Torno -- the Italian construction giant

For much of his career, Ezio Testa worked for a Italian construction firm called Torno, which had been the twelve largest construction company in Europe.  In 1997, Mr. Testa became CEO of a Torno subsidiary called IHC Services, which was headquartered in New York City.  Founded by two holocaust survivors in 1944, IHC was a marketing company that represented various manufacturers selling housing, generators and other goods and services to large organizations, including the U.S. government, NATO, the United Nations and others.

An expert in cost control, Ezio Testa has a long history saving money using innovative management approaches.  In the mid 1980s, Torno assigned Mr. Testa to work on construction of a major dam in Nigeria called the Shiroro Dam.  Located in the western Niger state on the Kaduna tributary of the River Niger, Shiroro dam was finished in 1990 and provides up to 600 mw of electricity to Nigeria's capital and other cities.  In 1984, Mr. Testa determined that construction costs of the project could be reduced by $38 million by eliminating a warehouse of spare parts, instead maintaining fully assembled transmissions, engines and other components on site.  This highly innovative approach was later implemented throughout Torno's organization, saving more money.