Expensive energy, inflation and material costs: this is how Italian SMEs rethink and study a new business model

Energy crisis, inflation and delays in the supply chain with consequent increases in the prices of raw materials, semi-finished goods, finished products and components, put a strain on Italian small and medium-sized enterprises. It is in this complex scenario, aggravated by strong geopolitical tensions due to the conflict in Ukraine and by a very volatile economic situation, that our SMEs must rethink their business model trying to make ends meet without going back a millimeter on sustainability issues. environmental and social. These are the themes that will animate the new appointment, scheduled in Rome on Monday 7 November at 11.20, of the cycle “Italy 2022: People, Work, Business”, a platform for dialogue with the greatest exponents of the world of institutions, finance and company promoted by PwC Italia in collaboration with the Gedi publishing group, entitled “The new agenda of Italian SMEs: from the impact of the PNRR to energy, supply chain and training challenges”.
The reference economic scenario, photographed by the PwC Italia study center, is changeable and not very encouraging. Estimates speak of a real GDP growth rate in Italy between 3.2% and 3.4% (3.1% in the euro area) in 2022 and between minus 0.2% and 0.4% in 2023 (0, 3% -0.5% in the eurozone), with inflation that should grow in our country around values ​​between 7.8% and 8.7% in 2022 (compared to 8.1% -8.3% in the eurozone ), to then settle on lower but still high values ​​in 2023 (4.7% -6.5% vs 5.7% -6.2% in the eurozone).
A macroeconomic scenario that will inevitably have an impact on SMEs which, according to Cerved estimates, could close the year in the most optimistic scenario (base) with a recovery in turnover to pre-pandemic levels: more 2.4% compared to 2021, and then decelerate to more than 2% in 2023. On the other hand, taking into consideration the most pessimistic scenario (worst), the recovery of pre-pandemic turnover levels is expected to move away over time: in fact, forecasts estimate a strong slowdown in turnover growth in 2022 ( plus 0.6% compared to 2021) and a slight contraction in 2023 (minus 0.5%).
Making everything more difficult is the race in electricity and gas prices which, Pwc Italia points out, began even before the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine. The data speak for themselves: the Single National Price (the average purchase price of electricity on the Italian electricity market) increased by 463% from January to December 2021 and in the same period the price of gas on the TTF market in Amsterdam (value of reference for the formation of gas prices in Italy) grew by 368%. These increases continued throughout 2022: the price of gas increased by 118% from January to October and by 1200% compared to the pre-pandemic values ​​of December 2019, with strong fluctuations and peaks of over 300 € / Mwh reached in August (380% more than in January and over 26 times the pre-Covid price). Electricity increased by 190% between January and September 2022 (270% per annum and 8.5 times as much compared to the September 2019 price).
The rise in prices has clearly had a strong impact on Italian companies: industry, in fact, is responsible for 22.2% of Italian energy consumption and services for 15.3%. According to Confindustria, the incidence of energy on production costs would have gone from 4.6% to over 9.8% in 2022. Net of the aid put in place by the government to limit the damage, the situation remains very complicated for Italian SMEs which also have to face the growing uncertainty of global supply chains, which began with the pandemic crisis and continued following the geopolitical contrasts fueled by the war in Ukraine.
Before Covid, PwC Italia reports, the prevailing industrial management model was the “Just in Time”, a model that provided for inventory management that minimized all stocks of raw materials, semi-finished and finished products, considered as one waste of resources. Now, the scenario has changed and it is necessary to rethink the supply chain that passes, first of all, from a model of sustainable supply chain management, greener and less global (reshoring and near shoring), and the adoption of new technologies. , such as artificial intelligence and machine learning, which make it possible to make available and analyze (through algorithms) large quantities of data in real time, making it possible to forecast the demand more precisely and consequently better planning of all the components of the supply chain.
The digital event, scheduled for Monday 7 November, will be streamed starting at 11.20 on all the social platforms of PwC Italia – Youtube channel PwC Italy, on the Twitter page PwC Italy, Facebook PwC Italy and Linkedin PwC Italy – and on the Homepage by La Repubblica, La Stampa, Huffpost and GNN.

Speakers:

• Giovanni Andrea Toselli – President and CEO of PwC Italia

• Alessandro Grandinetti – PwC Italia Partner, Clients and Markets Leader

• Marco Fortis – Director and President of the Edison Foundation and Professor of Industrial Economics and Foreign Trade

• Maria Caterina Fosci – PwC Italia Partner, Infrastructure

• Veronica De Romanis – Professor of European Economics, LUISS University

Interviews to:

• Giovanni Savorani – President of Confindustria Ceramica and CEO of Gigacer Spa

• Mariano Roman – CEO of Fantic Moto

• Carlo Palmieri – CEO Pianoforte Holding (which owns the Carpisa and Yamamay brands), Vice President of the Italian Fashion System and Vice President of Confindustria Napoli

• She will host: Alessandro De Angelis – Deputy Director, HuffPost and Maurizio Molinari – Head of La Repubblica will participate