One of the goals of any good mechanical engineer is to study and experiment with new machines, new processes and new solutions each and every day, and this research, study and experimenting starts at university.

Or more to the point, it starts at the University of Brescia’s Department of Mechanical Engineering, which sent 40 of its students to the Pirelli Foundation on 28 May to study the history and development of a multinational that has been in business for over 140 years.

They also took a look at technology, from the tyre manufacturing process to the equipment used to measure vibration, and from a tour of our indoor testing room to one of our Bollate (Milan) production facilities.

For these students, it was an opportunity to catch a glimpse of what the future could bring, given that manufacturing remains the traditional career outlet for all those who graduate with degrees in mechanical engineering.

It’s looking like a busy May for the Pirelli Foundation. Every Thursday and Friday of the the month, the Foundation will host classes from the Giovanni Battista Pirelli elementary school, located in the Bicocca district of Milan.

The purpose of the initiative is to make kids aware of the history of the Bicocca area, its radical transformation from an industrial hub to a residential neighbourhood, and the important role played by the manufacturers who once operated there, and Pirelli in particular . The encounters with the school children are organised in two sessions: a ‘theoretical’ lesson, to be held at the Fondazione, followed by a more ‘experiential’ visit to the HangarBicocca.

During the morning at the Foundation, our young guests will have the opportunity to visit the Bicocca degli Arcimboldi, the cooling tower inside the Pirelli Headquarters, and of course the Historical Archive. Here, the kids will learn about the transformation of the area, the manufacturing process of a tyre (told through the metaphor of baking a cake) and the evolution of Pirelli advertising, using materials from the Archive.

The second part of the day takes place at HangarBicocca, where creative activities will be conducted, such as the realisation of an advertising poster, an updated map of the Bicocca district or the construction of a tyre using salt dough. Lastly, our guests will have lunch in the restaurant Dopolavoro Bicocca restaurant, which will offer them a special menu.

An intense experience that promises to enrich all the participants, and that reminds us all once again of the importance of historical memory and its preservation.

For further information or to find out how to take part in the event, please write to info@fondazionepirelli.org.

Our encounters with the university continue. 18 and 19 April are devoted to Erasmus programme students, both Italian and from abroad, thanks to the Erasmus program, and to the employees of the University of Milano-Bicocca.

The visits to the Pirelli Foundation and its Historical Archive, the Bicocca degli Arcimboldi and the cooling tower inside the Pirelli Headquarters are organised by the Associazione Studenti Bicocca (ASB) in collaboration with the Erasmus Student Network (ESN).

Magazines to leaf through, drawers to open, photos to look at, and videos to screen: a whole array of activities plunged the students into the history of a company with a long story to tell.

Over 3,000 students from 60 schools and universities took part in the activities of our educational programme, which started in September last year. Inside Edu was set up to capture the impressions and opinions of children and young people. This video-interview project led to the creation of 11 video clips, which were published on social networks, with a discussion on the company archives and on innovation and communication.

The classes were given guided tours through the premises of the Foundation, with in-depth analyses in the fields of photography, company history, sustainability, and visual communication, to mention but a few of the topics covered. The tour devoted to the evolution of advertising graphics was one of the most appreciated: after visiting the current exhibition, Advertising with a Capital P, many classes tried their hand at creating stop-motion advertisements or posters for bicycle tyres.

To have a close-up view of the complexities involved in the creation of a new tyre, the kids found out about the chemical laboratories, where the raw materials are analysed, the physics laboratories and, also in the research and development department, the experimentation laboratories, where prototypes are tested to meet the standards required for safety and sustainability. The Next MIRS plant in Milan Bicocca and the Pirelli Industrial Centre in Settimo Torinese – two excellent examples of digital factories – allowed the students to follow the entire production process, from the compounds all the way to tyres ready for the market.

In autumn 2018, many partnerships were entered into with external institutions and associations. Pirelli Foundation Educational collaborated for the first time with the Traffic Police, with agents taking part in the educational activities at WOW Spazio Fumetto during the week devoted to road victims. An exhibition of historic Pirelli posters and educational courses for primary schools were organised with the aim of raising young people’s awareness of the dangers of the road and introducing them to the 10 golden rules of road safety.

The Pirelli Foundation’s focus on the world of robotics, coding and the digital revolution in general was at the centre of interaction with Coolest Projects Milano 2018, an international project that gives young people the chance to present their inventions in the field of digital creativity. As part of the event, the Pirelli Foundation, in collaboration with the company’s Research and Development department, illustrated Pirelli’s commitment to training and innovation in the digital age.

