Mind The Gap

14Stories from the Frontlines: How the Playbook Works in the Real World

The lessons that matter most rarely appear in strategy decks. They surface in conversations with founders who navigated chaos, investors who watched patterns repeat across continents, and operators who built trust one misunderstanding at a time. This chapter distills those hidden truths.

Vision Beyond Borders Sets the Path Beyond Borders

Global success begins long before a company sets foot abroad—it begins with vision. Mario Scuderi of CPD Venture Capital emphasizes that the founders he’s seen in Italy who broke through internationally were not only the most technically accomplished; they were the ones who paired deep expertise with an unapologetically global vision. He points to founders like Luca Rossettini of D-Orbit, who set out to build a space logistics company long before the category existed. (The company’s tech systems deploy constellations of small satellites from a single rocket launch, making access to orbit faster and cheaper for clients who buy slots in a deployment.) D-Orbit has drawn funding from both global VCs and strategic corporates who saw its long-term potential in in-orbit services. Similarly, Claudio Padoacini of Energy Dome built a long-duration energy storage technology using CO₂ phase changes—an idea so contrarian and ambitious that it is now positioned at the center of global grid transition and AI-driven power demand. And with Cubbit, another Italian start-up, the founders ...