Presented in late 2023 with a launch event in Milan, Terra & Tech is a national open innovation program focused on the Wine Industry, designed to foster new connections and collaborations between winemaking traditions and technological innovation. The Terra & Tech initiative serves as a bridge between start-ups – including international ones – and Italian wine producers, promoting technology transfer and field testing of the most advanced solutions.
The program was conceived, organized, and promoted by Filiera Futura, an association that works throughout Italy to innovate and enhance the agri-food sector, comprising banking foundations, universities, and trade associations, in collaboration with I3P, the Innovative Companies Incubator of Politecnico di Torino, which has been active for over 25 years in supporting the creation and development of innovative start-ups with high technological intensity and growth potential.
The initiative was partnered by six Foundations of Banking Origin, associated with Filiera Futura and active in northern, central, and southern Italy, which offered their support and contributions: Fondazione CRC, Fondazione Cariverona, Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Lucca, Fondazione Carifac, Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Jesi, Fondazione CON IL SUD.
The program’s activities
From its very inception, Terra & Tech has established and maintained a threefold objective: to listen to winemakers and their needs for innovation in the vineyard, in the winery, and in marketing; to identify the most promising technological solutions to address practical needs; and to support producers in effectively implementing these solutions in the field.
A series of workshops, held throughout 2024 in various regions of Italy – in the cities of Cuneo, Verona, Lucca, Polizzi Generosa (Palermo), and Cupramontana (Ancona) – involving the six foundations and their networks of member producers, enabled the direct collection of production challenges and innovation needs from over 140 industry stakeholders with extensive hands-on experience.
The wealth of insights gathered during meetings across Italy was put to good use with the development and launch, in late 2024, of the program’s first call for start-ups, titled “Terra & Tech | Innovation for the Wine Industry”. The initiative was open to all companies, both domestic and international, offering innovative solutions and technologies capable of contributing to the evolution of the wine sector, with the aim of accelerating the transition toward new, sustainable ways of growing, producing, and selling.
The call offered many specific challenges to choose from, grouped into the three application areas of vineyard, winery, and marketing. Among the evaluation criteria used to assess the submitted projects were: the strength of the company and the entrepreneurial team, the technical feasibility of the proposals and their integration into production chains, the economic, environmental, and social impact of the projects, and alignment with the initiative’s areas of interest.
During the seven weeks that the call for start-ups was open, Terra & Tech received over 70 project proposals from Italy, Europe, and the United States. Most applicants addressed challenges related to innovation in vineyards (56%), followed by those related to the marketing of wine products (30%) and those related to winery management (14%). Among the technologies most commonly used in the submitted solutions were: electronic devices with sensors and the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI), big data, machine learning, drones, cloud computing, UX platforms, virtual reality (VR) or augmented reality (AR), and advanced robotics.
Testing the solutions in the field
In 2025, the selection of the 20 most promising solutions was completed, presenting them to the networks of the partner foundations: more than 70 manufacturers from across Italy were able to assess the feasibility of launching pilot tests within their own organizations. Among the selected projects:
- for vineyards: 9 focused on collecting data on crops and soil conditions, 2 on water management, 1 on weather forecasting, and 2 on other topics;
- for wineries: 3 on new winemaking methods and 1 on reducing energy consumption;
- for marketing: 1 on digital promotion tools and another on improving customer insight.
To date, ten face-to-face meetings have already taken place between producers affiliated with the partner foundations and innovative start-ups that responded to the Terra & Tech call for proposals. Based on these substantive discussions and the mutual exchange of expertise, the first five field trials have been defined; some were already carried out in the final months of 2025, while others are set to begin in the spring of 2026 across multiple regions of Italy.
In the upcoming articles of the Terra & Tech Stories series, each field test will be covered in detail, providing insights into the participants, the technologies used, the challenges faced, and the results achieved during the joint activities.
“It is significant for Filiera Futura to see how the collaboration between producers and start-ups can lead to concrete field tests,” said Francesco Cappello, President of Filiera Futura. “These initial tests represent not only an opportunity for technological innovation in our supply chains, but also a chance to strengthen the dialogue between producers and developers of advanced digital solutions. Our goal is to promote sustainable practices, improve production efficiency, and disseminate replicable models that can serve as a benchmark for the entire Italian agri-food sector.”
“We are proud to have contributed to the development of the Terra & Tech program and the opportunities it is creating, both for the Italian wine industry and for the ecosystem of innovative start-ups,” commented Paola Mogliotti, Director of I3P. “The Incubator of Politecnico di Torino is continuing its efforts to support field testing of the most promising technological solutions and, at the same time, is defining the next steps of the project in collaboration with Filiera Futura. We would like to express our gratitude to the initiative’s partner foundations, for their crucial role as representatives of the sector and as facilitators of contact with the numerous local producers who have shown interest and responsiveness to the opportunities offered by dialogue with start-ups.”