Cinema & History, the 7th edition of the training and refresher course for teachers, took place in the last quarter, from February to April, organised in collaboration with Fondazione ISEC and the Fondazione Cineteca Italiana. This year, about 80 teachers took part in a course of lectures and screenings that reflected on the experience of nation states and on their historical evolution in the light of contemporary processes of globalisation.

Medicine-Engineering. To combine knowledge on health, wellbeing and life quality with the most innovative digital technologies. Thanks to an agreement between Humanitas University and Milan Polytechnic, a new degree course has been launched in Milan to train the doctor-engineers of the future. And once again the city consolidates its reputation as the ideal place for original combinations of sciences with other disciplines, for a “new humanism” that develops innovative new areas of knowledge. “Medical and technological research is converging all over the world. Big data, artificial intelligence, biomaterials, machine learning. Italy can afford to be ambitious if there is a joint effort between universities, research centres, businesses and public and private authorities,” explains Gianfelice Rocca, a man of science and economics, chairman of Techint and Humanitas and former chairman of Assolombarda (Corriere della Sera, 6 June).

The upshot of this is Medtech School, a degree in Medicine and, at the same time, Biomedical Engineering. A six-year programme for 50 students selected from international applicants (entrance test on 6 September) with courses in English, classes and lab work at both Humanitas (where the hospital departments are available) and the Polytechnic. Its ambition? To become an innovative trailblazer for other similar courses across the world. “Effective, personalised and sustainable healthcare,” comment Marco Montorsi, surgeon and rector of Humanitas University, and Ferruccio Resta, engineer and rector of the Polytechnic (Il Sole24Ore, 6 June). They explain: “Precision medicine, nanotechnologies, robotics, artificial intelligence and big data will become an increasingly day-to-day part of the lives of future doctors and this must be reflected in their training, so we can enrich the country with the knowledge and expertise that our graduates need in order to grow.” Rocca continues: “It is a cultural change. Technology serves to give doctors more time to take their eyes off the patient and look at them more thoroughly. And the life sciences sector is destined to become even more decisive in ageing economies. In the US it represents 20% of the economy and accounts for 30-40% of research. A profoundly social sector. With communities that compete to achieve excellence and blaze a trail for their regions.”

The major pharmaceutical companies are getting involved in the life sciences sector. But so too are Google, Apple and IBM. Business logic is being combined with the social logic of “taking care” of ageing people, the vulnerable (the sick), and the families affected by the suffering of their nearest and dearest. Europe and Italy have a long tradition in the area of welfare. And this profound culture of solidarity and assistance, this public mission, must be carefully supported also with the help of new technologies. In short: improved welfare thanks to hi-tech expertise. A “public” mission – it is worth adding – which is strengthened thanks to collaboration between public entities and private enterprises. There are plenty of virtuous examples from the healthcare sector in Milan and Lombardy (but also in Emilia) which can act as benchmarks at both national and European level. Rocca explains: “In terms of innovation, the results are positive: of the top ten research centres in Italy, seven are in Milan and all of these figure among the top 5% worldwide. We now have a joint responsibility to drive this cluster of life sciences forward.” Is Milan the new Boston? “Boston is in the top 2% worldwide. But we can grow.” How? By continuing to attract resources, talent and expertise. By getting the academic world, industry, the state and regions which invest large amounts of the public budget in healthcare and insurance to work together. And by involving patients and their families.

Montorsi and Resta add: “Medtech School is designed for young men and women who want to be doctors who are capable of managing the development of innovation in medicine, doctors who are able to fully exploit the new technologies, understand their mechanisms, govern the processes for modifying and improving them, place them at the service of healthcare professionals and provide patients with even closer assistance.” But this isn’t all that’s on the horizon: “We will see the creation of a new professional figure dedicated to businesses and industrial sectors that operate in the area of devices and biomedical technologies or in the pharmaceutical sector; to government healthcare institutions; to research centres, where medical and engineering expertise will be the springboard for amazing possibilities in terms of innovation and new results.” It is a complex challenge. Technological, entrepreneurial, educational and social in nature. And therefore also political and cultural. Italy and Milan have much to contribute, also at a European level.

A speech by the Bishop of Milan offers an interesting take on business culture

It is important to ask ourselves questions about the meaning of the things we do. Perhaps it is even more important to ask ourselves what the real goals of our actions are. These are questions that apply to everyone. Including entrepreneurs and managers involved with production systems that can impact significantly on the surrounding environment and on the people that help them achieve their production targets.

