10 of Italy’s largest family businesses. And what has kept them standing for generations

Italy has a particular relationship with the family business.
According to EY’s Global 500 Family Business Index 2025, it ranks fourth in the world by number of large family groups in the index, behind the United States, Germany and France: 22 companies, up from 20 in the previous edition. EY estimates the combined revenue of these businesses at 179 billion dollars, 12% more than in 2023.

The phenomenon, however, is far broader than the twenty-two companies that make it into a global ranking. The 17th edition of the AUB Observatory monitors 23,578 Italian companies with turnover of at least 20 million euros: 15,568, or 66%, are family-controlled. Over the long term, they also continue to show strong advantages in cumulative growth and profitability.

Within this universe, very different structures coexist. Financial holding companies, listed multinationals, private industrial groups, companies where the family surname is the brand and others where the owners have progressively separated their name from the operating identity. It is precisely this variety that makes Italian family businesses interesting.
What they have in common is the problem of continuity.

When they work, they manage to hold their course through economic cycles, crises, acquisitions and successive generations. When they stall, the breaking point often comes with generational succession, in the relationship between family and management, or in the difficulty of separating the company’s value from the figure who built it.

This selection is not a literal transcription of the EY ranking. We chose ten large Italian or Italian-origin groups by cross-referencing size, recognisability and the interest of their governance case. The financial data reported are the latest publicly available for each group and refer to financial years and scopes that are not always fully comparable. The order should therefore be read as indicative, while the focus remains on the choices that have allowed these families to retain control and direction over time.

1. Exor and the Agnelli family: John Elkann’s holding company

Reference metric: 2025 GAV of €37.1 billion | Industrial origins: 1899 | Family: Agnelli, third and subsequent generations

Exor is the current investment holding company of the Agnelli family. Its industrial history is rooted in the founding of Fiat in 1899, but its present-day structure reflects a far broader shift: from the centrality of the car to a global portfolio that includes, among others, stakes in Ferrari, Stellantis, Philips, CNH and Juventus.

Family control runs through Giovanni Agnelli B.V., the company held by the descendants of Giovanni Agnelli and built with an explicit purpose of continuity. At the end of 2025 it was Exor’s largest shareholder, with 54.94% of economic rights and 83.97% of voting rights. The official ownership structure openly describes it as a vehicle intended to preserve unity and continuity of control.

Governance note: the Agnelli case shows an evolved form of family continuity. The family oversees capital, direction and appointments, while the operational management of the portfolio companies is entrusted to professional managers. John Elkann is the link between these two dimensions. The strength of the model lies precisely in the fact that the family does not need to run every company in order to keep governing its industrial capital.

2. EssilorLuxottica and the Del Vecchio family: the role of Delfin

2025 revenue: €28.5 billion | Luxottica founded: 1961 | Family: heirs of Leonardo Del Vecchio through Delfin

EssilorLuxottica is the world’s largest eyewear group. The 2018 merger of Luxottica and Essilor combined the industrial and distribution capability built by Leonardo Del Vecchio with the technological and ophthalmic strength of the French group. The portfolio brings together Ray-Ban, Oakley, Persol and numerous global licences, alongside a distribution network with few equivalents in the sector.

The Del Vecchio family exercises its influence through Delfin, the holding company Leonardo Del Vecchio had built to concentrate stakes and assets. After his death in 2022, the presence of several heirs made the holding company even more important: control does not depend on running the company directly, but on the ability to keep ownership orderly and coherent.

Governance note: the Del Vecchio succession is interesting precisely because it takes place within a listed multinational that is already highly professionally managed. The risk concerns the heirs’ ability to act as a stable shareholder, preventing a multiplication of owners from producing a multiplication of strategies.

3. Ferrero and the Ferrero family: Giovanni Ferrero and the third generation

Revenue 2024/2025: €19.3 billion | Founded: 1946 | Family: Giovanni Ferrero, third generation

Ferrero was founded in Alba in 1946 by Pietro Ferrero and grew to turn products such as Nutella, Kinder, Ferrero Rocher, Tic Tac and Raffaello into global brands. Today it operates in more than 170 markets and continues to expand through innovation, investment in production and acquisitions.

