The operation was finalised in recent days, says the CEO Eng. Davide Lusignani, although it is clear that the path had been marked for a long time. This is not the first time that the innovative startup of Parma makes people talk about itself, so let's hear Eng. Lusignani telling us about some background.
"eDriveLAB was born as a spinoff of the University of Parma and it is now one of the most innovative startups in the field of electric mobility, with a large portfolio of projects and prestigious customers, including among many others even the Ferrari of Maranello," Lusignani tells us. "I founded eDriveLAB in 2017 by concentrating a pool of selected excellences among professors, researchers and engineers active here in the Parma area. The goal was to join as protagonists the green revolution that is crossing the Motor Valley and the world of transport in all its declinations."
The words of the CEO reveal a lot of awareness but also emotion and passion.
"In the first years since the foundation of the spinoff", continues Lusignani, "we have designed numerous hardware and software systems to electrify any type of vehicle, from cars to industrial machinery, up to tractors, motorcycles, racing vehicles, really anything with at least two wheels! Much of our work gave also rise to patents that are now used in our realizations. Our team is characterized by young talents, almost all recently graduated, but not for this without strong skills. In fact, within the University we follow directly the most talented students during their studies and we intercept them once they have completed their study path, also thanks to the UniPR Racing Team project of which I am Faculty Advisor. The latter gym allows students to practice with the technologies of electrification of the vehicle even before graduation, and eDriveLAB is the natural continuation for those who are passionate about this world."
We ask how the decision to move to a different sector and turn towards the nautical was born.
"The first 4 years of life of eDriveLAB were characterized by being a highly specialized pole in the terrestrial electric mobility, this until we met William Gobbo who, with Sealence, gave us confidence assigning us a first order that was worth, at the time, much more than our entire annual turnover. Due to the size of the order for the small startup we were, we found ourselves suddenly projected into the field of naval propulsion. Moreover, from a technical point of view, between the powertrain of a boat and that of any other electric vehicle does not change much."
"Looking back, the most important thing of that first order was the possibility to understand closely the enormous potential of Deepspeed jet propulsion and above all to observe how William manages his startup and his team. In a very short time, on the entrepreneurial level, William managed to start a project of enormous complexity and technological innovation and, at the same time, to grow in a way that for me was inconceivable! We realized that under the wing of Sealence we could enrich the Deepspeed project and be part of that incredible growth. Shortly I contacted William and we closed an agreement in a few minutes in August, with a granita enjoyed on a beach in Calabria!"
"I start by saying that in a few months, thanks to Sealence, our small spinoff became a company able to provide job for about fifteen engineers and that is continuing to hire. William never intervenes in the management of our startup except for planning together the strategies and objectives of the group, leaving us free to manage and make decisions autonomously. Therefore, from this point of view, nothing has changed since before. The thing that has really changed is the possibility of accessing the millionaire budgets of the parent company, with which we can accelerate our path of growth and technological enrichment. William is an innovation fanatic and he knows that you get it by investing in people's talent and passion and in research and development. Everything else is just a consequence of his way of acting."
The story of Eng. Lusignani is enlightening and reveals a reality of real technological innovation not usual in the Italian landscape, so we ask what lesson can be drawn from all this.
"If I continued the growth path of eDriveLAB alone, today I would probably be a small individualist entrepreneur like many that characterize the Italian scenario and I would almost certainly be focused on the main problem of a startup: its daily survival. Thanks to Sealence, I can focus on the development of my technology and my company instead, without worrying about anything but developing innovation. If I had any merit in this affair, it was probably to guess that, together with William, I could create much more value for everyone, for me, for my collaborators, my employees and for the group I joined. Working alongside William is a gym that changes the way you observe and decipher this world, even the most complex things suddenly find a way to become easy and achievable. It's a choice I'm very proud of and I would do it a thousand times more!"