virgilio, a multimedia museum in the Napoleonic fortress of Pietole near Mantua, in which Virgil’s works are told through interactive installations; or the Museo Archeologico Nazionale Mario Torelli in Venosa (PZ) in which the archaeological display is combined with interactive 3D models to be inspected and navigated.

One of the latest digital products produced is ‘Torre Guevara Experience’. Can you tell us about it?
The project, drafted and coordinated by Engineer Enrico Spera, head of the Building and Heritage Office of the Province of Potenza, not only recovers and enhances an urban space in the city of Potenza, but transforms it into an immersive experience for visitors by combining the physical world of architectural design with the virtual world of multimedia design in a synergic way: the visit to the large square of the Conti Guevara is enriched by a detailed historical narrative, made possible through the use of interactive technologies. One of the most fascinating is the Virtual Reality experience: users, wearing VR visors, fly over the rooftops of the city on board a ‘chronolfiera’, a hot-air balloon capable of going back in time to 1621. In that year, Countess Beatrice Guevara, a figure of great nobility of spirit, donated the land adjacent to the tower to the Capuchin friars for the construction of a place dedicated to the care of the sick and infirm. Through this experience, visitors can relive one of the most significant historical moments in the city of Potenza. Moreover, with Augmented Reality, using high-performance tablets, users can see historical buildings superimposed on the current square, creating a bridge between past and present. Finally, the ‘Torre Guevara Experience’ mobile application, which can be downloaded for free from the main stores, offers an interactive map that guides visitors through the city’s historical points of interest, making exploration more intuitive and engaging.

How much do you invest in technological innovation?
Technology underpins everything we do. Over the past ten years, we have had to redefine our production model several times to adapt to the constant changes and we have also integrated new tools using Artificial Intelligence, which have enabled us to speed up certain production steps, such as storyboarding or the creation of scenic backdrops, which used to be done by hand. These tools allow us to save precious time while maintaining a high standard of quality.
One of the biggest challenges has been to stay relevant in a rapidly changing industry. Technology advances at such a speed that it is essential to stay up-to-date. Furthermore, working with cultural heritage implies a great responsibility, as we have to ensure that the history and identity of the place is told respectfully and accurately, while using modern tools that amplify its reach.
We will continue to explore new technologies and push the boundaries of interactive storytelling. Augmented reality, virtual reality and, in the future, maybe even artificial intelligence applied to cultural heritage will be our next challenges. We will never stop innovating and looking for new ways to tell the stories of the past.

So many achievements to date. Future goals?
Our goal is to remain a benchmark in the field of digital museum displays and interactive storytelling. We want Effenove to continue to be synonymous with innovation and quality, contributing to the enhancement of cultural heritage for future generations.

Hikikomori: when youth distress results in the loss of sociality

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Imbimbo

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16 Ottobre 2024

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Today, an increasing number of young people between the ages of 12 and 19 decide to withdraw from social life for long periods, locking themselves away at home, without direct contact with the outside world, sometimes not even with their parents. They thus begin to swap day for night, to abandon their studies, to neglect their friendships, until a real ‘social withdrawal syndrome’ is triggered: the Japanese term Hikikomori – which literally means ‘to stay away’ – is used in jargon to refer to those young people who live at home prisoners of themselves, their anxiety or depression. We discuss this delicate topic with Michele Miccoli, Criminal Lawyer, Full Professor of Criminal Law at the International University of Milan, National President of the Associated Italian Sociologists, author of numerous academic publications and several books including ‘Hikikomori. Il nuovo male del secolo’ (published in 2018 by Lupetti editore), in which the author highlights a phenomenon that is unfortunately spreading like wildfire and which, precisely for this reason, calls for careful reflection.
by Roberta Imbimbo

Prof. Miccoli, who are the Hikikomori?
Hikikomori is a complex juvenile psychic unease characterised by a refusal of social, scholastic or working life for a prolonged period of time, of at least 6 months, and consequently, by a lack of intimate relations with the exception of those with close relatives. The phenomenon – which in Italy alone now involves 120 thousand youngsters – is taking on worrying dimensions, even in the face of the very limited resources that our country has allocated to psychiatry in the age of development. Self-isolation is now the second most frequent cause of suicide among young people and is the first cause of self-harming acts, aimed at causing damage to one’s own body in a voluntary manner, not always necessarily for suicidal purposes. It is therefore a very serious problem which, unfortunately, has multiplied exponentially since Covid: before the pandemic, in fact, hospitalisations for self-harm accounted for about 25-30% of cases, today 65-70%. The latest data provided by the Italian Federation of Paediatricians also speak of a 75% increase in attempted suicides in the last two years. Every day in Italy an adolescent tries to take his own life. And 150 thousand young people live isolated, without any social interaction with the rest of the world. In the face of these alarming figures, requests for neuropsychiatric counselling, even in emergencies, have increased 40-fold.

