Legacy

Women's start-ups and green hydrogen: the Mandarano Prize in Catania relaunches innovation

From Proteo to energy transition: Giuseppe Patti turns Raffaella Mandarano's legacy into an incubation path for women under 35

by Nino Amadore

7 June 2026

Il rendering dell’impianto che sarà realizzato a Priolo (Siracusa)

3' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

Key points

The story behind the award
From water to hydrogen
The operational legacy
Previous winners

3' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

A prize for female entrepreneurs, a green hydrogen project in the heart of petrochemical Sicily, a technology company founded in Catania in 1986, when the word start-up was not yet in the business lexicon. The third edition of the 'Lympha - Raffaella Mandarano' Prize can be read like this: not just a call for entries, but a short circuit between past and future.

The award, dedicated to the Catanese manager who passed away in January 2024, is aimed at women aged between 18 and 35 with projects with a high social, environmental and technological impact. Nominations will remain open until 16 September 2026. The award ceremony is scheduled to take place in Catania on 9 October. The winner will receive EUR 2,000 and a four-month incubation course worth EUR 10,000.

The story behind the award

So far the chronicle. Then there is the industrial history. Giuseppe Mario Patti, Raffaella Mandarano's husband and founder of the Lympha Prize to commemorate her vision, sums it up like this: 'The South can anticipate.

Patti is a civil and hydraulic engineer, a specialist in automation and remote control systems for water and gas networks. In 1986, Mandarano founded Proteo together with him and other young graduates. The field was hydroinformatics: hydraulics, hydrology and information technology applied to water management. Today we would talk about innovation for utilities. Back then it was a pioneering gamble.

"Talent and technology do not need to emigrate to exist. They need a network,' says Patti. It is the phrase that takes the discourse out of commemoration and into the real economy: skills, businesses, critical mass.

2005 saw the arrival of Etna Hi-Tech, a consortium set up to bring together technology companies in the area. The intuition: small innovative companies that together can tackle larger orders and build supply chains.

Giuseppe Mario Patti

From water to hydrogen

The most disconcerting transition is from water to hydrogen. Patti is now president of GreenWaveR, a company engaged in the production of green hydrogen from renewable sources. The HFR - Hydrogen From Renewables project is being developed in the Augusta-Priolo SIN, the heart of Sicily's petrochemical industry: a plant to produce clean energy inside one of the symbolic places of the old industry.

Therein lies the paradox. Catanese innovation is trying to enter the decarbonisation economy from an area that for decades represented the Sicily of oil and heavy chemicals. The project, financed with NextGenerationEU funds under the PNRR 'Hydrogen Valleys', envisages an investment of EUR 20.283 million and entry into operation by May 2027.

At the heart of the plant will be a 3 MW PEM electrolyser, powered by a 4.5 MWp photovoltaic array and a 6 MWh storage system. The estimated annual production is about 600 tonnes of hydrogen. The construction will be entrusted with turnkey EPC contracts, in compliance with the PNRR rules on traceability of financial flows and the DNSH principle.

But the point is not only technical. Inside one of the most controversial places in Sicilian industry, a project is taking shape that tries to bring skills, facilities and production culture towards the energy transition. And it is here that the line that started with water, data and utilities finds its most unexpected landing place.

The Operational Legacy

The Lympha Prize is not just a memorial award. It is an attempt to turn an entrepreneurial biography into a tool for new businesses led by women. "An idea without a network remains a dream," says Patti. And this is where the memory of his wife becomes operational: incubation, accompaniment, relationships, access to an ecosystem.

Mandarano had dedicated an important part of her commitment to female entrepreneurship: for ten years she chaired the Catania Chamber of Commerce Committee, was vice-president of Confindustria Catania and general director of the Catania Ricerche Consortium.

'Female talent, in enterprise and technology, is the resource that the South wastes the most,' Patti argued, recalling his wife's conviction.

The winners of previous editions

In 2024, Valentina Mancuso won with 'Neurocognitive Virtual Reality', software to anticipate the diagnosis of cognitive impairment. In 2025, the prize went to Sarah Kamsu, founder of We Africans United, a cultural ecosystem that produces digital content, events, a map of the Afro-Italian diaspora and the Spazio WAU in Milan.

The question is industrial: can an area that has built parts of its economy on chemistry, traditional energy and utilities transform those skills into new enterprise? The answer comes through Proteo, Etna Hi-Tech, GreenWaveR and Premio Lympha. "Proteo, EHT, GreenWaveR, the Lympha Prize: a single thread," says Patti.