The Società anonima delle strade ferrate della Lombardia e dell'Italia Centrale was a joint-stock Anglo-French-Italian private company formed, following the partition of the territory, and the railways built in it, under construction or planned, resulting from the defeat of Austria in the Second Italian War of Independence, following the convention of 25 June 1860 among the Ministers of King Vittorio Emanuele II for Public Works and Finance and the previous Imperial-regia società privilegiata delle strade ferrate lombardo-venete e dell'Italia Centrale.
On 14 March 1856, a Convention concerning the recruitment, construction and operation of the railways in the Lombard-Veneto Kingdom was signed between the Imperial-Registers Ministers of Finance and Commerce of Austria and a consortium of financiers and bankers, including Rothschild of the Viennese, Parisian and English houses, Paulin Talabot and other Frenchmen, Pietro Bastogi, the Duke of Galliera and other Italian financiers.
The company adopted the name of Imperial-regia società privilegiata delle strade ferrate lombardo-venete e dell'Italia Centrale as a result of this assignment.
On May 24 of the same year, the concession already granted (16 June 1851) to the Società Anonima per la Strada Ferrata dell'Italia Centrale regarding Pistoia-Bologna (and passed to the new company) was officially revoked.
After defeat in the war, and the loss of Lombardy, the Austrian government entrusted all the lines built or under construction in the territory remaining in its possession to the Südbahn (which was also majority-owned by Rothschild), subtracting them from the competence of Lombardy-Veneto (in which there was significant French and Italian capital).
Thus was born the Società per le strade ferrate dell'Alta Italia (SFAI) whose members and financiers were practically the same as the previous company - a simple takeover with the acquisition of some additional lines.
Into the coffers of the Kingdom came 188.42 million lire for the transfer of rolling stock and railway tracks to the newly established Società per le strade ferrate dell'Alta Italia.