Giovanni Ferrero, son of Michele and grandson of Pietro, is Executive Chairman. Operational management is entrusted to CEO Lapo Civiletti. This is an important detail: the third generation retains a decisive role in vision and capital allocation, while the industrial machine is run by a manager from outside the family.

Governance note: Ferrero shows how private ownership can become an advantage when it is accompanied by profitability, discipline and management. The absence of stock-market pressure allows a longer horizon, but the real protection comes from the ability to turn family values and product culture into a system that keeps working when the people change.

4. Edizione and the Benetton family: from fashion to holding company

Consolidated revenue 2025: €10.3 billion | Founded: 1981 | Family: Benetton

Edizione reflects one of the most radical transitions ever made by an Italian business family. The Benetton name began in clothing, but the family’s asset structure has gradually become a diversified holding company. Today the portfolio spans transport infrastructure, travel retail, digital infrastructure, financial stakes, real estate, agriculture and control of Benetton Group. Edizione is wholly owned by the Benetton family.

The transition is interesting because it also changes the family’s economic identity. The surname is still associated with the fashion brand, while a growing share of the family’s value is generated in businesses that the general public links far less directly to the Benettons.

Governance note: the holding company allows the family’s wealth to be separated from the individual operating companies and capital to be allocated on a portfolio basis. It is a model that reduces dependence on a single sector and makes clearer a principle central to mature business families: continuity does not require remaining identical to what the business was in the first generation.

5. Esselunga and the Caprotti family: succession after Bernardo Caprotti

Revenue: over €9.4 billion | Founded: 1957 | Family: Caprotti, Marina Caprotti executive chair

Esselunga was born in 1957 with the opening in Milan of the first supermarket in Italy. The group’s growth has remained tied to a model of direct control over its stores, strong integration between production and distribution, and a customer relationship built over decades of continuity.

The most delicate phase came with Bernardo Caprotti’s succession. Family relationships, inheritance decisions and disputes among the children turned the transition into a public affair. The current structure has Marina Caprotti as executive chair and a more clearly defined governance after years in which the identity of the company’s future owner was itself part of the problem.

Governance note: Esselunga shows how the founder’s narrative and the reality of succession can become inseparable. A company can have solid numbers and an extremely strong brand, yet the transition remains fragile when ownership, family and corporate identity have not been made sufficiently independent of the person who held them together for decades.

6. Marcegaglia: Emma and Antonio Marcegaglia at the helm of the group

Revenue: €7.5 billion | Founded: 1959 | Family: Marcegaglia

From Gazoldo degli Ippoliti, in the province of Mantua, Marcegaglia has become one of the world’s leading steel processing groups. Today it reports 7,800 employees, 36 steel plants across four continents and 15,000 customers.

Ownership has remained in the family, and the handover from Steno Marcegaglia to his children Antonio and Emma took place within a group that was already international. Emma Marcegaglia has also built an institutional profile far higher than is typical for a B2B company, including through her presidency of Confindustria.

Governance note: the model shows how a second generation can share out roles and representation without breaking control. A family member’s public visibility can strengthen reputation and relationships, but it also increases the need to keep the personal brand and the company brand distinct.

7. Grimaldi Group and the Grimaldi family: family control in logistics

Consolidated revenue 2024: €5.09 billion | Founded: 1947 | Family: Grimaldi

The Grimaldi Group is today Italy’s largest shipping group and one of the world’s leading operators in the maritime transport of vehicles and rolling cargo. It is wholly owned by the Grimaldi family and led by Gian Luca Grimaldi, Emanuele Grimaldi and Diego Pacella. Its network comprises more than 130 vessels, port terminals and logistics companies in an increasingly integrated chain.

