Assomac and the new role of management

As of January 2024, Agostino Apolito is the new general manager of Assomac, the national association that aggregates and represents Italian manufacturers of footwear, leather goods, and tannery technologies. With a well-established background in Confindustria Florence, where he acquired transversal skills that led him to the deputy chairmanship of the Tuscan body in 2016, Agostino Apolito picked up the baton from Roberto Vago.
We met him in Vigevano at the Assomac headquarters to understand in detail the key points of his strategic role of supporting the presidency in advocating the interests of member companies and promoting their business globally. “We also believe very much in our role as disseminators. Being able to tell well about who we are, what we do and how we do it, starting with content, is the challenge I have given myself.”
Agostino Apolito, what are the lessons passed on from your previous management career in Confindustria Florence? Is there a common thread that accumulates the roles and responsibilities you assumed in the exercise of the two different activities?
“I am picking up the baton from our ‘emeritus’ director, as I call him, a chemist lent to mechanical engineering who will now be able to enjoy his well-deserved retirement.
During my 27-year career in Confindustria Florence, I have worked on multiple aspects: guidance, assistance and support to companies on finance and business law, governance, internationalization, innovation, investment policies and merger strategies. In a world of 1,800 member SMEs, divided initially into 19 and then 13 product sections, I learned the importance of dialogue with businesses. Over the past 12 years, I took up the challenge issued by Gianfranco Lotti of BMB (Bottega Manifatturiera Borse), president of the leather goods section, to devote myself to one of the most important sectors of the fashion business. The spark was lit and I began to work in direct contact with the supply chain and brands in the sector, dealing with the organization of production processes, business networks, the aspects related to the relationship between suppliers/subcontractors and principals, cost/ minute, all issues with a strong impact on workers and the product. This was the liaison that led me, following a conversation I had with Assomac President MaVi Brustia, to decide to get back into the game, accepting to become head of a national association that is small in the number of members, but large in terms of the value it brings to our districts through a supply chain worth about 30 billion euros.”
What are the key points of your work as director general of Assomac?
“ First of all, the goals of a director are linked to those of a presidency. We are approaching the opening phase of new nominations. However, I do not believe there will be any major changes. The current presidency has set a course of continuity in programs, there is a long-term vision to which the Assomac team must serve. There are basically three key points for us.
The first is to be closer to the clients. We must seek direct contact with our stakeholders (i.e., the companies that produce the semi-finished or finished products) by finding opportunities to work on joint projects.
Then activate communication and promotion initiatives on the emerging issues of sustainability and digitization. Finally, lower ourselves into the role of an association of opinion, where the interests of our member companies an be represented in the most congruent and organic way possible, opening up institutional dialogue.”
Not surprisingly, you have become members of IT- EX.
“Promoted by Fondazione FieraMilano and 14 constituent members, the new association of Italian international trade fairs has as its main objectives the support of internationalization and the promotion of the Italian trade fair system as a key asset for business development. IT-EX intends to respond concretely to the international vocation of Italian companies through industrial policies that favour exports and the development of trade fairs in terms of attractiveness, organization and supply.
Assomac is therefore open to a whole series of actions that place it in the context of a fast-paced world such as the fashion industry, with a long-term vision of the value and importance of trade fairs in the promotion of Made in Italy on a global level.”
This year marks the 50th edition of Simac Tanning Tech. What are the new ambitions of the fair and how do you plan to enhance it?
“We are ready to celebrate the 50th anniversary of imac with a special edition full of initiatives. First of all, members and our key stakeholders will be treated to an invitation-only evening event on the 18th, where we will present them with a scenario related to the geopolitical transformation of the fashion world and how the fashion system is changing within the complexities we are experiencing.
As part of Hall 18, we will organize an exhibition on the evolution of technology and the supply chain, the rendering of which has gradually been upgraded from the initial idea. We will set up a kind of open venue where finished product, semi-finished product and technology meet in order to show the use of machinery in the making of some iconic accessories.
The ‘extra’ element of the event will be linked to the project with The European House-Ambrosetti organized to address themes and initiatives capable of anticipating client needs and further increasing the value of Made in Italy in the world. On the 17th, we will present together with our associates the innovations welcomed within the fair through a path of approach and study carried out with the collaboration of more than twenty brands, in order to best exhibit the value offered. Simac Tanning Tech – a point of reference for the sector with a visibility even outside the Association – has always hosted under one umbrella different organizations, now instead we are trying to better refine the whole proposal, enhancing the differences in order to offer our exhibitors, more than 270 among Italians and foreigners, a more qualified review with differentiated opportunities. The goal is to reach a foreign participation of target visitors of at least 40 percent of total attendance. We consider ourselves to be prepared participants: we have always presided over the tanning technology market with more than 50 percent of the market share, in progressive decrease the part related to footwear with 10 percent, while with technology for leather goods we are around 21-22 percent.
The most urgent challenge for Assomac is to create the conditions for people to really work in the supply chain, according to a logic of proximity to the client. It is no coincidence that the 2023 General Assembly of the Association was titled ‘Co-designing the Manufacturing of the Future.
Technologies for new supply chains’: the goal is to do our part in an even more collaborative way in supply chains, proposing advanced integrations in production processes.”

Therefore, the goal is to emphasize the importance of consolidating the implementation of innovative technologies in production chains starting with the fashion industry?
“Our challenge is to think all together about a new process or to improve that given production process so that technology, man and management goals converge on the issues identified. In Transition 5.0, man is at the center in the dialogue with the machine, where in Industry 4.0 the dialogue was between machine and machine. Version 5.0, according to the EU vision, complements the 4.0 paradigm by highlighting research and innovation as drivers for an evolution toward a sustainable, human-centered and resilient European industry. The next step implemented by the 5.0 plan is to harness the collaboration between increasingly powerful and precise machinery and the unique creative potential of human beings. That is why one of the important actions that the ministry envisages is precisely on the continuous training of operators, and this fits perfectly with another of our goals, which is precisely to constantly implement the training of companies’ staff.”
Instead, we come to the topic of new professions in demand in the sector. You will have to address training, with the development of partnerships with ITS. How can we bring young people closer to this world?
“Training starting from high school or postgraduate schools is an acknowledged difficulty, but also an opportunity. One way to make the world of technology more expendable in the eyes of young people is to connect it to the fashion supply chain, creating an ecosystem that is an added value for all. Federmacchine, together with Assomac and its associates, organized an event last April aimed at ITSs, technical institutes and high schools, entitled ‘Young leaders with Made in Italy machinery,’ aimed at explaining to students the contents and value of the Italian capital goods industry along with the opportunities for professional growth and personal fulfillment offered by companies in the sector. In order to make them understand how technology is changing factories and work in the manufacturing industry, we have ‘entered’ the company and the functionality of machinery through the use of 3D viewers. For now, we have completed the first step, but the project will gradually be implemented and taken around schools in order to represent and narrate the true essence of a company in the right way.
We are also focusing a lot on our technology centers abroad in Vietnam, India, and Pakistan so that they become a driving force for new technologies. Of course, we operate in cooperation with local entrepreneurs’ associations and with the support of ICE. There are countries looking out for market trends, such as Vietnam and Indonesia, that we absolutely have to watch over. The Assomac team is always out at trade shows to promote Italian technology and our brands.”

www.assomac.it

Agostino Apolito, the new Assomac director at the Vigevano headquarters of the association made up of 137 companies specializing in the production of machinery and technology for footwear, leather goods and tanning