From a 50x Exit to the next bet

They built Venistar from scratch, sold it at an exceptional multiple, and are now putting thirty years of luxury digital expertise back on the table for a project they believe will change the rules of the market. A conversation with the President and CTO of AVÈIRE.

Thirty years working side by side, a technology platform that transformed how brands like Moncler, Ferragamo and Ferrari manage retail, and an exit delivering 50x on invested capital. Roberto Da Re and Carlo Zuccon don’t fit the typical profile of first-time founders. And yet that’s exactly what they’ve done, with the clarity of people who know where they’ve gone wrong before, and the credibility of people who have already been proven right.

Today they are co-founders of AVÈIRE, a B2B2C platform designed to digitalize the intermediated luxury market for high-spending travellers. A multi-billion euro market across Europe, still run entirely by phone and WhatsApp. We spoke with them about the journey that brought them here, what they’re looking for, and why they believe this is the right move.

Let’s start from the beginning. Who are you, where do you come from?

Carlo Zuccon: I’ve always worked in fashion. I’m from the Veneto region — you can probably tell from the accent — and I started out at companies that represented the excellence of Italian textiles in the Eighties and Nineties: Stefanel, Benetton, Lanerossi. I was working on IT systems, at a time when these companies were building their first retail chains and their first franchising models. That’s where I met Roberto, who was a supplier to one of the companies where I worked. From that point, a journey of more than thirty years began.

Roberto Da Re: I started at IBM, then at what is now Accenture — though it had a different name back then. We’re really talking about the last century. After that I spent six years as CEO of the Benetton Group’s IT services company. In 1992 I left, took an entrepreneurial path, and became a partner in a software company. That’s where I met Carlo — he was IT director at one of our clients. To win his trust, one day I showed up with my car and an IBM AS400 system in the boot. I said: “Here, try it.” That was the beginning of a relationship built on trust that’s lasted more than thirty years.

That company eventually became Venistar. What did you build together?

Carlo Zuccon: Venistar was founded in 2005 with a very clear mission: consultancy and software development for the fashion luxury world — vertical, no distractions. We brought young people on board, trained them, and passed on everything we’d learned over twenty years in the sector. The real turning point came around 2009-2010, when e-commerce stopped being an experiment and Apple launched the iPad. We decided to build a proprietary platform: CX, Commerce Experience. The idea was to create an omnichannel orchestrator — a system that allowed brands to have a single view of stock, orders and customers across all channels, from physical retail to e-commerce to marketplaces. Something others claimed they could do, but in practice required enormous resources. We managed it with a simplicity others didn’t have.

Roberto Da Re: Around 2017, CX started entering major brands: Geox, Moncler, Versace, Tod’s, Ferragamo, Ferrari. What gave us the most satisfaction wasn’t just the technology — it was the credibility we’d built. When Carlo walks into a project, anyone who knows him has no doubts. We have no skeletons in the closet, and in this sector that matters as much as patents.

In 2020 you sold Venistar to the Retex Group. How did that go?
Roberto Da Re: Retex’s CEO knew me. He had a clear vision: to build a group with significant international presence, starting from a base of around 20 million in revenues. He asked whether we wanted to be part of that. I talked it through with Carlo and the other partners, and we said yes. Venistar was the first piece. From there the group made acquisitions in Italy and Spain, and by 2022-2023 had reached around 100 million in revenues. Today — we were actually holding the accounts approval meeting just yesterday evening — the group is around 280 million.

On the exit value — can you share anything?
Roberto Da Re: Relative to the capital we invested, I think we did around 50x. Something like that.

Fifty times the invested capital. And then you chose to start again.
Roberto Da Re: Not exactly from scratch — but to put everything back on the line, yes. I call it the grey-haired startup. When people talk about startups they always picture a twenty- something nerd. Instead here we are, with a few more years behind us, alongside young and brilliant people without whom this adventure wouldn’t be possible. The mix works: we bring the experience, they bring the energy and a technological freshness that makes a real difference.
Carlo Zuccon: It’s the same dynamic we lived through with Venistar. First we tackled the world of ERPs, when nobody was talking about them yet. Then the world of omnichannel, when it still seemed like an abstract concept. Now with AVÈIRE we’re moving towards something new that, as far as we know, isn’t yet on anyone else’s radar.

