Leonardo CEO Roberto Cingolani: European all-rounder

Around two weeks after Russia's invasion of eastern Ukraine in 2022, Italy announced that it would end the country's energy dependence on Russia within 24 to 30 months. The brains behind it: Roberto Cingolani, then Minister for Ecological Transformation in Italy.

Cingolani is once again striving for more independence – this time as CEO of the Italian arms all-rounder Leonardo. Since becoming CEO of Leonardo in May 2023, Cingolani has been working towards a more independent European arms industry. The Italian state holds around 30 percent of the arms company.

He recently told the Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper that he had set himself the goal of driving forward alliances in the European defense industry: "We are big, but nowhere near as big as US companies, for example." He therefore wants to create "European giants" that are "based on cooperation". And he says something unusual for a defense manager: "If we plan more efficiently, we might not even need the two percent."

That's easy to say when you're hoping for big business. In October, Cingolani sealed the foundation of Leonardo Rheinmetall Military Vehicles (LRMV) in Rome, arm in arm with Rheinmetall CEO Armin Papperger. After the German antitrust authorities approved the joint venture last week, Rheinmetall and Leonardo are hoping for a lucrative order from the Italian government. Italy plans to spend EUR 23 billion on armored vehicles in the coming years.

Leonardo is also hoping for a sales market beyond Italy. The EU, with its 27 member states and proximity to Russia and countries in the Middle East, offers a large sales market for national defense, said Cingolani at the meeting in Rome.

Leonardo produces helicopters, airplanes, weapons for maritime operations, and electronics. "A decathlete" is what his company would be if it were an athlete, Cingolani told the SZ. He tries to be one himself. He used to box, is said to enjoy cycling and motorcycling, and has published over 1,000 articles in his academic career as a physicist.

He headed the Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia in Genoa for ten years until Cingolani became Head of Innovation at Leonardo in 2019 and then Energy Minister under Mario Draghi. His university career took him to Japan, the USA, and Germany. From 1988 to 1991, he worked at the Max Planck Institute in Stuttgart. In non-fiction books such as "Il mondo è piccolo come un'arancia" ("The World Is As Small as an Orange") from 2014, he attempts to explain the possibilities of nanotechnology more broadly.

However, Italy's energy dependency is not going so well at the moment. In 2024, Rome imported more gas from Russia than in the previous year. Gabriel Bub