Firstly, please be aware that a quick check of teh archives will bring
up some information on both Sannino and Romani. To check the archives,
go here: http://search.bikelist.org/
Romani was a company based in the town of Sala Baganza in the province of Parma. It was a rather big builder (many thousands of frames per year), however you rarely saw many bikes with the Romani name on them because over 80% of their production was third party frames. They therefore built the frames and then put whatever name was requested on them. Virtually any shop in the Parma/Reggio Emilia/Modena area that had a shop branded line of bikes would have bought from them if they did not build in house. They also built for many exporters. Their quality was quite good and always represented a good value for your money. They were like Billato a far larger builder than you might ever imagine. They have now closed down as best as I can tell. I have seen Romani built bikes from the 40's, through to the 90's, all carrying different names. Apart from the Piemme labeled track bike that Mark pointed out, I have also sold a CR member a Ghidini branded bike as well as a few Romani branded bikes that were claimed to be Romani's.
Sannino was initially set up in Torino by a number of friends, with Mauro Sannino being the lead partner. They quite quickly developed good ties with a few East Bloc countries and became teh de fact o national team suppliers. This most likely involved some type of barter agreement between the Italian communist party and their East Bloc equivalents. It could also have involved a barter agreement involving Fiat whose main plant was just across the street from the Sannino workshop. Sannino built many very nice bikes and built up quite a reputation. In the late 90's there was apparently a falling out between the partners and Maro decided to go out on his own. He left Italy and emigrated to Germany. He is now building carbon fiber bikes under teh Corratec brand. Corratec has indeed supplied bikes to at last one pro team. When I lived in Torino in the late 90's I did go by the shop a few times.
Steven Maasland
Moorestown, NJ
USA