Luigi Nocivelli (Offlaga, 29 April 1930 – Verolanuova, 19 December 2006) was an Italian entrepreneur and business executive. Between 1988 and 2002, he was a board member of Banca Lombarda.Prospetto Informativo della Banca Lombarda e Piemontese
Early years
Nocivelli was born in Offlaga in the province of Brescia and was the first son of Angelo and Lina Nocivelli. In 1947, a few days before Nocivelli was due to sit for his final exams for a diploma as an electrical engineering technician, his father was seriously injured falling off a train while traveling to Milan.
During his father's recovery, Nocivelli kept the family's small electro-mechanical workshop in business. At the start of 1950, Angelo Nocivelli had made a suitable recovery and he returned to work alongside his son. Nocivelli decided to continue his studies and enrolled in the Economics faculty at Bocconi University in Milan. He had an important insight when reading an article about voltage regulators which Siemens had studied but never produced industrially. This component would improve how televisions worked and a voltage regulator would be required in every television sold. It was a potentially vast market. The Nocivelli workshop in Verolanuova (BS) began to grow as production increased rapidly and the business expanded. In 1956 he was enlisted, but during time in the barracks he continued to think about the development of the family workshop. His aim was to transform it into a real electromechanical factory and a short while after he was discharged, at the end of 1957, OCEAN of Verolanuova was founded, the Officina Costruzioni Electriche Angelo Nocivelli (Angelo Nocivelli Electrical Constructions Workshop).
The management of Ocean
In 1958, Ocean was a robust company. Angelo's other children were alongside their father and brother at the helm of the company: Bruna was responsible for administration whilst Gianfranco specialized in commercial relations and would go on to follow Luigi in all subsequent industrial ventures. However, in the second half of the year there was a sudden collapse in the market for voltage regulators, so Nocivelli decided to explore the sector of refrigerators, which was at that time a new, rapidly growing market. In 1959 the first experimental phase began, with the aim of commencing manufacturing the following year in Ocean's factory, so the plant capacity was expanded to meet orders of more than 5,000 units.
In 1960 Nocivelli married Barbara Zarnetti and in 1964, he moved with his wife and two children to live above the new Ocean factory which by then covered an area of 10,000 m2. During this period the Company experienced significant expansion and began to serve foreign markets. Ocean became one of the leading European producers of freezers on behalf of third parties, with annual production levels of 250,000 units.
In 1969 the Nocivelli family acquired a factory in Pozzaglio to produce vertical freezers for domestic use, operating in conjunction with the viale Europa plant in Verolanuova.
The Italian electro-mechanical dream At the start of the 70s, as he was overseeing the expansion of Ocean, Nocivelli was also cultivating his dream of re-launching Italian electro-mechanics at an international level. He started to buy shares in Ercole Marelli with the aim of mounting a takeover of the company that could best represent Italy's potential in this sector. He joined the board of directors in 1973Indice storico di tutte le annate dell'Annuario R&S dell'Ufficio Studi Mediobanca and, after becoming majority shareholder, took control of the company, leaving his brother Gianfranco at the helm of Ocean.
He embarked on a restructuring planCarletto Calcia, Il "mio" Tecnomasio, Editrice Alkes, 2016 to restore Marelli's pride and competitiveness, embodying an entrepreneurial style characterized by dedication, know-how and pragmatism.
He wanted to create a system that would combine machines for producing energy and machines for transforming this energy into electricity that could be transported to consumers. He expanded the range of products and implemented the system capabilities. The company entered the market of electrical power lines and increasingly focused its attention abroad in order to identify new markets and opportunities for major contracts. The company also focused on nuclear energy, which was considered essential for the growth of the country.
Under Nocivelli's stewardship, Ercole Marelli significantly strengthened its position, with a turnover of almost 80 billion lire in 1974 - an increase of 56% compared to 1973. However, Nocivelli's dream was made more challenging by an extremely complex global situation marked by oil crises, the blocking of the energy plan, inflation, monetary chaos, unemployment and salary reductions, while armed insurrection and terrorism brought the country close to the brink. Marelli was forced into liquidation and Nocivelli stepped down from the management of the electro-mechanical group in 1981.