How to recognise a Hikikomori? What symptoms should a parent be concerned about?
Hikikomori experience social exclusion through self-isolation. Reluctance to leave the house can be due to several causes including clinical depression, social phobia or anxiety disorders. Addiction to social networks has also been widely associated with the syndrome, as young Hikikomori end up using them as their only means of communication and interaction. Teenagers choose to drastically withdraw from real life, abandoning the natural relational circuit and devoting themselves exclusively to the virtual world. This is a world artificially created to avoid human contact even more, thus worsening the state of the pathology and giving an illusory sense of having escaped the fear of real social relationships. But there can also be other causes: bullying, overwhelm, high expectations on the part of the family. School is the first place that can help us identify the first alarm bells, as it is the place where the young person may be most exposed to bullying and social pressure. But not only that. Young people may fear disappointing their family’s high expectations and not being able to cope with social pressure and confrontation with the outside world. The sense of continual failure in failing to reach the desired standards can cause a loss of interest in life, a reversal of the sleep-wake rhythm, intense feelings of anxiety, depression, panic that lead the young person to abandon studies (despite in most cases extremely high school performance), sports, friendships, and to isolate themselves in their room, which thus becomes a safe refuge from the outside world.
How to deal with a case of Hikikomori?
Since it is a real addiction as such, it should be dealt with therapeutically, trying to catch the first signs of discomfort early, not underestimating the requests for help from children in difficulty, not experiencing this pathology as a shame or a failure of one’s own child but instead promoting moments of listening, dialogue and encouraging opportunities for relationships, especially with peers. Although having a Hikikomori child is a difficult challenge for many parents, it is advisable to seek the help of a qualified specialist who can slowly lead the child out of this dangerous vortex and reintegrate into the social fabric, in a more harmonious and less conflictual manner.

Healthcare liability in nosocomial infections

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Imbimbo

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16 Ottobre 2024

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Founded in 1995 by lawyer Diego Ferraro, the Ferraro Law Firm, based in Palermo, is an excellence in the field of civil, health and insurance law (with a particular focus on civil, medical and professional liability in general). Thanks to its highly specialised know-how and a network of competent and qualified professionals, including external ones, the firm is able to guarantee judicial and extrajudicial assistance to healthcare facilities, insurance companies, professional firms, institutions and doctors throughout the country. Lawyer Diego Ferraro speaks on the subject of healthcare-associated infections (ICA), also examining the most recent case law on the subject.
by Roberta Imbimbo

Mr Ferraro, what is meant by nosocomial infections?
By definition, hospital infections – technically called I.C.A. (healthcare-associated infections) – are those infections that were not present (i.e. they were not clinically manifest, nor were they incubating) when the patient entered the healthcare facility, but which arose during hospitalisation, although in some cases they only manifested themselves after discharge. Today, these infections represent a significant challenge for the scientific community: given their extent and frequency, they have a very significant clinical and economic-social impact in terms of prolonged hospitalisation, long-term disability, mortality, the increase in antibiotic resistance and the greater economic burden for patients, families and national health systems (in Italy alone, there are between 450 and 700 thousand care-related infections every year).

In a case concerning nosocomial infections, who bears the burden of proof?
In healthcare liability lawsuits concerning nosocomial infections, where the contractual liability of the facility is invoked due to its lack of hygienic and sanitary deficiencies or to the failure of the doctors involved to perform their professional duties, the injured party must prove that he suffered a care-related damage (i.e. the aggravation of the pathological situation or the onset of new pathologies) and the causal link between that pathological condition and the hospital stay. Once the connection between the onset of the infection and the stay in the ward has been ascertained, also in terms of time, the healthcare facility, in order to be declared exempt from liability, must prove that it has adopted all the precautions prescribed by current regulations and by leges artis in order to prevent the development of infectious pathologies, and that it has promptly and adequately treated any infection once it had manifested itself. This proof, however, is by no means simple, since the facility must demonstrate that it has concretely applied the prevention protocols envisaged for this purpose. Jurisprudence on the subject is in fact very strict: the formal adoption of the protocols is not sufficient; it is also necessary to prove that they have been correctly applied to the concrete case by providing suitable evidence of said application. With this in mind, the Court of Cassation has finally specified in detail the evidentiary burdens on facilities, requiring ‘an indication of the time when the prevention activity was actually carried out’ as well as ‘an indication of the criteria for controlling and limiting the access of visitors’ and ‘an indication of the numerical ratio between staff and patients’.

