"Catas continues on its successful path," says President Lucia Cristina Piu with satisfaction, commenting on the 2023 results of Europe's most important testing entity in the wood-furniture sector.

"The year 2023 ended with excellent results," explains the President of Catas, in her second term of office, "both in terms of the number of tests carried out for customers all over the world, more than 50,000, and from an economic-financial point of view, with a turnover that has continued to grow compared to the €7 million of 2022. Profits are always reinvested in equipment and laboratories, guaranteeing the solidity and continuous technical updating of a reality that today employs about sixty people. An extremely competent and close-knit team that has always been the most important capital of Catas, thanks to which in its long history it has been able to accompany companies in the sector, becoming a point of reference worldwide'.

Catas, an international perspective

Over the last twelve months, Catas has not only further consolidated its positions in Italy, thanks to the headquarters in Lissone (Monza Brianza) and the Catas Point in Pesaro, but has invested in an even more significant presence at international level.

The excellence of Catas, also recognised at international level, could allow it to enter other fields, demonstrating its capabilities not only in the wood and wood derivatives sector, but also in mechanics, in the plastic or composite materials industries, which could be a new starting point for a path of development at national and international level.

"Catas' outlook has always been international,' comments Lucia Cristina Piu, 'and in 2023 this vocation was underlined by our first participation in a major international trade fair, which allowed us to meet many operators from all over the world. For us, this is an absolute value not only in terms of acquiring new customers and consolidating relations with important companies from other countries, which today represent around 30 per cent of our customers, but also as an important opportunity for comparison, verification, gathering information and knowledge on new processes and materials that then become the heritage not only of the laboratory, but also of all the companies we work with'.

Catas Academy: a heritage of skills to be transmitted

Catas also continues to preside over the training segment. The President explains that "Catas Academy is based on a wealth of skills that it is imperative to pass on in markets where products must measure themselves against increasingly stringent standards, imposing increasingly strict limits on quality, sustainability and safety. A principle that is also the basis of our relations with the world of education, from technical institutes to universities, both locally (University of Trieste and Udine) and nationally, from the Milan Polytechnic to the University of Florence'.

Another important project concerns sustainability: Catas is in fact working on drawing up its own 'Sustainability Report', a focus on the environment, the territory, and conscious consumption that is also being realised through the creation of the first regional Energy Community.

Important projects for important choices

Among the objectives for 2024 is also the dissemination of the need to measure the environmental impact of a product or service through the LCA-Life Cycle Assessment protocol, in anticipation of the fact that, in 2027, every good or product will have to carry a real 'environmental passport' certifying its 'goodness' in terms of the use of resources.

Important projects, which require important choices, not the least of which is the need for new spaces at the San Giovanni al Natisone site: "We are working on a hypothesis of expansion," concludes the President, "new spaces that are precious for the growth of the laboratory and that will be at the service of everyone, including the educational and professional realities that may need laboratories where they can complete training courses, perhaps having a fleet of machinery that is adequate for the current state of the art of technology.