ProActivity is a new model on the Italian market; what is the situation like in other countries?

Abroad, the market is dominated by large, established players that offer standardization and guarantees of scalability. In Italy, on the other hand, the landscape is still extremely fragmented, with dozens of small companies managing a limited number of collaborators. ProActivity aims to import the Anglo-Saxon platform model, focusing on greater service customization. The major players mainly offer a marketplace model, in which the customer chooses freelancers and then manages the relationship directly, with limited support from the platform. Our service model, on the other hand, requires the customer to deal with a single point of contact—ProActivity—which then manages all freelancers, simplifying the administrative complexity. Our goal is to overcome the current fragmentation of the market and become a major national player capable of offering companies the number of IT talents they need, quickly and in compliance with all regulations—labor, security, and other types.

In your opinion, which customers will be most interested in the ProActivity model?

Currently, our main contacts are system integrators and large companies, entities that manage huge volumes of projects and have a constant need for numerical and technical flexibility. These customers are finding it increasingly difficult to manage dozens of different micro-suppliers, so they are looking for a solid partner capable of providing large numbers of qualified freelancers within a reasonable time frame. Managing activities for specific projects also leads to situations where the number of employees is sometimes adequate, while at other times it is excessive. To avoid situations where the cost of staff not involved in projects is too high, it is therefore clear that having a certain proportion of your workforce flexible is advantageous. SMEs also represent an interesting market in which we want to expand more and more, facilitating access to high-profile skills and people who can help them in the technological transition processes they are facing.

What is the main problem in the Italian market that ProActivity wants to solve better than others?

I wouldn’t talk about a single problem, but rather a combination of factors that make it interesting and advantageous to use freelancers instead of hiring employees. Firstly, the instability caused by geopolitical or financial crises—which represent shocks to demand—forces companies to adapt to markets that contract or expand very quickly. In this context, freelancing is an excellent response, as it allows companies to shrink or expand their scope quickly and at low cost. Added to this is technological acceleration: experts on specific stacks are needed immediately, and internal reskilling is often too slow. Finally, companies often face temporary peaks in workload for which permanent hiring is not the right solution. ProActivity solves this complexity by offering immediate and scalable access to skills that companies do not want, cannot, or do not find convenient to internalize. Finally, let’s remember that more and more professionals (especially highly skilled ones) find it convenient, for the lifestyle they want to have, to work as freelancers rather than be subject to the rigid constraints of an employment contract.