Pavia relaunches on innovation: work starts on Cardano hi-tech park

Laboratories, offices, classrooms for research. This is the first step, developed over 2400 square metres, of the Gerolamo Cardano Park for Sustainable Innovation, Pavia's scientific-technological hub, today the protagonist of the start-up ceremony.

Space created with 12 million euro funding from the Lombardy Region and the support of the Ministry for Universities and Research, which will be built on the grounds of the local university, with the aim of creating in Pavia an innovation district closely linked to the technological-scientific area of the university. This will include the Faculty of Engineering and the Departments of Biology and Biotechnology, Mathematics and Natural Sciences, as well as the Genetics and Mathematics sections of the CNR.

Construction will take place in two phases, with separate but strategically connected interventions. Firstly, the research and training centre, Parco Cardano 1, whose construction site gets underway today. It is intended to provide the companies that will settle here with direct contact with the 18 Pavia University departments and other research centres in the city, as well as opportunities for targeted training and education. Thanks to full funding of 12 million euro from the Lombardy Region, classrooms for training, laboratories and offices dedicated to scientific research activities will be built on an area of 2,400 square metres. The aim is to complete the project by autumn 2026.

The second phase concerns an infrastructure for technological innovation that will host private companies and other entities interested in developing innovative research projects. In particular, on an area of over 5,000 square metres, laboratories and offices dedicated to applied scientific research of private companies and other entities that will operate in synergy with the University will be built. The area will be developed by Arexpo, a company owned by MEF, the Lombardy Region, the Municipality of Milan and Fondazione Fiera Milano, which is currently involved in the development of MIND, Milano Innovation District, the innovation district that is being developed in the area that hosted Expo 2015. For the Pavia project Arexpo will therefore follow the planning and authorisation process, the construction of the buildings and their management for the concession period of 40 years, and the identification of the private companies that will be present within the Park. Commitment for which Arexpo foresees an investment of approximately 20 million .

The Gerolamo Cardano Park will focus on sustainable innovation in the areas of environment and health, inspired by the UN Sustainable Development Goals 2030 and the thematic objectives of the European Green Deal. There are currently three sectors on which the Park has already collected expressions of interest from companies: Microelectronics, Pharmaceuticals and Nutrition.