The sector makes the value of continuity particularly evident. Ships, terminals and new routes require long-term, capital-intensive investment. Decisions taken today produce effects for many years, often beyond the tenure of any single manager.

Governance note: family control can favour speed and consistency in capital allocation, especially in a sector that demands long-term bets. As the group grows, however, so does the complexity of the next transition: the more global the organisation becomes, the less continuity can depend solely on the family’s direct presence in key roles.

8. Menarini and the Aleotti family: family ownership, professional management

Consolidated revenue: €4.887 billion | Founded: 1886 | Family: Aleotti

Menarini is one of Italy’s largest family-controlled pharmaceutical groups. Headquartered in Florence, it operates in 140 countries and has more than 17,000 employees. Ownership rests with the Aleotti family: Lucia and Alberto Giovanni Aleotti are shareholders and members of the Board.

Pharmaceuticals impose a particular kind of complexity. Research, compliance, market access, manufacturing and regulation require expertise that makes it hard to imagine governance based on lineage alone. Family ownership has to coexist with a highly professionalised managerial and scientific structure.

Governance note: Menarini is a good example of the distinction between owning and managing. The family can set the horizon, capital and long-term responsibilities without having to occupy every operational function. For many growing family businesses, this separation is one of the necessary conditions for scalability.

9. Barilla and the Barilla family: almost 150 years of continuity

Revenue 2025: €4.837 billion | Founded: 1877 | Family: Barilla

Barilla was born in Parma in 1877, when Pietro Barilla opened a small bread and pasta shop. Almost a century and a half later, the group operates internationally with brands including Barilla, Mulino Bianco, Pavesi, Wasa and Harrys. Family leadership is today associated with Guido, Luca and Paolo Barilla.

Its longevity makes Barilla particularly interesting from a brand perspective. In a company with this history, continuity means above all being able to change products, markets and communication without making the promise built over time unrecognisable.

Governance note: Barilla shows how far generational continuity depends on the ability to transfer a system, not just ownership. The brand must remain credible even when the people whose surname is on the boardroom door change.

10. Mapei and the Squinzi family: the handover to Marco and Veronica

2024 consolidated revenue: €4.4 billion | Founded: 1937 | Family: Squinzi

Mapei was founded in Milan in 1937 and today operates in 59 countries, with more than 13,000 people and over a hundred production plants. After Giorgio Squinzi’s long leadership, the group is led by Veronica and Marco Squinzi as chief executives, with a structure that keeps the family at the centre of both ownership and management.

The succession was prepared before Giorgio Squinzi’s death in 2019. It is a detail that radically changes the transition: the next generation enters the system while the previous leader can still pass on relationships, criteria and decision-making logic.

Governance note: early planning reduces the risk of succession coinciding with a crisis. In Mapei’s case, the transition shows the difference between inheriting a role and arriving in it having already built skills and legitimacy within the organisation.

A shared lesson: the family alone is not enough

These ten cases have very different histories, sectors and ownership structures. Some groups are listed, others remain private. Some bear the family surname, others have built a clear distance between ownership and brand. Some are led directly by the heirs, others entrust a significant part of management to external managers.

What they have in common runs deeper: family control works when it manages to become an institution. As long as the company depends on the personal ability of a single figure, the founder’s strength already contains the fragility of the future.

The decisive step comes when values, criteria, responsibilities and identity are turned into brand governance and corporate governance. At that point, continuity can outlive individuals without losing what makes the project recognisable.

The issue concerns more and more companies. The AUB Observatory 2026 records an acceleration in leadership transitions and a growing use of models in which generations work side by side. Preparing for succession therefore means working simultaneously on ownership, management, skills and brand equity. The value of the name, relationships and reputation is as much a part of the company as the assets on the balance sheet.

The interesting question for a first-generation entrepreneur, then, comes before succession. It concerns what would remain of the company if, tomorrow, the founder stopped being the person who holds every decision together.

Large family businesses become what they are when they find an answer solid enough to last more than one generation.