Italian experts see innovation as bridge to China

MILAN - "It was not an odd choice, as many thought at that time, when we decided to go to China," Maurizio Boiocchi, General Manager at Italian company Pirelli, stressed at a conference held here on Thursday.

It was in 2005 and Pirelli, one of the leading tyre manufacturers in the world, decided to open two factories in China' s Shandong province.

"We had always been considered a brand for top-level cars, and the Chinese market did not look so pleasing in this regard," Boiocchi recalled.

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"Ten years have passed and we are now the proof that it is possible to produce high-quality goods in China," he told Xinhua.

Boiocchi underlined that Pirelli produces in China the same identical products that it produces in Europe or in the United States.

"China decisively means innovation and quality to us. We do not have only factories in China, but also a research and development center," he added.

Pirelli was one of the pioneers in a journey that has led many Italian innovation-driven companies to build stronger ties with China.

Those taking part in the Italy China Innovation Forum, which was held in business capital Milan in the presence of Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi and top officials, provided testimony of how China is considered by the Italian industrial world as a highly innovative country.

"China has strong technological capacity, while Italy has a predisposition for creativity," Giovanni Azzone, rector of the Politecnico di Milano university - one of the best technical universities in the world which has many projects with China and hosted the conference - told Xinhua.

"These two ways of innovating are complementary," said the rector, whose dream is to create an integrated campus "in which the Chinese and Italian methods can take advantage of diversities. "

Azzone described Li's visit to Italy as an opportunity to see first-hand how innovation can be a bridge to China. "I had the feeling of a person with a great vision," he said referring to the Chinese premier.

Innovation-based agreements were signed during Li's visit to Italy in a variety of sectors including energy, aeronautics, health, transportation, environment, shipbuilding and education.

Family group Mossi Ghisolfi, another jewel of the Italian industrial world, signed a $600 million deal for the establishment of a refinery of second generation bioethanol in China's Anhui province.

Mossi Ghisolfi, a world leader in the application of innovation to the sectors of PET, engineering and renewable chemical products derived from non-food biomass, has developed with other parters a technology for the production of second generation biofuels from plants not suitable for food consumption.

In simple words, the group's CEO Guido Ghisolfi explained to Xinhua, the refinery will employ the Italian technology to convert around one million of metric tons per year of Chinese agricultural residues into bioethanol and green energy.

"We are excited to collaborate with China in the environment protection, and moreover we are particularly happy to have carried out this important project in the province," he highlighted.