ITALY – The atmosphere in the Italian wood machinery industry has clearly improved. 

Plenty of signals from several directions are generating optimism, with the additional support of hard figures: in 2015, the turnover of Italian woodworking technology amounted to 1,864 million euro and the economic survey for the first quarter 2016 showed further positive signals, with a 22.7 percent growth driven by sustained business both in Italy and across the borders.

Although business follows specific and well-known trends during a year, if such increase continues at 10 percent on an annual basis, total 2016 turnover would exceed the two thousand billion euro threshold, getting very close to 2.1 billion that represent the industry’s all-time record. “We can say with confidence that a great contribution to this result was given by Xylexpo, our biennial exhibition that closed a few weeks ago”, said Lorenzo Primultini, President of Acimall and of the exhibition. “In the weeks before the exhibition, during the exhibition days, and in the exhibitors’ statements about the results of the event, there is one common element: great satisfaction for the ‘Milan May’. Xylexpo has always been an international event with a global scope, but once again it was the home exhibition of made in Italy; an opportunity that Italian companies were able to leverage to meet industry operators from all over the world coming to Milan”.