What damages are compensable today?
When a nosocomial infection is caused by negligence or non-compliance with hygiene and prevention rules, the patient is entitled to claim compensation. This compensation, taking into account the specific case and the outcome of the infection, may cover various items, including medical expenses incurred and any additional costs for treatment or prolonged hospital stay, non-asset damage, differential biological damage, and loss of chance (of survival or recovery). The latter, which the Supreme Court identifies as the ‘lost chance of a better outcome’, is undoubtedly the item of damage typically linked to hospital infections.
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Freedom in Sales confirms itself as a qualified and reliable partner

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Imbimbo

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8 Ottobre 2024

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Founded in 2012 to offer shippers, airlines, handling agents and their local representatives its services, on the strength of its air space with some first-tier carriers and its market neutrality and highly specialised know-how, Freedom in Sales has recorded vertiginous growth in a short time, succeeding in imposing itself worldwide for reliability, professionalism, punctuality and high quality of services offered to the entire air transport chain. ‘Thanks to an innovative vision aimed at customer-centricity and market orientation, and the entrepreneurial ability demonstrated in the management of complex movements, we have succeeded in establishing our leadership in both the Italian and international markets,’ says Roberto Melis, CEO of a future-oriented company certified by IATA (International Air Transport Association). ‘In recent years, we have worked hard to strategically innovate in order not to miss out on the important business opportunities offered by a market that, despite the strong world instability caused by the wars still going on in many geographical areas and the consequent geopolitical tensions, looks to the future with ever greater optimism. And so, in order to prepare ourselves for increasingly ambitious challenges, we have not only further strengthened strategic agreements at a global level that we can offer the Italian market, creating an impressive network of forwarding agents and thus becoming one of the main Italian players for exports to North America, and in addition to specialising in the airfreight of temperature-controlled pharmaceutical products (we are among the very few companies in Italy to have obtained the most important certifications for the management of this particular product), we have decided to focus on an increasingly high added-value and competitive offer, and we are working on the creation of an innovative digital platform capable of improving the management processes of bookings and shipments. We have also continued the company’s internationalisation process, expanding our trade routes to new strategic markets such as South America. An excellent achievement for a company with a green heart that has managed in a short time to significantly expand its customer base, even in a complex historical moment such as the one we are currently experiencing.

Tax Solving STP, a niche professional reality in the Lower Bergamo area

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Imbimbo

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8 Ottobre 2024

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In the pulsating lower Bergamo area, in Romano di Lombardia, operates Tax Solving STP, a firm among professionals whose founding partners are Dr. Giorgio C. Rubini and Dr. Luca Alberti, both Chartered Accountants, Tax Defenders and Auditors. Tax Solving STP represents a niche firm in the said territory in which, in addition to traditional tax & accounting services, the in-depth skills matured by the two professionals converge with a highly specialized offering in the fields of tax litigation and wealth protection planning and defense. Recently, the firm also gave birth to the department focused on issues related to sustainability reporting, in view of the revolution introduced in the European landscape by the CSRD (Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive), which came into force on January 1, 2023.

“Tax litigation represents the core business of our corporate structure,” explains Dr. Giorgio C. Rubini, an experienced tax defender with nearly 30 years of professional activity, many of which have been spent defending taxpayers in tax courtrooms throughout the country. “We assist our clients already from the pre-litigation phase, in case of accesses, inspections, audits or “desk” controls, where it not infrequently happens to witness a compression of some of the fundamental rights of the taxpayer, on paper constitutionally guaranteed, with blatant violations even of inescapable principles of Euro-unitarian derivation. In Tax Solving STP we can boast of having achieved specializations in numerous Master’s degrees at the highest levels related to the area of tax litigation and litigation that have allowed us to develop skills and sensitivity such as to enable us to adopt from time to time extremely incisive strategies in the protection of clients,” concludes Dr. Rubini.

“As part of a global defense project, our firm is also involved in providing entrepreneurs with more forward-looking tools to protect personal and corporate assets, clarifies Tax Solving STP co-founder Dr. Luca Alberti, a tax defender and wealth management expert. “Today, managing assets in an increasingly evolving regulatory and market environment has become particularly complex. Our firm aims to offer expertise, methods and practical tools to provide clients with appropriate tools to protect capital in generational transitions, ensuring continuity of assets and preserving their value. Families increasingly need to develop a long-term strategy for wealth preservation, setting themselves the goal of achieving the right balance between the needs of the present and future ambitions.” Lastly, in Tax Solving it was decided to give a strong impetus to the creation of an area dedicated to the topic related to Sustainability. “This is a topic that is very close to our hearts,” Dr. Luca Alberti further clarifies. “Few people know, in fact, that following the amendment of the second paragraph of Article 41 of the Constitution, two additional constraints have been added to the freedom of private economic initiative, which cannot take place in conflict with health and the environment. The legislative change also reformed the third paragraph of Article 9, which, by providing that public and private economic activity “may be directed and coordinated for social and environmental purposes,” confirms the idea that state legislation should also take ecological needs into account. The most important consequence, in my opinion, of the new legislation is that the choice to have a sustainability management and communication tool brings a number of benefits for the company: internal benefits, which are reflected in better organization and management of endogenous processes of the company, and external benefits, which result in better visibility and greater reliability for the company’s stakeholders. As Sustainability consultants, we accountants of Tax Solving Stp with its Partners can support even small and medium-sized companies that, although not yet obliged by legislation, are embedded in a context that requires them to meet certain sustainability standards or, in any case, in a forward-looking way, wish to set up a competitive sustainability policy that affects the value creation process.

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