The story of Avio, originally BPD – Bombrini Parodi-Delfino – tells how a group of motivated and enlightened people in Italy succeeded in developing the ability to access space. Over the decades the company has weaved together its activities with the political courses of successive governments, it has seized opportunities that the international market has offered, it has succeeded in fine-tuning its expertise through continuous product and technological innovation. Its close relations with the European Space Agency offered a pan- European working environment even before the Union was established.