The electrical appliance empire
Nocivelli returned to Verolanuova to work full-time on the industrial development of El.Fi Elettrofinanziaria, the company that the Nocivelli Family had created to manage their group's finances and future acquisitions. His idea was to evolve mainly through external growth, with the aim of transforming the family-run business into a leading international player in the electrical appliances sector. Since the early 80s, there was a continual stream of acquisitions. This is a summary of the main M&A operations: 1984: Zanussi Climatizzazione of Bassano Del Grappa (VI), subsequently Ocean Idroclima, which saw the group first enter the sector of household appliances 1984: Sangiorgio of La Spezia, that operated in the washing machines market 1985: Samet of Romano d'Ezzelino (VI), that deals with the cookers and ovens segment 1987: Costan of Belluno, the commercial refrigeration leader in Italy with branches all throughout Europe. The business was not directly present in the household sector, but it was in a similar business sector and this was seen by Luigi and Gianfranco as a new and interesting opportunity. 1988: Bonnet Réfrigération and Froid Satam Brandt, later Bonnet Névé (France), that were acquired from the Thompson group and were in the commercial refrigeration sector 1988: Filiberti Argo, a factory producing complementary products to those produced by Ocean Idroclima like boilers, cast iron radiators and small household air-conditioners 1989: Chaffoteaux et Maury (France), producers of wall-mounted boilers, electric and gas hot water heaters 1989: Ofta, later Domoservice (France), specialised in the maintenance of heating systems 1991: Filiberti Argo became Sanyo Argo Clima following a joint-venture with the Japanese companies Sanyo and Sumitomo 1992: Blomberg GmbH (Germany) manufacturers of high-end washing machines and Elektra Bregenz (Austria), also owned by the Blomberg family, which manufactured ovens, kitchens and cooking hobs 1999: Thomson-Brandt (France), out-and-out market leader in the sector of large electrical appliances who acquired in 1999 Polar, a Polish company within the same sector 1999: in the same year it also acquired the English company George Barker that operated in the commercial refrigeration sector. Every operation represented a stage in a process of growth that stems from a very specific philosophy on life. Luigi Nocivelli was striving to create a large homogeneous, harmonious and balanced system: from freezers to refrigerators and from there on to all other segments of the electrical appliance sector, to enter families’ homes and help solve practical everyday issues. Nocivelli and his brother Gianfranco transformed the small family-run business into one of the main European industrial players in the electrical appliances sector."I fratelli doppio Bianco" - La Repubblica, 8 july 1988 By the end of 1993 El.Fi. controlled an important leading group in the white goods sector that was also active in industrial refrigeration, heating & air-conditioning market, with a total turnover of almost 3500 billion lire and 14,000 employees.Luca Masia, Luigi Nocivelli, page 91, Mondadori, 2016
The final project There was a variation in the strategic objectives of the Nocivelli brothers: they decided to focus the business in the electrical appliances and commercial refrigeration sectors, thus completely abandoning heating and air-conditioning.
Nocivelli pursued a design which he had had in mind since his time with Marelli, which involved creating a consistent and integrated system of multinationals that would interact with each other, while complementing one another by diversifying risks and maximizing profits. The acquisitions during the previous twenty years aimed to establish a European electrical appliances company in order to reach the homes of the greatest possible number of consumers and be present simultaneously with refrigeration, cooking and washing appliances. The only piece missing from the project was that of small electrical appliances.
Moulinex could have been that very piece, but despite being a very large and well-known company, it was experiencing financial difficulties and was protected by the State and large banks so it was not very transparent and difficult to value. Luigi Nocivelli decided to acquire a small stake to start testing the waters. "La saga des amoureux de robots ménagers. Le clan Nocivelli, prétendant à l'achat de Moulinex, cultive le mystère autour de lui" - liberation.fr 7 april 2000 In this same period he had a health scare as a tumor in his intestine required surgical removal.
In 2000 the takeover attempt of the French group continued. The aim was valuing Moulinex and Brandt, aligning the two companies and proceeding with a merger. Nocivelli requested a detailed due diligence, but when the French opposed this, he abandoned the idea of investigating further and signed the preliminary letter of intent for the merger. "Brandt offre un nouveau départ à Moulinex" - lsa-conso.fr 14 september 2000 Once the agreement was completed at the end of the year, he presented a three-year restructuring plan with the aim of achieving a turnover of 6,000 billion. The plan involved cutting the workforce by approximately 2,000 employees and confirmed that all production plants would be kept, although they required investment and modernization.Luca Masia, Luigi Nocivelli, page 121, Mondadori, 2016
Nocivelli decided to leave the companies’ management in French hands and restricted his role to that of majority shareholder allowing the board to work with the banks. In April 1500 employees were made redundant and three factories were shut down. In subsequent months, the management closed down other sites and laid-off more staff. The situation plummeted when the French banks closed the lines of credit and in September 2001 CEO Patrick Puy was summoned to present the company's accounts in court.Luca Masia, Luigi Nocivelli, page 124, Mondadori, 2016