Instituto Nacional de Industria

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Instituto Nacional de Industria (INI), literally National Institute of Industry, was a Spanish state-owned industrial holding. It was legally created on 25 September 1941, with the objective to promote the development of Spanish industry and the self-sufficiency of the Spanish economy.

INI included an impressive set of companies, from heavy and basic industries, to "soft" services, most of them with E.N., standing for Empresa Nacional (National Corporation), in their acronyms. Among them were: Ensidesa (steel), Enasa (trucks), SEAT (cars), Ence (cellulose, biofuels)^[1], Endasa (aluminium), Iberia (airline), Endesa (power), EN Calvo Sotelo (petrochemicals), EN Bazán (military shipyards), Aesa (non-military shipyards), EN Santa Bárbara (weapons), EN Elcano (merchant shipping line), Atesa (tour operator), and many more.

On the contrary, Spanish State monopolies imposed by law, such as Campsa (gas stations), RENFE (railways), Tabacalera (tobacco), or Telefonica (telecommunications) were never part of INI.

Despite its inefficiencies and some strategic mistakes, INI was indeed instrumental in move the underdeveloped primary-sector-based closed Spain of the 1940s, to the booming Spain of the early 1970s (the so-called Spanish miracle).

Nevertheless, its success was too its sentence: when Spanish economy fully opened to the international trade and specially to the European Economic Community, INI lost any real reason to exist. Therefore almost all its companies were privatised in the 1980s and early 1990s. In this process, Ensidesa was taken over by Arcelor, SEAT by Volkswagen Group, Enasa by Iveco, Calvo Sotelo by Repsol, and so on; while others, like Endesa or Iberia have kept their independence.

The remains of INI are presently called SEPI, and are confined to Hunosa (coal mining) and a few other industries.