Confindustria, R&S (Mediobanca) and Unioncamere have formalized an agreement to launch a long-term research project on medium-sized manufacturing industry in the main European countries.

The aim of the project is to analyse trends in terms of earnings and financial situations for medium-sized companies, and will be based on analysis of company financial statements and complementary information. Medium-sized companies have been defined on the basis of criteria consistent with those used in the Italian survey by Mediobanca-Unioncamere.

The first edition will cover companies based in Germany, Italy and Spain. At a later stage the research will be extended to include France and the United Kingdom. The project will lead to the publication of an Annual Report on Medium-Sized European Companies, consisting of three sections (one for each country) and a comparative review of the phenomena that emerge.

The research will be co-ordinated by R&S (Mediobanca) which will also be responsible for drawing up the country report on Italy based on the survey carried out by it jointly with Unioncamere. Prof. Frank Wallau, director of the IfM (Institut für Mittelstandsforschung) in Bonn and Prof. Juan Antonio Maroto Acín, director of the Departamento de Economía Financiera y Contabilidad III of the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, will be responsible for the country reports on Germany and Spain respectively. The R&S advisory committee will review the contributions with the co-ordination of Prof. Gioacchino Garofoli from the University of Insubria.