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so he went there for three days a week and the other four days he returned to Milan. But of course on Sunday he slept all the time since he worked about 400 hours per month. So after my initial period of working in the technical assistance realm, as soon as I finished my secondary education I wanted to quit in order to work for my father. When I was 16, I was in charge of the technical assistance in Milan, and I had 10 technicians to coordinate, while my father was in Bologna. [Paolo's father] Bruno never asked me to do that, but somehow I thought that there was need to. It was a natural path to follow. Then, at the age of 18 when I got a driving license, I was already a technician with a solid technical knowledge and education, so I started to visit coffee shops. SA: How did the transition from La Spaziale to Dalla Corte come about? PDC: I worked as a technician and helped Bruno in regard to small projects or modifications on the products that were developed by La Spaziale, until 1990. Then in the period from 1990 to the end of 2000, our roles inverted: I started in the research and development department in La Spaziale, also continuing with customer technical support, whereas my father, in order to spend more time with my mother and the family, started to focus on the technical assistance and sales in Milan and in the nearer provinces. So my previous experience within the technical service on one hand and the following period within the R&D; department on the other, gave me and my father a certain understanding over the entire operation. We felt that the espresso coffee machines that were already on the market were obsolete in comparison with the evolution that coffee was experiencing, starting from the cultivation process to the final roasting. We felt that those machines didn't express the best of every single origin of coffee anymore, in relation to all the organoleptic features that the different coffee might offer in the final cup. Since there wasn't any possibility to develop something completely innovative within the La Spaziale company, my father, Elsa [Paolo's sister, who also worked for La Spaziale], and I decided to start from zero with a new company and a new project. This project was so innovative that I think it can be considered a split between traditional and obsolete systems, and a new generation of technologically advanced machines able to better express the features of the coffee from all over the world. So starting from this, the Dalla Corte technologies are today a reality for everybody, especially the multiboiler one. This technology has been the basic technology to enable the birth of a new coffee concept. Starting from this technology we started a new path and we had new perspectives as regards coffee extraction. We significantly increased our studies on coffee, especially those concerning its reaction in relation to temperature and the extraction preparation [preinfusion]. This technology enabled us the development of new technical solutions. I'm referring to the connection between grinder and the machine. In fact, through this connection we allow the dialogue between the two devices that have the most prominent role in the coffee transformation. This technical solution appeared on 82 barista magazine the market in 2005 thanks to a partnership with Mahlkönig, who made its K60 available to us in order to be modified and thus obtaining the electronic regulation of the grind. In so doing, we could develop what we call today the DC system. The DC system is an espresso coffee machine that is connected with the grinder. Every five coffee erogations, there is a control of the parameters of those espresso and if there is need, the grinder automatically regulates the particle size of the coffee so that the coffee can be extracted in the best range of time, thus compensating the 85 to 90 percent of external variables that influence the raw material. SA: Dalla Corte is a family company in the most traditional sense—today both of your children, Valentina, 29, and Pietro, 23, work for the company. What do you hope for Dalla Corte in the next 10 years? How about in 50 years? PDC: Yes, DC is indeed a family company but it also boasts the inclusion of good people, both internally and externally. Dalla Corte has an international perspective, and as a consequence, we developed coffee machines that are easily adaptable to the different ways in which espresso is experienced throughout the world. We live in a world in which there are strong economic powers. These economic powers have tried to standardize products, to sell low-quality machines, and to bring the traditional espresso coffee machines toward "vending," i.e. develop solutions for the monodose system in order to draw people towards mass consumption. It is clear that in the next 10 years the vending/monodose system will obtain more market segment. This is the natural effect of the global socioeconomic change. However, in contrast with this trend, there is also a quality trend. I wish to always continue towards worthy goals, like we are already doing, aiming at the improvement of the coffee transformation technologies, and developing technological solutions that can increasingly help the barista in what he/she does, but without depriving him/her of an identity. Furthermore, I wish to improve, with every new project, the efficiency of energy consumption and the compatibility of our products to the environment, both in relation to the material used and the kind of manufacturing process. I hope to maintain a company concept that respects those working in it, and that allows for growth both at personal level and, as a consequence, for the company itself. Finally, I wish that through a gradual improvement of the company profits, we will be able to increasingly promote social initiatives like that of the Orangutan Coffee Project in Sumatra. In this project, DC is acting like support for the people who cultivate coffee, in order to improve their living conditions by producing a better quality coffee and promoting a fair price for it. SA: Can you please explain the philosophy behind Dalla Corte's grouphead and portafilter size? PDC: The choice to construct our groupheads with portafilters with a smaller diameter in comparison with those on the market— we use a 54mm diameter instead of a 58mm—is due to different factors: On the one hand, there is the empirical experience, but this is supported by the technical analysis. A smaller diameter, in