The ‘Cura Italia’ Decree, which we have already introduced in contents overall, was approved by the Council of Ministers on 17.3.20. (1) Also in view of Phase 2, meaning the progressive restart of activities suspended so far because of the COVID-19 emergency, we now focus on two points of interest for startups innovative and ‘bonus advertising’.
startups innovative and digitalization of the Public Administration
Containment measures of the Covid-19 contagion, starting from the decree #StayAtHome (Prime Minister's Decree 11.3.20), have created the urgency to organize the so-called ‘smart working’ (or smart working). Which presupposes the availability not only of individual devices and connections on the part of the workers involved, but above all the organization of shared and secure IT systems where they can operate.
The ‘Cura Italia’ – in recognizing this need – has reserved to the startups innovative (startups) a key role, for the purpose of implementing and ‘spreading smart working and network services for access by citizens and businesses’:
– the public administrations, until 31.12.20, will be able to purchase IT goods and services (with preference toward cloud computing based on the model SaaS, Software as a Service), through direct access to the negotiated procedure. That is to say, without the obligation of prior publication of a tender notice,
– the simplified procedure mentioned above is however subject to the condition that the winner is selected from a shortlist of at least four operators, of which at least one is an innovative startup or a small and medium innovative enterprise. (1)
After the award, the administrations are authorized to immediately stipulate and execute the contract. With the aim of ‘accelerating and simplifying bureaucratic procedures as much as possible for the purchase of IT goods and digital services, at a time when they are particularly strategic and important for the entire country’, as declared by the Minister for Technological Innovation and Digitization, Paola Pisano.
‘Cura Italia’ and ‘advertising bonus’
‘Cura Italia’ also intervened on the so-called ‘advertising bonus’, referred to in D.L. 50/17, article 57-bis (Tax incentives for incremental advertising investments on newspapers, periodicals and local TV and radio broadcasters and support measures for newly established publishing companies).
The extraordinary measures urgent to support the printing supply chain introduced by the decree actually provide for the granting of a tax credit in the single amount of 30% of the total value of the investments made. Within the limits established by DL 50/17, in favor of the subjects and according to the methods indicated therein, with effects limited to the 2020 tax year (DL 18/20, art. 98).
The tax credit, with reference to the current tax year only, is extended – in addition to the ‘retail traders who operate exclusively in the sector of retail sale of newspapers, magazines and periodicals’ (2) – also to all ‘press distribution companies that supply daily newspapers and/or periodicals to retailers located in municipalities with a population of less than 5,000 inhabitants and in municipalities with only one point of sale’. With the further possibility of considering expenses for the supply of electricity services, telephone and internet connection services, as well as home delivery services of newspaper copies.
The maximum limit of the tax credit is set for 2020 at 4,000 euros (instead of 2,000). And the period for sending the online communication to access the credit is postponed by 6 months, from 1 to 30.9.20. The validity of applications submitted between 1 and 31.3.20 remains unchanged.
Selena Travaglio e Dario Dongo
Notes
(1) A further prerequisite for the application of the simplified procedure is that the purchases are instrumental to the implementation of projects supporting the Three-Year Plan for IT in the Public Administration
(2) Cf. law 145/18, art. 1, paragraph 806
Dario Dongo, lawyer and journalist, PhD in international food law, founder of WIISE (FARE - GIFT – Food Times) and Égalité.
Lawyer, specialized in intellectual property rights. LL.M. in agri-food law.
