The analysis by Assocomaplast, the Italian trade association, belonging to CONFINDUSTRIA, which groups together some 160 manufacturers of plastics and rubber processing machinery) of the latest ISTAT, the Italian National Institute of Statistics, figures for Italian foreign trade shows that, in the first half of 2013, imports in the sector were somewhat weak compared to the same period in 2012 whereas exports held relatively firm, as summarized in Table 1. The downturn in imports is a symptom of a domestic market that still struggles to recover. However, a potentially promising sign, on this

Brevini is a worldwide specialist in planetary technology. After 50 years of experience we developed a product range of gearboxes which goes from very small applications to >2,5 million N/m. We needed a new manufacturing location for the upper range (above 1 million N/M) where we could deploy the best possible technology. We focused on the wind market because it is one of the biggest for planetary applications. The US was, until two years ago, the biggest wind market in the world and there were plans for expanding the renewable sources ten folds by 2025. What a great chance for Brevini!!! We

13 well known woodworking and furniture supplier magazines who met in Istanbul by the sponsorship of Intermob 2010 trade fair, founded an organization called FSM (for International Woodworking & Furniture Supplying Magazines) on 17th October 2010. The board consists in five members: Zeki Yücel, Mobilya (Turkey); Luca Rossetti, Xylon (Italy); Richard Barth, Material Technick Mebel (Germany); Carlos Castelo, L'Echo des Bois (Belgium); Eduardo Kiss, Mobile Fornecedores (Brasil). In the first meeting, after the voting process, Zeki Yücel (Turkey) and Luca Rossetti (Italy) are elected respectively