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The “Società Autostrade” company, in the course of over 40 over years of operating (since 1956) has fully accomplished its goal of creating a network of toll superhighways that has certainly contributed to Italy's economic and social development.
Seasoned experience in the management of the complex activities and the changes that have taken place have led the Company to look at the opportunity of exploiting its assets by diversifying its own activities in such a way as to increase the proportion of non-toll receipts and to center itself onto a logic of market and competition, possibly entering into associated sectors.
At the beginning of 1995, the Company therefore went ahead with the acquisition of “Autostrade Finance S.A.” and “Autostrade International S.p.a.” in order to develop its presence on International markets through the supply of technical services and/or financial assistance, participation in highway initiatives, commercialisation of management “know how” and innovative technologies such as the “Telepass” system.
At the end of 1995, “Autostrade Telecomunicazioni S.r.l.”, later transformed into an S.p.a. (“Inc”) was set up to further widen the activities of the Group, making use of company assets like the network of fiber optics. Finally, in 1996, the company SPEA was acquired, as was control of “Pavimental”. These businesses operate, respectively, in the planning and maintenance fields of roads infrastructure.
The attitude that the Company has taken on has led to the reinforcement of its position as sector leader and to the laying down of the basis, following the removal of some legislative chains, for embarking on its own entrepreneurial agenda according to market-orientated logic.
In this scenario, the Company can fully carry on its entrusted mission: to ensure a fair return to shareholders, through the construction and management of highway systems and the commercial exploitation of the pertinent and/or connected activities, guaranteeing a suitable quality of service, in line with the medium-high standards internationally. The business mandate obviously involves directing attention to the economic results but, and above all, to enhancing the value of the entire infrastructural assets which the Company is responsible for, as well as maximizing the professional and entrepeunerial talents developed in the course of 40 years worth of operations.
In the light of the events that have occurred in the most recents years, and of the contents of the agreement between the Company and ANAS (the National Road Board), the activities of the Company chaired by Prof. Giancarlo Valori fall into five macro-areas: construction, management, maintenance; surveys and research; diversified operations.

Construction The building of infrastructure comprises two distinct activities:
- constructing the arteries according to the road network design as defined by Parliament;
- bringing about road widening and modernization schemes for the highways already existing, for the purpose of increasing the capacity of the arterial roads, raising the overall usefulness of the system and responding to customer needs.
Whereas the building of new arterial roads might be considered as quite finished in regard to its basic arrangement with the opening in 1995 of terminal parts of the A26 “Trafori” and A27 Mestre-Belluno highways, the provision of third and fourth lanes and punctual solutions to network functionally problems form a crucial activity for the Company.

Management Running the network involves a series of activity, organized and co-ordinated among themselves that, taken together, shape the provision of the superhighway service. The operations concern traffic safety, information, control and assistance, and the collection of toll payments. These are the areas in which, once again in 1997, the efforts have been ever greater to improve the services, strengthen their implementation, introduce technological innovation and generally update the level of service offered to meet the qualitative diversification of the demand. This can be summarized in the following crucial points:
- As regards progress in the automation of toll collection, the extension of the Telepass system to all network toll stations allowed the proportion of automatic payment transactions to reach 48% in 1997;
- The Company's telecommunications system avails of a fiber-optic network of 3,318 km, a similar sized network of copper cables and the radio networks. It was further strengthened during the year;
- Concerning user assistance and safety, several structural type interventions were made, such as the investment on the network for safety, backed up by other managerial type investment. Maintenance This includes all the activties carried out to safeguard the entirety of the infrastructural assets entrusted to the Company and to guarantee adequate levels of safety and reliability of the structures. The grand effort that has characterised these recent years, and 1997 in particular, has been that of directing conferment maintenance to the works of adjunctive quality, more adapted to the new working order demanded. Alongside this more innovative front, there have been rationalizations achieved in the processes and operations of programmed maintenance (surveillance systems of the works of art, planning systems for maintenance activities, road works technology).

Research and development The Company concerns itself, both independently and in co-operation with outside bodies (national and international), with studies and research projects.
These are aimed at determining the methods and instruments for creating technical break-throughs, sharpening managerial models, raising the level of consumer service and improving the safety of the highway traffic circulation. The studies mainly involve the fields of civil and electronic engineering, economic analysis, transport economy, market research and sector strategies. Diversified operations Other activities, that represent the area of diversification from the highway services, are carried out by the Company either directly or through other Group companies.
The operations involve: the supply of services in the fields of planning, maintenance and highway maintenance, both in Italy and abroad; the provision of services in the telecommunications sector; the commercialization of the technology for the automated collection of toll payments.

These five activities areas that the Company operate in are, however, only partly perceptible by the road user. One could say the latter only comes into contact with whatever outlines the overall highway service.
De facto, the drivers have at their disposal the highway and the other infrastructure that allow transportation in their own vehicles. The shareholders, on the other hand, participate in the capital of a company that is active in diverse sectors and which, over these past years, has known to reward the confidence accorded it with profits.

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