Piombino Dese (PADUA), Italy, 14 September 2007

With the Italian ambassador and the Mexican authorities present, Sergio Stevanato, Chairman of the Stevanato Group, today laid the first stone of what will become the group's new factory in Cienega de Flores (Monterrey), in the State of Nuevo Leon.

Set in an area of 50,000 square metres, once completed the factory will be one of the most technologically advanced in the world for the manufacture of glass tube containers for the pharmaceutical industry. The American market will be the target, especially the USA, which is why the location in Northern Mexico is strategically significant. But, as Group Chairman Sergio Stevanato declared, there are also other reasons for the choice. "We believe that the American market is the key to our growth over the coming years, and here in Monterrey we have found an ideal base for various reasons, among which I'd like mention in particular the presence of an important local tradition in industrial glass manufacture, dating back to the early 1900s, and the fact that the area has one of the highest concentrations of top grade technical universities in all Mexico."

The choice to open a new facility plant follow the world market trend to create and sell technologically advanced products towards USA. Several big pharmaceutical industries have already moved in Mexico and the Stevanato Group comes up to this need getting over the distance between Europe and America.

Contacts:Press Officer:Gabriele Peron gabriele.peron@ompi.it

The Stevanato Group, founded in Italy in 1949, is today one of the world's largest manufacturers of glass tube containers for the pharmaceutical industry. Its status as an acknowledged world leader is unique, due to its internally developed technologies, fruit of a robust programme of autonomous research, development and implementation.

The company is made up of two divisions. The Glass Division specialises in glass tube primary packaging containers for the pharmaceutical industry (bottles, phials, bowls and syringes, etc.), and comprises Nuova Ompi (Padua - Italy), Alfamatic (Latina - Italy), Medical Glass (Bratislava -Slovakia). The Engineering Division, on the other hand, designs and manufactures machinery and technological equipment for the production of glass tube containers, based in the Italian companies Spami (Padua) and Optrel (Vicenza).

The Stevanato Group employs 950 people and in 2006 had a turnover of 115 million euros (70% from outside Italy), trading with over 60 different countries and providing quality and innovation to 300 major clients through the 1,600 million glass containers it produces every year.