Newstex publishers' stories: Giuliano Bifolchi of SpecialEurasia

This article has been edited for length and clarity.

The basics

Tell us about yourself

Giuliano Bifolchi of SpecialEurasia: I'm an open source intelligence analyst. I used to work in academia as a professor in Islamic studies. I decided to establish Special Eurasia with my colleague Sylvia Balu. It is a platform which provides reports, consulting, risk assessment, and training regarding geopolitics and intelligence analysis. We decided to establish Special Eurasia because we wanted to provide what is called actionable intelligence for decision-making processes, and we wanted to fill a vacuum that we perceived in Europe and other parts of the world. There was this kind of vacuum, so we decided to create Special Eurasia for this reason.

Do you write yourself?

Giuliano Bifolchi: Yes, I'm one of the writers, one of the analysts, and I'm also the manager of a group of analysts. We have internal and external contributors. Among our analysts there are academic scholars, journalists, and experts who visit different countries abroad. I'm also one of the authors because I really enjoy writing reports.

Can you tell us a little bit about your creative process for writing?

Giuliano Bifolchi: Well, inspiration - I find inspiration from what happens in the world every day. Usually, I can read different languages, so I go online and try to check different news and different information. I try to collect this information to provide actionable intelligence for decision making. For me, the best part is transforming what I perceive, what I know about the world into a text which everyone can read, can understand and can use for different purposes. This is what I really like most and it really inspires me regarding the writing process.

So you’re trying to transform heavy news into a language that we can all understand?

Giuliano Bifolchi: Yeah, this is really right. I also try to clean information from rumors and information that are not partially true. I also combine different sources from different languages. In this way, I can provide to our readers and customers 360-degree information and also some scenarios - possible future scenarios. If they are going to take into consideration some future project or business, we can provide them with some future scenarios that they should take into consideration.

First steps

What motivated you to start creating content? 

Giuliano Bifolchi: Well, speaking honestly, some years ago we were in front of the TV and we were witnessing some specific crises and some critical moments in our life. We had COVID, we had many problems in the world. We understood that many people were looking for information and were also looking for the interpretation of information or events, but there were few products available for everyone. There are some products, but you should pay for them a lot or you should master the language of intelligence or military doctrine. We tried to do this. The motivation was to try to reach a broad audience or the international audience, to try to inform them. I also try to push them to discover more about new markets and new worlds because knowledge is the first step to understand each other and to understand possible threats but also possible opportunities.

So it was all in the love for knowledge.

Giuliano Bifolchi: Yes, the love for knowledge and the passion for the job, the love for the job. This kind of job is amazing.

Pros and cons

What do you like the most about publishing and what is the most frustrating part of it?

Giuliano Bifolchi: What I like most, as I told you, is trying to transform what I know, what I perceive into a product that everyone can read, everyone can understand. What I love most is trying to reach an international audience and get different feedback from them because feedback is really, really important in our job, in our activities. What I like less is time management because for this kind of job we have to manage a lot of time because writing a report is not something that you can do in 5 minutes. We are really quick in this process because we elaborate our methodology, but if we want to provide a good report, we need time. Sometimes when different things happen in the world, we don't have time. Trying to manage the time is crazy and sometimes I say, "Oh, why does the day last just 24 hours?"

Do you have any tool or strategy for time management that you could recommend to other publishers here?

Giuliano Bifolchi: Well, we try to create our framework of reports, so we have different frameworks of reports and during the years, we try to fix some mistakes and also to see the products that really fit our needs. Now we have 5 or 6 different templates that we can adapt. In this way, we have a starting point and this can be really useful and sometimes also to manage time the best as possible. Take a break - because if you take a break, 5 minutes, 10 minutes, then it can be very productive.

What do you consider to be your career highlight?

Giuliano Bifolchi: Well, regarding my career, it was combining report writing with experience on the ground. I had the pleasure - it was also hard times, but for me it was a pleasure - I had the opportunity to be in the Middle East during the Islamic State, so I had the opportunity to see and to check all the sources that I had, open sources, with the reality on the ground. I have the opportunity to travel abroad in North Africa, in the Middle East and also in Asia, so I can consider this one of the highlights of my life because I could combine my knowledge with experience on the ground. This was important when I was working in academia, but also when I'm working in the field of consulting and open source intelligence. This is really, really important for me. This is something that I also try to put in the products, especially Special Eurasia and the books that I wrote in the past for the Italian audience.

So one of those books is a result of your experiences?

Giuliano Bifolchi: Yeah, yeah, one of the books was a mix between research and experience on the ground. This is really important because sometimes just researching, just reading the sources cannot be 100% a complete picture of what is happening. But when you go abroad, when you go on the ground, you can speak the language of the people, you can talk with the people. You can mix it. This is probably what we are really proud of, especially Special Eurasia, that all the people who collaborate with us, work with us, they are promoting this project. They can speak different languages and they travel abroad.

Where can we find your books, by the way?

Giuliano Bifolchi: Well, in the English language, there are some of my academic papers that you can read. There are some reports, there is also a report when I was in Iraq during the Islamic State. I wrote it - it was probably in 2017 or 2016 when I published the report. The books now, they are just for the Italian audience, but one of the future projects in publishing is to translate into English for the international audience. But time management is the biggest problem for this project.

Future plans and choosing syndication

What are the current plans for Special Eurasia?

Giuliano Bifolchi: Well, a couple of months ago we started not only report writing but also podcasting with some guests in English. We have some international guests from different shows and we have interviews, dialogues or conversations with them and we want to promote also this product because we believe that reading reports is really important, but sometimes when you are driving your car, you are doing your sports, something like that, it's also important to listen to the information, the reports. We try to promote this product to make our audience more informed in different ways. We are also planning to provide more reports like complete reports with different aspects - longer reports for a specific audience. These are what we are trying to do and we are also enhancing our network of contributors and also our area of interests. This is really important. When we start a new range or new area of interest, we do it this way because this means that we have contacts. For instance, Sylvia Balu, one of the co-founders, my colleague, now he's traveling to Morocco for a specific project on North Africa. This means that we are opening new projects, also publishing projects, but for doing this, we are creating connections, networking, and knowledge because before communicating to people our view or opinion of this area, we have to educate ourselves and we have to master the situation on the ground.

Why did you decide to partner with us?

Giuliano Bifolchi: Well, I decided to partner with you because I saw how your company operates and also I saw in the presentation other platforms, other blogs, other websites that are connected with you, that they are performing well, they are reaching a broader audience. Also your audience, I can say that we are really interested in your audience because they are companies in different fields. We decided to do this because thanks to you we can reach a broader audience and we can make our products more available and also we can get more feedback because as I told you feedback is really, really important. Also, your marketing experience was a good asset that we evaluated and we said, "Okay, this is the right company that we are looking for."

Giuliano Bifolchi is Co-Founder and Research Manager at SpecialEurasia, with extensive expertise in intelligence analysis, geopolitics, security, and conflict management. He holds a PhD in Islamic history from the University of Rome Tor Vergata, a master's degree in Peacebuilding Management and International Relations from Pontifical University San Bonaventura, and a master's degree in History from the University of Rome Tor Vergata.