“Contribution to a dialogue. Economics, work, social justice”, written and read by Mario Enrico Delpini, Bishop of Milan, at the LIUC during the celebrations to mark the 150th anniversary of the death of Carlo Cattaneo, provides lots of interesting new perspective on these questions.

Delpini begins his discourse by considering how the Scriptures can help us to interpret the crisis facing us today. Beginning with one of the most famous passages from the Gospels (“You cannot serve God and money”), the Bishop outlines the risks of idolising wealth. “The idolatry of wealth/profit/efficiency – says Delpini -, leads us to pursue the foolish illusion that economic wellbeing can save lives and guarantee happiness, ignoring the precariousness of these idols (…)”. He continues: “The idolatry of wealth/profit/efficiency/accumulation depersonalises people and becomes systemic”. All of this while recognising that it is “legitimate for every businessman, teacher and student to ask themselves who they want to serve, the real God or the money god, because sometimes it is as if two types of god existed: one on Sundays and holidays, and the other from Monday to Friday”. Naturally, the danger is that “profit becomes a kind of illusory absolute, created by foolish men that lose all sense of proportion”.

With all this in mind, Delpini comes to the conclusion that a large part of the economic and production system needs to “change its tune”. A complex and difficult process but one that is possible if we begin from the premise that “looking after ‘human capital’ is a positive practice adopted by farsighted businesses”, an approach whose cornerstones include the sharing of values, the growth of people and the transfer of knowledge and these same values.

Although Delpini’s view of business culture comes from a strictly Christian perspective, his considerations will also find common ground with those that have different visions of the world. And if nothing else, the words of the Bishop of Milan make interesting reading for us all.

Contribution to a dialogue. “Economics, work, social justice”

Mario Enrico Delpini, Bishop of Milan,

LIUC, Castellanza, 14 May 2019

Click here to download PDF

A book takes a critical look at the myths of the digital economic system and identifies new resources for Italy

Myths are still perpetrated today. And they also exist in the business industry. Without mentioning viral urban legends (even the Internet itself is often a myth). And without considering the series of tips for the correct management of businesses that fall under the umbrella of management theory. The myth of the brilliant manager exists and is widespread, as is that of the Internet being able to solve every problem and the notion of ‘teambuilding’ at all costs. But we need to keep our feet on the ground when it comes to striving for super efficiency. We need to know the facts and to understand. One way of doing this is by reading “Start down. The crisis of digital myths and the reawakening of innovation” by Gabriele Colasanto and Marco Rossella.

The book questions the myths of the digital economic system with an ironic and well-informed style. It contains figures, but above all stories, images, personalities and points of view in around 200 pages that will interest those in the industry but not only. The key point pressed home by the two authors is the need to reassess the ability of Italy to create jobs without having to launch futuristic start-ups every time. Which all too often is precisely what we are told is required. A phenomenon which is seen frequently in Italy, a kind of “perennial election campaign climate” in which artisans, SME’s and pensioners come first in a constant dialectic which both represents a sales pitch and fans the flames of the social discontent permeating the country. The book also makes an assertion borne out by the numbers: the international start-up system has not produced companies capable of inventing new paradigms at global level for at least fifteen years and is looking for original new ways to reinvent itself. Italy therefore risks continuing to frantically pursue a dream that is already old, regarding the legendary Silicon Valley with deference, gambling too late on imported ideas and reproducing the sins of pettiness and presumption that are typical of our country.

Divided into nine chapters and numerous in-depth profiles, the book begins with a prologue with a significant title – “Prologue.  Or on the need to bust the myth” -, and finishes with a conclusion with an equally attention-grabbing title – “For all those young people full of hope” -, which contains an important assertion in the final lines: “The overall impression is that it would do us good to stop using the word “digital” erroneously, at least for a little while, and to begin using the word “innovation” again: here, the playing field is larger and we can still make a contribution with our individual and collective stories”.

The book is further enriched with three contributions from Marco Grazioli (chairman of The European House – Ambrosetti), Salvatore Majorana (director of Kilometro Rosso, Bergamo) and Luigi Serio (who teaches Economics and Business Management at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore).

Colasanto and Rossella’s book is lively and well written and rather than theory focuses on people and real lives, stories of successes and failures that are able to teach us all something.

Start down. The crisis of digital myths and the reawakening of innovation

Gabriele Colasanto, Marco Rossella

GueriniNEXT, 2019