Agreements for Competitiveness in Lombardy: now you can talk quickly and directly to public administration

Among the point of weakness of Italy in attracting investments, there is an always mentioned issue: time and uncertainty when trying to dialogue to the public administration. Initiatives and projects, especially when coming from foreign investors, can be prevented to look for a support by the public administration because of its poor reputation in timing and feedback.

The need for easy-to-manage tools to simplify the relationship between investors and public administration is now satisfied by the “Agreements for Competitiveness”, active in Lombardy starting from April 2014.

Companies wanting to launch projects in the field of Research & Innovation, public infrastructures and training of human capital can now aspire to be supported in Lombardy and obtain concessions granted according to EU Regulation 651/2014 up to a maximum amount that can vary from 15% to 50% of the total cost. For the projects related to Research & Innovation, the sectors included in the concessions are:

• Aerospace;
• Agro-food;
• Eco-Industry;
• Art and Cultural activities;
• Health;
• Advanced Manufacturing (IT innovation);
• Sustainable mobility

How it works. Lombardy Region offers economic support to business investments through the co-financing of:

1. projects of research and innovation;
2. project aimed to improve the human capital;
3. public infrastructure related to the productive settlement.

The tool is targeted to companies, in individual or shared form,

1. not established in Lombardy yet, but are interested in opening a new production plant in the region;
2. interested to acquire and/or invest in existing companies based in Lombardy;
3. with production facilities in Lombardy, and deciding to give up a plan for relocation/outsourcing abroad in order to continue to invest in Lombardy region;
4. with production facilities in Lombardy and deciding to review and develop the business activity, even integrating in Lombardy part of the production currently existing abroad.

The Agreements for Competitiveness are based on the idea to support business investments through co-financing and are organized in a lean and short procedure, articulated in a selection of projects proposals (expression of interest and executive project) and a negotiation procedure.

Timing is the point of strength of the Agreements of Competitiveness, it is precisely defined so to be suitable for the planning and budgeting proceeding, absolutely necessary of companies. It works as follows:

• within 30 days from the submission of the expression of interest, an Evaluation Team will assess it and will decide to reject or to admit
• if the project is admitted, within 90 days after the submission of the draft, the project will be evaluated by the “Evaluation Team” that will proceed to reject or to admit it at the negotiating procedure
• the negotiation procedure is completed within 90 days from the date of approval of the final project.

The whole content of Agreements for Competitiveness can be read here in Italian and is summarized in English here

Invest in Lombardy is available in supplying further information and supporting applications to the Agreements for Competitiveness. Contact us: info@investinlombardy.com