DIGITAL MAGICS LAUNCHES 56CUBE, PIONEERING INCUBATOR FOR INNOVATIVE STARTUPS IN SOUTHERN ITALY

DIGITAL MAGICS  LAUNCHES 56CUBE, PIONEERING INCUBATOR FOR INNOVATIVE STARTUPS IN SOUTHERN ITALY

Based in Fisciano (Salerno), 56CUBE boasts a close collaboration agreement with the University of Salerno. The incubator will be presented officially at TBIZ 2012 on November 7th-8th (Pad. N°6)    

 

Salerno, October 30th 2012 – 56CUBE, a pioneering internet venture incubator spawned from leading Milanese incubator Digital Magics, aims to replicate its unique business model with a focus on Southern Italy. 56CUBE – www.56cube.it – supports talents and young entrepreneurs, backing them in the development of original ideas into successful businesses, accelerating their growth.

Company headquarters are located in Fisciano (SA), walking distance from the prestigious Università degli Studi di Salerno, with which 56CUBE has developed a sound alliance to share skills and competencies with the mutual objective of fostering the advancement of the local high tech ecosystem.

56CUBE – to be presented on November 7th (Open Space Agorà Business Devils 17:00), will be a key feature of the fourth edition of TechnologyBIZ 2012, a celebrated event dedicated to ICT and innovation, held at the Mostra D’Oltremare di Napoli.

56CUBE’s strategy is to act both as a venture capitalist, providing seed-stage financing to startups, and as an incubator, supporting young companies with services that cover several areas including human resources, product development (both strategy and technology), finance and marketing support, administration and logistics, assisting the teams with sector specific managerial expertise on the path towards growth. 56CUBE will also help the companies in raising new capital and identifying private investors for successive rounds, picking from its vast network of industrial and financial players.

The first two startups incubated by 56CUBE are: You-ng, a project revolving around independent publishing financed directly by users and founded by Germano Milite and SkillMe, a digital network of free lance professionals founded by Danila Autuori.

This investment in the Campania region closely follows the almost contemporary announcement regarding 4w MarketPlace, a Digital Magics startup, which has just raised Euro 2.5 Million from Principia SGR to strengthen its research and development department (see www.digitalmagics.com).

“56CUBE calls out to all entrepreneurs in Southern Italy who have an innovative business idea based on the Web and who wish to develop it into a business” commented Gennaro Testone, Founder and CEO of 56CUBE, “Thanks to the knowledge shared with the University of Salerno and with Digital Magics, we will be able to develop successful business models and important relations not only with the local community but also on a global scale, starting with TBIZ. We shall organize a launch Press Conference and participate with a stand (Padiglione N°6) and a workshop. We are also actively involved in “Business Devils” the initiative that targets startups from the Campania region which will have the opportunity to pitch their ideas within the happening TechnologyBIZ event”.

“The Digital Economy represents the future of our country; it is a fast growing industry which offers plenty of opportunity and we see many young entrepreneurs with projects worthy of support” states Enrico Gasperini, Founder and Chairman of Digital Magics, “Potentially the digital economy, startups included, can contribute up to half of the country’s growth in GDP. At Digital Magics we have been active as a startup incubator since 2008. We screen over 500 projects a year. The South has a strong potential, yet unexplored, both in terms of talents and professionalism and in terms of market growth rate.”

“As a native of Salerno I can proudly state that this city has always been alive with creativity and entrepreneurship” states Edmondo Sparano, Partner of Digital Magics and Responsible of the project 56CUBE, “An incubator such as 56CUBE can rapidly become a center of aggregation of both talent and competencies for the development of the entire Southern Italian region. We strongly believe that to curb the “talent drain” that the country is currently facing the first thing to do is to offer the concrete opportunity to change things, creating new job opportunities and supplying whatever resources are lacking”.

 

Digital Magics www.digitalmagics.com

Digital Magics is an investment company which has been active since 2008 as an incubator of innovative startups with a high tech focus. More than a simple seed fund or an accelerator, Digital Magics is a venture incubator: it founds and builds internet companies, investing its own equity capital. Digital Magics’ process starts from the ideas and the talents behind them, transforming them into successful and disruptive digital businesses, both on the Italian market and internationally. The incubator promotes a culture of entrepreneurship and risk-taking, contributing to economic growth and youth employment. Digital Magics provides services to support the launch and growth of innovative startups and accompanies them in the subsequent stages of capital raising among private and public investors, both Italian and International. The Digital Magics model is unique in Italy and is based on Digital Magics Lab: an internal team that identifies, analyses and launches new projects supporting them with mentorship as well as financial, administrative, strategic, logistic, technological, and marketing advice and services, as well as a backing in business management capable of accelerating the growth process of the company. Since Inception Digital Magics has invested over 10 Million Euro  launching 30 startups which today cover all principal areas of the online market and creating over 300 jobs.

56CUBE www.56cube.it

56CUBE is a startup incubator in the online industry based in Salerno. Founded in 2012 within the Milanese incubator Digital Magics, it aims to replicate Digital Magics’ successful model with a focus on Southern Italy. It boasts a close partnership with the Università degli Studi of Salerno sharing researchers, resources, facilities and research & development activities. 56CUBE partners with new local entrepreneurs helping them transform their ideas with high tech content into successful businesses. 56CUBE supports employment in Southern Italy, contributes in creating youth employment and a fresh driver of economic growth. The incubator is actively seeking new talents and founders, new funds and investors to finance the new businesses. The two first projects to be launched by 56CUBE are You-ng, a project revolving around independent publishing directly funded by its users, and SkillMe, a digital network of freelance professionals. The CEO is Gennaro Tesone.

For further information:

Digital Magics – Press Office

Giorgio Bocchieri giorgio.bocchieri@digitalmagics.com

56CUBE – Press Office

Imma Della Corte dellacorte@nablacom.it