The Intesa Sanpaolo Group consolidated important agreements with trade associations to support business growth.

Cooperation with Confindustria Piccola Industria continued. The agreement “Una crescita possibile” (“A possible growth”) was extended to include new areas added such as company welfare and capital market access for SMEs, along with financial benefits for investing companies.

The government's proposed 2016 Stability Law included a “Package for Businesses” with a number of benefits and tax relief measures. Tax relief up to 140% of the value of capital goods will be granted (“invest 100 and deduct 140”) immediately for taxpayers making investments. In 2016, Intesa Sanpaolo assisted companies wishing to make investments, offering a combined medium/long term loan (maximum duration of 5 years, including prepayment up to 2 years) and a short term credit line to support current assets, provided as an advance on trade receivables generated by company growth with the investment made (up to a maximum of 40% of the amount invested).

An agreement was also renewed with Confindustria Piccola Industria in November 2016 (the sixth since 2009) for the 2017-2019 period, with the shared aim of repositioning the industrial system in a central role in the country's development. The agreement, called “Progettare il futuro. Accelerazione, trasformazione digitale, competitività” (Planning the future. Acceleration, digital transformation, competitiveness) has earmarked 90 billion for companies to lever opportunities of the “fourth industrial revolution” to digitalise the production system.

The agreement focuses on the following areas:

  • financing growth, accelerating company investments, through the use of a new rating model (that considers intangible assets along with purely financial and economic factors of individual companies), and targeted MLT solutions;
  • empowering human capital in companies, with training, the inclusion of young people in production (alternating school/work) and offering company welfare solutions;
  • consolidating business integration and creating ecosystems or networks among companies;
  • creating a digital platform – the Tech-marketplace – to support internationalisation and some important Italian sectors such as tourism and artistic/cultural heritage (see the section “Intellectual and infrastructure capital”, page 110).
  • promoting the creation of new businesses, also through the development of a new model to assess innovative start-ups, women in business and companies run by non-EU citizens.

The agreement signed in December 2016 with Confcommercio shared the objective of supporting the re-qualification and innovation of trading and service companies. Human capital and generational change, support for women and young people in business, e-commerce and POS, valuing Italian manufacturing, loyalty initiatives and training all feature in the agreement.

To support agriculture and food industry companies in Italy, Intesa Sanpaolo and the Ministry of Agricultural, Food and Forestry Policies signed a three-year agreement for cooperation in the food and agricultural sectors, in 2016. The agreement has a three-year limit of 6 billion euro, mainly for promoting and developing Italian production chains, generational change, e-commerce, technological innovation and products. Agreements with main trade associations were also renewed. The “Plafond Creditagri Italia” (Italy Credit Agreement) was renewed with Coldiretti, and a partnership with entered into with Confagricoltura to train members (Enapra), with whom the tender “Social Agriculture” was called.

The commitment of international banks to agriculture was significant. Some of the actions taken in 2016 are listed below. Intesa Sanpaolo Bank Romania continued to provide financial support for small and medium-sized agricultural companies during seasonal changes, for young farmers and rural start-ups. Intesa Sanpaolo Bank Albania supported the local agricultural industry with advisory services and loans, and involved around 300 farmers in events and seminars for implementing new financial tools for the sector. Banca Intesa Beograd started the “Agroprotect” project for Serbian farmers.