Italy can hardly stop proving itself this year. While knows that Italy is the undisputed ruler of music and sports in 2021, there’s another sector now defined by Italian success — a sector that’s more surprising. Today, according to research from the European Center for Digital Competitiveness (ECDC), our traditional tech laggard now looks to be a model of a digital hub. How did this astonishing transformation happen?

Responding to crisis: the Digital Europe Programme

To aid Europe’s recovery from the pandemic, the EU has made considerable sums of cash available. The Next Generation EU fund — with which Italy’s National Plan for Recovery and Resilience (PNRR) — is just one stream of aid. Yet, as part of the Digital Europe Programme, EU funding of a further €7.5 billion has been made available for digital hubs that are (or will be) supported by their member state.