 Imagine an evening meal with an Italian businessman, from Umbria to be precise, with a passion for cultural assets, technology and research, who for decades has been President of a network of companies that offer high-tech integrated services...
Imagine his guest, an Arab businessman, from Dubai to be precise, with a similar calling, Vice-president and CEO of an economic group present on the international market for fifty years…
Imagine as background for this symposium, the splendid Villa Monticelli swathed in greenery on a quiet Perugia summer’s evening…
The former is Emo Agneloni, who along with his son Francesco and a few trusted collaborators and friends, had the pleasure of hosting in a place suspended in time, Mr Yahya Lootah accompanied by his brother Rashid and some members of his staff, on the occasion of the Assisi Endurance Lifestyle in Umbria. What these two businessmen have in common may be easy to spot: experience, qualifications, inclination maybe... but that’s not all.
The core business of Agneloni’s Network The First Brick (www.thefirstbrick.com) is building management which is specialized in know-how, automation, control, verification, recovery, conservation, maintenance and enhancing of infrastructure, civil and industrial, movable and real estate assets but above all of historic and artistic monuments; their activities include also research, development and technology transfer to public and private bodies, training and communication, experimental engineering for the monitoring and the testing of structures and materials in situ and in their laboratories, architecture and assisted design (thanks to their considerable experience in the field of materials and innovative technologies, that is fibre reinforced composites such as FRP, SRP, SRG).
Mr Yahya Lootah's S.S. Lootah Group (www.sslootah.com) deals in Financial Services such as banks and insurance, in the construction and trading of real estate, in manufacturing, energy, restaurants and hotels, engineering and architecture integrated services, applied research, ICT, health care and education.
So here is what these two captains of industry from two realities that are geographically and culturally worlds apart have in common: a vision of themselves, their businesses and the world... or rather of themselves AND their businesses IN the world. They have actually already signed one MoU and will be singing another, to work together.
I asked Mr Yahya Lootah how this joint venture with Mr Emo Agneloni had come about. Of course they both have to do daily with international economic operators, but that is precisely the point: how do businessmen of that calibre “choose” each other?
“Our group”, explains Yahya Lootah, “feels the constant need to expand further throughout the world, but one has to be very careful to choose the right partners, the ones who have the right characteristics: basically, those who share the same principles and the same values. This is how we work: we are aggressive, we make rapid decisions, we keep an open mind. Well, our partners must be like us. And Emo Agneloni has these same qualities. So we are sure our interaction will offer added value to Italy and to the United Arab Emirates”. And he added: “We are happy to be able to sign new agreements at international level, it is not where we sign them that counts, but rather the vision of the world that we share with our interlocutors”.
I then asked him to comment on Assisi Endurance Lifestyle, the event that will end on June 15th and that bears witness to the close business and friendship relations between Italy and the Arab Emirates.
“The Emirates are renown for their endurance equestrian events that I follow regularly when I’m at home. Moreover, I love horses”, and this is why following an event such as this is in any case a pleasure for him, says Mr Lootah.
And what about Italy? Driven by my national pride, I asked our guest from Dubai for his “sincere” opinion. And he answered rather laconically: “My yacht is Italian, I drive an Italian car and I came here on my honeymoon".
Francesca Mallone
(13-06-2008 10:41)
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