Why Six Italian SMEs Joined the Alchemyx Whitelist Before Launch

Most startups obsess over product velocity. They build, launch, iterate, and meet their first user on opening morning. Alchemyx did something different. The team behind the AI-powered media buying platform spent months validating demand before the MVP existed, and by the time the product was ready a group of Italian SMEs had already put their names down for the test phase.

Six small and medium Italian businesses are enrolled in the Alchemyx whitelist for the pilot starting in September 2026, with four more in negotiation and participation capped at ten. Alchemyx is pre-revenue: no campaign has run yet and the platform is not open to the public. What makes those six interesting is not revenue. It is what they were willing to commit to before seeing a single result.

The Pre-Launch Problem

For most advertising platforms, launch day is day one. Alchemyx's founder, Fabio Ferrara, a media planning veteran with 15 years in the industry, knew that would not work. The advertising industry does not adopt new platforms because they are technically innovative. It adopts them because they solve a specific pain point in a way nothing else does.

The pain point Ferrara identified was straightforward: media buying is fragmented, expensive to operate, and inaccessible to small businesses. FM radio, local TV, cinema and DOOH all exist as channels, but the operational friction (finding inventory, negotiating rates, adapting creative, tracking delivery) keeps them behind agency gatekeepers. The barrier is not capital. It is access.

What the Six SMEs Actually Signed Up For

The whitelist is not a free pilot. The businesses taking part will run real campaigns, on real media, with their own budgets. What changes is the commercial structure: the Alchemyx platform fee of 13.98% is waived for the entire test phase, and any business that activates a campaign keeps a 50% discount on all commissions for the following 24 months. Joining is not binding and no participant is obliged to run anything.

They will be the first paying clients among the participants, and that distinction matters. Alchemyx is not claiming revenue it does not have. It is claiming that six businesses read the terms, understood they would be spending their own money on real media, and enrolled anyway.

Three advertising agencies have also signed white-label agreements for the same phase, which gives them a way to offer multichannel media buying to their own clients without building the infrastructure in-house.

The Economics: What a Campaign Costs

Alchemyx runs on a single fee: 13.98%, always included in the campaign budget the client declares, never added on top. A business that declares a EUR 5,000 campaign pays EUR 5,000 plus VAT, fee included. The minimum to activate a campaign is EUR 2,000 plus VAT, per campaign and not per month, again with the fee already inside that figure. For context, traditional media agencies typically take 15 to 20% on top of the media spend, plus a monthly retainer.

No subscription is required. The Free plan gives access to the platform. The Premium plan at EUR 2,180 per year adds campaign history and detailed analytics for businesses running several campaigns a year. Optional AI creative production costs EUR 250 per campaign and delivers three copy variants, audio, video and visuals adapted to every format in the plan.

Eight Channels, One Plan

The platform consolidates eight advertising channels under a single interface: FM radio, local TV, connected TV, cinema, DOOH, social networks, Google Display and Google Search. The AI builds the media mix from the brief, and every plan always includes at least one offline channel.

What separates Alchemyx from a media planning tool is what happens once the plan is approved: the platform books the space and buys it directly, online and offline. Behind that sit 154 sales mandates across 260 mapped offline media, 152 of them already purchasable in-platform, covering all 20 Italian regions.

What the Press Coverage Revealed

News of Alchemyx reached the major Italian trade media (Engage, Youmark, DailyOnline, MediaKey, RassegnaBusiness, CloseUpMedia) before launch. That coverage served two purposes. First, it validated the market insight: journalists covering advertising do not write about vaporware. Second, it accelerated word of mouth within the SME and agency communities, which operate on relationships and reputation.

The timeline is straightforward. The MVP was completed and deployed in July 2026: registration, dashboard, AI brief, strategy engine, five payment methods with invoicing, Creative Studio and inventory backoffice. The test phase opens in September 2026. Commercial launch in Italy is scheduled for Q1 2027.

Why This Matters for the Broader Market

The standard narrative in adtech is that innovation comes from the big platforms or from venture-backed startups that raise large rounds and burn cash for years. The Alchemyx story is different: bootstrapped, validation-led, and unwilling to bet on scale before proving the market exists.

That approach appeals to SMEs and agencies precisely because they operate the same way. They do not have venture capital to burn and they need proof before they commit. Six enrolments and three white-label agreements are not revenue, but they are evidence that the problem is painful enough for businesses to put their own budgets behind a platform that has not run a campaign yet.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Alchemyx already generating revenue?

No. Alchemyx is pre-revenue. No campaign has been delivered and the platform is not open to the public. The six businesses on the whitelist will be the first paying clients among the participants when the test phase starts in September 2026.

What do whitelist participants actually get?

Real multichannel campaigns on their own budget, with the 13.98% platform fee waived for the whole test phase, and a 50% discount on all commissions for the 24 months that follow if they activate a campaign. Joining is not binding.

Is the EUR 2,000 minimum monthly or per campaign?

Per campaign, not per month, and plus VAT. The 13.98% fee is already included in that figure, with nothing added on top. It is enough to fund a meaningful presence across two or three offline media plus a digital layer, which is not achievable buying those channels individually.

How does the white-label model work for agencies?

Agencies resell Alchemyx to their own clients under their own brand, setting their own fee inside the platform. Alchemyx provides the technology, the inventory and the buying operations. The agency keeps the client relationship and the creative.

How does Alchemyx access offline inventory?

Through sales mandates rather than partnerships. A mandate takes weeks to obtain and allows Alchemyx to sell the space immediately, where a formalised partnership takes months and a track record a first-year company does not have. Alchemyx currently holds 154 sales mandates across 260 mapped media, with 152 already purchasable in the platform.

When does Alchemyx open to the public?

The test phase runs from September 2026 with a maximum of ten participating businesses. Commercial launch in Italy is scheduled for Q1 2027.

About the author

Written by Fabio Ferrara, CEO and founder of Alchemyst LAB Srl. With over 15 years of experience in media planning and agency advertising, Fabio has personally managed multichannel campaigns for national and local brands before founding Alchemyx to democratize access to professional advertising for SMBs. He has been featured in Media Key, Close Up Media, Rassegna Business and other leading industry publications. Follow him on social media: X | LinkedIn