How did the idea for AVÈIRE come about? When did Antonio Canovese first mention it to you?
Carlo Zuccon: It was a bit like when we first spotted the omnichannel opportunity. We noticed that there were high-spending clients travelling to luxury destinations — Milan, Paris, London, Dubai — with precise expectations. They want access to the best products and services, but not necessarily through a boutique or an e-commerce site. They live in luxury hotels, on yachts, in private suites, and they always have someone around them — a concierge, a personal stylist, a lifestyle manager — who handles every aspect of their stay. The problem is that this “someone” works without any tools. No visibility on stock, no platform to book or pay, everything done by phone. We realised there was no digital infrastructure for this channel.
Roberto Da Re: And when Carlo identifies an unexpressed market need, he’s rarely wrong. It already happened with omnichannel. The feeling here was the same.

Did you verify that nobody else was already doing this?
Roberto Da Re: Yes. And the answer is no. It’s a Blue Ocean — and not just in the Veneto countryside. It’s a global Blue Ocean.

How does the platform work in practice?
Carlo Zuccon: The underlying technology is called Manna. AVÈIRE is the commercial brand. The app is placed in the hands of the concierge, the personal shopper, the client’s assistant. From the app they access a geo-localised catalogue of products available in boutiques within a few kilometres of the hotel or event location. They can place orders, make reservations, handle payments. We’ve integrated Adyen for payments — the money is secure — and Global Blue for online tax-free processing, so the client doesn’t have to queue with their passport. The whole system runs on AWS with the highest security standards, and we’ve embedded AI components that help the concierge select the most suitable products for the client in front of them, plus a
virtual try-on so you can see how garments look before buying. What arrives at the boutique is a client — or a personal shopper — with a known purchase profile. That’s an opportunity for the brand, not a logistics headache.

Roberto Da Re: And there are no complex logistics implications for the brand. The stock is what’s physically in the boutiques. The supply chain is short: the product is a few kilometres away, delivered within hours. No warehouse, no shipping.

What does your day-to-day role in AVÈIRE look like?
Roberto Da Re: I keep enthusiasm high — inside and outside the company. I’m taking the platform to the brands we see as the most important users: ultra-luxury, clothing, accessories, jewellery. I contribute on the commercial and marketing side. Carlo Zuccon: I’m the builder. I designed the platform, defined the architecture, and work every day with an extraordinary team of young people completing the development. The APIs for brands are already in place. Integrations with payment and tax-free partners are live. My focus now is the product roadmap: the platform is already scalable by number of brands, by geography — it was born international — and by type of service. We’re already thinking about helicopter hire, exclusive experiences, spa bookings. Not just physical products.

You’re looking for co-investors. What exactly are you looking for?
Roberto Da Re: I want to be clear: we have already personally invested more than one million euros in this initiative. We’re not going to an investor saying “we put in 20 thousand, now you put in a million.” What we’re looking for are people who share the vision and can help us enter a market that is a Blue Ocean, but also a global one. It would be a shame to limit this initiative through lack of resources. We believe in it — the fact that we’ve put in real money is the proof.
Carlo Zuccon: And I’d add something important: the product already exists. An investor isn’t coming in to fund an idea — they’re entering where the product has already come to life. They’d be helping us scale it geographically and bring new partners on board. That’s a substantial difference compared to many other investment opportunities.

Are you also thinking about strategic partnerships — major hotel groups, for example?
Roberto Da Re: We hadn’t thought of it in those terms yet, but why not. A partner like that doesn’t just bring capital, they bring direct market access. It could be even more valuable.

Where do you see AVÈIRE in three years?

Roberto Da Re: (smiles) We’ll leave that to Antonio. We don’t want to give everything away just yet.

AVÈIRE is currently in go-to-market phase. The website is launching shortly. For partnership and co-investment enquiries: antonio.canovese@aveire.com