Top businesses are moving out of the capital to places like Milan, Parma, Caserta even as far as Bangalore and other cities around the world. Companies in the telecoms, food, banking, insurance, and IT sectors are packing up their headquarters that have affected 400,000 Romans over the past five years, says Walter Schiavella, head of Lazios Confederazione Generale Italiana del Lavoro (general employment federation). In the last year alone, Telecom Italia completed a transfer of 400 jobs to Milan, while another 100 jobs at media groups Rai and Sky also went to the Lombard capital. However, the moves are about rationalising staff levels as much as cost-cutting over premises, according to Mr Schiavella. He says these strategic decisions invariably mean job cuts: Assicurazioni Generali, for example, shed 1,500 staff when it moved out of the capital. Next on the horizon is Alitalia, the national airline, which is set to relocate 1,000 pilots and stewards to Milan in January 2007.