Italian spring makers struggling with raw materials costs, vaccinations, and Silk Road

The annual meeting of ANCCEM, the association of Italian spring makers, took place on Oct. 8 in northern Italy, in the historical city of Bergamo. A precious opportunity to meet, after months and months of forced isolation caused by the pandemic. “The moments of aggregation,” stated President Silvestri opening the conference, ”are the beating heart of our association's activity.” Referring to an economic survey carried out by Federmeccanica (the Trade Union Federation of the Italian Metalworking Industry), he pointed out that the first part of 2021 featured a strong recovery in industrial production. “Unfortunately, we are experiencing a slowdown compared to the frenzy of the first half of the year. The poor availability of raw materials certainly does not help.”

“The substantial price stability that had marked the two-year period 2019/2020 was interrupted between the end of 2020 and the beginning of 2021, with increases reaching 500 euros per ton in the case of carbon steel. Hot-rolled and cold-rolled coils prices have been falling slightly since August 2021: “We trust in a similar trend for the coming months but at the same time, we wonder: will this be the new price level we have to get used to?”


For spring makers, the economic situation is particularly complicated: because of the way the negotiation process is carried out, it is really hard to reverse any increases to customers. And that, as you can well understand, leads to an inevitable erosion of profits.

“We are going to struggle more,” Silvestri continued, “even though – back in the pre-COVID era – we showed a solid economic situation.” The problem could be mitigated by economies of scale, trusting that industry policies will help in this regard. The new National Reform Programme is a unique opportunity to act as a driver of growth and consolidation in this sector.

Immediately after the speech by the President of ANCCEM, Federico Visentin, from the homonymous spring-making company, took the floor. He has recently been appointed as the new President of Federmeccanica, a body that brings together 1,800,000 employees throughout Italy. Visentin focused on a challenge Federmeccanica has set itself, along with others, in the field of digitalization, namely that of digital literacy among workers, a move intended to have a significant social impact. Talking about current affairs, Visentin does not deny that the COVID-19 green certificate, which is mandatory for all employees from Oct. 15, is a source of complexity and a very divisive topic. But the real problem, says Visentin, is raw materials, an issue that is not just cyclical: “The battle over raw materials has two fronts: speculation by steelmakers, who have experienced seven difficult years and now want to return to profit, and the resistance of our customers – especially the largest ones – to accept the resulting price increases.” Spring makers are caught in the middle and, Visentin says, will likely find themselves suffering throughout 2022.


Taking over from Visentin on the stage of the Hotel San Marco was journalist and entrepreneur Stefano Piazza, who presented an interesting socio-political analysis based on the question: “Does it still make sense to talk about the New Silk Road?”. As is well known, the $8 trillion One Belt One Road project is a gigantic infrastructure operation. Behind it, Piazza argues, is China's precise intention to safeguard its supplies of raw materials – we know that China is a highly energy-intensive country – and to expand, even militarily. On this path, China has made many enemies (first and foremost the USA and Japan) and has sown some damages. It is estimated, says Piazza, that the debts of countries towards China related to the Silk Road project amount to 385 billion dollars, a huge figure that will be difficult for them to repay. At least 8 countries in the world are totally dependent on the country governed by Xi Jinping. What must, and can Europe do? In short, take advantage of this historical moment in which the Silk Road is "less sexy" than before to sit at the table and ask for true reciprocity, at a coordinated level and not at the level of individual countries.

Last but not least, Prof. Salvini and Dr. De Crescenzo of the Tor Vergata University of Rome presented a technical paper on the behavior of coil springs stressed to loads exceeding the elastic limit. The study, carried out in collaboration with the association, was introduced by ex-President Cortesi: a year and a half of research, 6600 pieces of data collected and processed; the aim of the investigation aimed to estimate as accurately as possible the elastic limit of the spring, that is the point where the so-called plastic deformation occurs. What are the forces that influence this limit, and is it possible to arrive at a formula or a model? The answer is more complex than expected because, when a theoretical model was developed, it was seen that homogeneous springs had lost length in an inhomogeneous way. We have not yet reached a definitive scheme, but we have discovered an area of topics and paradigms to deepen. The program developed by the two scholars will be disclosed to all members; and the research will continue, to reach new important results.