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Missed the last furniture week fair in Milan you were counting on to add new elegant pieces to your apartment? Struggling to remember the name of that wine firm you visited while in Sicily, last year? For those who look at Italy not only as a land of a millennial cultural heritage, or host to a number of naturalistic wonders to enjoy, choosing a reliable business partner can be daunting. The eight thousand municipalities in which Italy is divided are scattered with productive clusters animated by hundreds of thousands of micro, small and medium sized enterprises which hold the flag of craftsmanship, blended in a creative mix of tradition and innovation often unparalleled anywhere else in the world. Where to start from? The list of micro and small businesses wearing the “tricolore” on their websites is almost endless, and the risk of falling into the “Italian Sounding effect” is high.
That sound of Italy that doesn’t really ‘sound’ so well…
The improper use of words, colors, places, images, denominations and recipes that, although recalling Italy, in fact have nothing to do with the original national production is thriving around the globe. Too often they dig into the rich cake of Italian export. This bounty has increased by 60% in the last ten years and that accounts for 1000 out of the 5000 top products exchanged on world markets.
A startling example comes from the Food and Beverage sector. Sales of Italian F&B abroad are strongly affected by the impact of phenomena of counterfeiting and Italian Sounding, hitting from wines and spirits to a number of other products belonging to many more categories. Worldwide, in 2019 food fraud weighted on Italy’s trade balance in the agro-food sector a round figure of over 100 billion euros, with a record increase of 70% over the last decade.
Be it modified recipes, the use of lower quality ingredients or alternative production methods, all these practices have in common the poor transparency of the production and distribution chain along which, after multiple passages, it can be really hard to trace the real journey of your main course at that lovely (Italian?) restaurant in your neighborhood.
Looking for Made in Italy in the right place
Indeed, navigating the Italian business landscape can be as difficult as it can be without a guide who, like Virgilio for Dante – the reference is a must in the 700th anniversary of the death of the father of modern Italian literature – takes you from the sometimes-tricky trails of the web to the heights of “truth” of what ‘Made in Italy’ really is. There is a "hunger" for Made in Italy in the world. In the age of the Internet, smartphones and apps we are told the answer to all our curiosities is only a few taps away on our screens. But where should we be looking for?
Italianbusinessregister.it (IBR) is the online resource one should try to start from when looking into the rich basket of Italian productions. The Registry is the English version – output included – of the official Italian Business Register held at the Chambers of Commerce, the public entities responsible by law for collecting, storing and distributing information on all Italian businesses (an expansion of the information section of the portal is also just around the corner, as a new release will soon be available also in French, German and Spanish).
Thanks to the Company reports available at IBR, it is now easier to learn the legal situation and the main economic information of an Italian company, all in a simple online document already available in English, with the seal of reliability as it is provided by an official source.
The guarantee of reliability of the information provided is also backed by the QR Code printed on the first page of the report, the identification code thanks to which anyone can check, directly from their smartphone or tablet (as well as from a PC) that the document in their possession corresponds to the one on file in the Register of companies at the time of extraction. The service is particularly convenient, as there are no translation costs: company registration reports in English actually cost as much as reports in Italian.
What IBR offers: the list of outputs
It contains the personal, legal, economic and fiscal information for a company, as reported in the Italian Business Register. Includes references to: registration, name, details, contacts, address of the registered office, PEC (certified e-mail), registered office, secondary offices and local units, tax code / VAT number, legal nature, date of foundation, corporate purpose , distribution of share capital, activities carried out, any quality certificates, certifications, administrative positions, control positions and qualifications, corporate bodies, owners and partners with shares, presence in other registers, possession of roles and licenses.
The portal provides the series of deposited accounting documents (financial statements) that a company is required to draw up periodically, in accordance with the law, in order to follow the principle of truthfulness and provide a clear, truthful and correct picture of its financial situation.
Through the use of filters, it is also possible to extract customized lists of companies, both simple (with information only on the company name and geographic data) and more structured, in which in addition to the basic data it is also possible to obtain information on data economic, personnel related and additional information such as website, telephone number, e-mail address where stated.
The Italianbusinessregister.it in short
Created since its inception - in 1996 - electronically by InfoCamere, on behalf of the Italian chamber system, the Business Register is the official, complete and updated archive of public information relating to companies operating in Italy, required by law to register with Chambers of Commerce. Thanks to the italianbusinessregister.it portal, the Register can be consulted by the international public through a version completely designed to facilitate the search and identification of information essential for establishing reliable B2B relationships between foreign operators and Italian companies. From the name to the deeds of incorporation, to the persons who hold positions within them, passing through any changes made after birth and up to the economic activities carried out and the offices in the area and the certifications received, the Register is the essential starting point for each operator who wants to know the Italian production system - from large groups to business networks and up to innovative startups - to verify the truthfulness of information on a customer or potential supplier, or to identify possible partners to develop their business.
