Strategic integration between startups: the Yougenio case.

This work aims to analyze a new company, founded in June 2016, called Yougenio. As it is going to be clear along the text, it is not a normal startup, because it has not been founded by a young and inexpert team of “dreamers”, but it is an experiment pursued by an already established group called Manutencoop, based in Bologna (Italy), which is trying to exploit in a B2C market its previous knowledge and expertise developed in the B2B. The work has been divided in four chapters. The first one is an attempt to summarize what are the differences between EU and a better developed startup ecosystem, which is USA. Then, it follows a brief overview on the Italian situation on both the legal framework, created in order to facilitate the growth of this kind of new businesses, and the updated actual results. New management practices for new ventures are then discussed to give to the reader an idea of which are the best-known ways to deal with startups management. Next, a general look is taken on how firms can integrate their businesses together to achieve better synergies thanks to the use of M&A processes. The chapter is closed with a focus on how difficult it is to determine their values and which are the main issues to deal with the valuation processes. The second chapter tries to analyze in which background Yougenio is moving: in which segments the startup is actually interested, which competitors are developing in the same niche, etc. The third one, instead, goes further in the company business overview: all past moves of the company until today are explained (with the reasons behind specific decisions taken), and so are the results achieved. It focuses on the future strategy of Yougenio and how the top management is thinking to the next steps, knowing how this niche is a fast-pace moving environment. Taking into account what precedes, the chapter concludes with financial forecasts regarding the business and its future improvement. The text is concluded with the study of a possible integration strategy, Yougenio could go through, with two other competitors in order to boost their growth path, together.