Edizioni AF is the result of this initiative and will start publishing Arsutoria, Fotoshoe30, Arpel, Idea Pelle, Bambino, and Fur, amongst others, from January onwards. Fausto Villa (Fotoshoe Group) and Matteo Pasca (Ars Arpel Group) are the protagonists of this partnership.

“We have come to an agreement”, commented Fausto Villa, “that will allow us to become increasingly important protagonists on every level, while also having an increasingly complete dialogue about fashion, economy, exhibitions, events, and sector policies”. Matteo Pasca underlines how “‘together’ means being real protagonists on the international panorama of footwear, leather goods, accessories and components, materials and technology, without forgetting about a solid web presence, that becomes more and more important”.

Following this announcement, we have asked Matteo Pasca to tell us a bit more about the initiative and its impact in the industry.

How do you see this initiative to integrate the activities of both groups?
I believe this is a revolution in the industry. People are talking a lot of "joining forces" but we really did it and our plan is to leverage the amazing backgrounds of values, experiences and networks, and we will preserve the strengths of each organisation and together into new projects. We are strongly convinced that this integration will lead to better services for our customers.
 
In your view What would be the advantages of this move?
We are very complementary: ARSUTORIA has a strong experience in trend analysis and product design targeted to manufacturers of shoes and bags while FOTOSHOE is the leader in the publishing for retailers with a strong network with international fairs. We will cross fertilize our services and bring the best of our offering to customers of both organisations.

What can we expect from the new functioning model?
People will be the same and that is our major asset but in the future we will have a more clear market positioning of our offerings with a strong integration between publishing, services to international fairs and trend analysis  and for sure we will dedicate resources to develop our digital activities.