“I believe in what I do, and I do what I believe in, with the same enthusiasm and the same motivations as in the very beginning.” Thus Romano Volta, engineer and founder of Datalogic, brings the company to the accomplishment of its first 40 years, sharing goals for the near future with the current management team. “Today, Datalogic is a world leader in automatic identification, with excellent prospects for growth in the years to come.”
Dr. Volta, let us return to the early seventies when you were still a junior assistant at university. What led you to consider taking the path of entrepreneurship?
“Well, just like today, we are in the heart of what is known as the ‘packaging valley’. Here we have the greatest concentration of companies producing packaging machines: one product in three sold throughout the world – from food to pharmaceuticals, cosmetics to tobacco – is packaged by machines made in Bologna. In the early seventies, the machines were not automated, but manufacturers soon realised that in order to improve their efficiency, speed and quality, it would be necessary to have electronic optical devices so they could verify, for example, the centring of brands on packaging, the positioning of print, the presence of a tablet in a blister pack and so on. My chance came when some of these entrepreneurs asked Professor Giuseppe Evangelisti at the University of Bologna, to whom I was junior assistant at the time, to develop these electronic optical checks.
Without hesitation, Professor Evangelisti put me in charge of this task. So, in a small laboratory and with the help of a technician, I began to develop a new device, the ‘colour mark reader’, which is still installed in all packaging machines today. We were still in the mechanical era and this ability of mine not only to provide the checking equipment, but also to connect it electronically with the machine to result in a total solution, quickly made me well known in the sector and ensured my rapid success.”
What picture stays in your mind from these early beginnings?
“I remember with great pleasure that the initial Datalogic logo was Datalogic Optic Electronics, which underlined its capacity to combine optics with electronic processing so as to provide machines with extraordinary precision and speed performance for that era. Some years later, with the introduction of the system of tagging all consumer products with barcodes, it seemed natural for me to begin the development of the special optical devices that became known as barcode readers. At this point I left the post of assistant at the University of Bologna once and for all, in order to dedicate myself totally to my business initiative. I also transferred operations from the original small laboratory to a proper factory, small though it still was, based in Lippo di Calderara near Bologna airport.”
What was the atmosphere of those early years, what was the energy and drive that sparked this pioneering adventure?
“The drive came from my background and my character. From modest origins, with excellent academic results, my family had expectations of me that were much greater than the norm. I was expected to do something extraordinary with my life, just as I had done in school. This pressure, combined with my trait of always and at all costs wanting to try my hand at something difficult and unusual, was the impetus that led me to become an entrepreneur. The energy, then, was typical for the beginnings of a new business, with outlines and outcomes undefined. You know how it is when you are young, with nothing to lose; you are always ready to throw yourself fearlessly into things.”
Your closest associates from those early times give you great credit for having immediately sought a route into the rest of the world, the internationalisation of your business. What inspired this step?
“Internationalisation, which today is considered indispensable for the survival of a business, was a necessity for Datalogic and was from the start the very reason for our growth. Unfortunately, Italy is a small economy, without a significant industrial presence in the world of advanced technology. New applications always arrive with some delay. To find an outlet for Datalogic’s products, I had to turn to foreign markets: first Germany, then Japan and the United States. What was at first merely essential for our survival became, and still is, an extraordinary competitive advantage for Datalogic’s success.”
Until 1992, you retained total command of the company. Then, even here, came what is now considered another great inspiration of yours: to expand and transform the business from a family company, with home-grown roots, into a multinational organisation headed by a management team, competitive on the international market and publicly traded from 2001. How did you reach this decision, which we imagine must have been difficult?
“To have transformed Datalogic from a family business into a company with a management team and an organised governance structure is, I think, one of my greatest achievements. Of course, I am also proud of having founded Datalogic, because the role of founder is a difficult one: you are creating a company from nothing, and for that you must fight against everyone and everything. Still more difficult, however, is to create the conditions to be able to transfer the structure of the business away from that founder, especially in our country. Here, businesses are born from an individual who has had to dedicate himself to the enterprise, and who feels a sense of trepidation just at the thought of sharing ownership or entrusting leadership to external management. I admit that it is a very difficult decision, but it is essential for the survival and future development of the enterprise itself. My decision was encouraged in part by my presidency of the Industrialists’ Association of Bologna in 1998, a role which absorbed much of my time and energy. That was a time when I gave a lot to my city, but Bologna has also given me everything: it allowed me to study, graduate, grow up, begin my business and become successful. I am very fond of my city, and proud that Datalogic was born here.”
Although you are not leading Datalogic operationally, you have always played a fundamental role in formulating strategy at the level of entrepreneurial vision. Think of the major acquisitions that Datalogic has made over the last years. What do they mean for you, and what do you think of the cultural integration between the Italian and American realities?
“The acquisition of PSC represented a fundamental change of direction for Datalogic.
The innovative epicentre of bar code applications is in the United States.
To have no direct presence in that country, with a complete organisation of marketing, research, production and sales, means to be outside the vital centre, the pulse of innovation in our sector. Ultimately, it means running the risk of always being behind the times, and eventually being pushed out to the margins of the market. I pursued the possibility of acquiring PSC for years, with the tenacity and perseverance for which I am known. In this way, thanks also to a highly capable management team, we finally succeeded with the acquisition in 2005. This event definitively knocked down the barriers, cultural and otherwise, between us here in Italy and the USA. It opened a route for many Italians from Datalogic into the United States and vice versa, significantly facilitating that cultural integration between our head office and other countries that is typical of a true international reality. The success of this acquisition has highlighted the capacity, embedded in Datalogic’s DNA, to pursue growth not only from within but also from external sources, as is also demonstrated by the latest acquisitions of Accu-Sort Systems and PPT Vision.”
Considering the vast multilingual and multicultural world of Datalogic, how do you relate to the internationalisation that characterises the men and women who form part of Datalogic?
“Datalogic’s international calling has manifested in a great number of projects, not least the significant ‘World Class Operations’ for supply chain management at the global level. This led to the development of a plant in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, now employing 600 staff in the heart of the Asian market and destined to serve that immense territory, which presents peculiarities and characteristics different from those of the Western market. Today, the geographical distribution of Datalogic in all industrialised countries and the continual exchange of resources between these countries represent a real point of strength for our multiethnic, multicultural organisation. This, combined with superior technology, makes Datalogic a highly successful multinational business, or perhaps more of a ‘glocal company’ – global and local at the same time, but always proud of its Italian origins.”
Beyond the achievements recognised by those who have worked with you from the beginning, what is the one thing you are most proud of in the 40 years of Datalogic’s history?
“The thing I am most proud of is that my Datalogic has evolved over time, rather than staying the same. To begin with I was proud of meeting the challenge set before me, and later of coming into contact with many different countries and realities, all the while supported by the esteem and affection that I saw in my colleagues, from whom I expected much but to whom I also wanted to give much. All this has led to what I am most proud of today: being able to provide employment, and above all the motivation to succeed, to over two thousand people and their families. Datalogic owes its success to all of them.”
Romano Volta
Datalogic Group Chairman
