MAPEI’s Squinzi Attains Top Italian Honor

MILAN, Italy – Dr. Giorgio Squinzi, CEO of the Mapei Group, received the Leonardo Quality Prize for Italy in a ceremony headed by Italian President Giorgio Napoletano on Dec. 6.
The prestigious prize was given by the Italian Quality Committee Comitato Leonardo, a group of business people, artists, scientists and representatives of the cultural world organized to promote and enhance Italian quality throughout the world.
The Leonardo Italian Quality Awards are bestowed on entrepreneurs with success in international markets. Recipients are called “Ambassadors of the image of Italy in the World.”
The Squinzi family turned a small Milan-based firm, founded in 1937, into a multinational company in the field of chemical products for building. In 1978, Mapei started its internationalization strategy by opening the first subsidiary outside Italy in Canada.
Dr. Squinzi became CEO in 1984 and began implementing a corporate strategy based on three main principles: specialization, internationalization and innovation. The Industrial Group today consists of 53 companies with 46 plants; seven of these plants are in Italy, while the others are strategically located in 23 other countries, including U.S. facilities in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.; Fredericksburg, Va.; Garland, Texas; San Bernardino, Calif.; Tempe, Ariz.; and West Chicago, Ill.
The company’s investments in research and development are more than €60 million per year. Mapei’s total annual revenues are currently €1.4 billion (approximately $2 billion).
In 1998 the title of Cavaliere del Lavoro, an honorary knighthood recognizing exemplary business leadership, was conferred upon Dr. Squinzi by the Italian government.