Fondazione Social Venture Giordano Dell’Amore

Isola Catania

Isola Catania is Sicily’s social innovation hub. Active since 2023, it has a hybrid identity that combines entrepreneurship and social mission, with the aim of creating opportunities for young people in the South. It immediately chose the qualification of social enterprise, with the aim of combining economic sustainability and collective utility. Each initiative responds to real needs, enhances local resources and creates connections between the public, private and third sectors, giving life to an open and generative ecosystem.

Isola operates through an integrated model composed of three business units: the Spaces, the enhancement of a UNESCO heritage site in the heart of the city that hosts coworking spaces, training rooms, offices, event spaces to build a diverse and inclusive community; the Coalitions, a platform that unites public and private, profit and non-profit, local and global organizations to collaboratively address complex territorial challenges together; the Projects, high-impact initiatives dedicated in particular to young people and vulnerable subjects, with free opportunities for orientation, empowerment, training, networking and matchmaking.

In 2023 Isola Catania participated in the Get it! Call for Impact. After completing an acceleration path, in June 2024 it was selected as “Best Start-up For Impact” at the Get it! Investor Day, benefiting from an investment of €50,000 by Fondazione Social Venture Giordano Dell’Amore, the strategic and operational arm of Fondazione Cariplo in the field of impact investing and promoter of the program, in partnership with Cariplo Factory.

Impact

In 2024, Isola consolidated its impact business model, clarifying the relationship between economic activities and social objectives, and defining a value chain that makes its theory of change tangible. Four impact areas guide its daily work: School, aimed at increasing students’ awareness of the opportunities (educational, work, entrepreneurial and cultural) offered by the area; Skills and work, aimed at encouraging the increase in skills in high-demand professional fields that favor the job placement of underserved categories in the area; Entrepreneurship and innovation, dedicated to increasing entrepreneurial skills and competences for the creation or growth of companies committed to the ESG field; Culture and creativity, aimed at supporting the expansion of skills and relational assets of professionals in cultural and creative organizations.

Foundation year
2023
Legal status
S.r.l. Social Enterprise
Site
Catania
Sector
Innovation and training for the South
In portfolio since
2024
Investment
€50,000
Type of investment
Equity