On Friday 21 May, the European Commission launched a public consultation on the proposed targeted revision of the Guidelines on State aid to promote risk finance investments.
Interested parties are able to respond until 16 July 2021.
Margrethe Vestager, Executive Vice-President of the European institution in charge of competition policy, explained that one of her aims was “to make it easier for Member States to give access to finance when the market doesn’t deliver”. “Of course, ensuring that possible competition distortions are kept to a minimum”, she stressed.
The Commission is proposing (https://bit.ly/347xowa ) several changes to the current rules: - limit the need to provide a funding gap analysis for the largest risk finance aid measures, in particular those that allow amounts greater than EUR 15 million to be granted per individual beneficiary; - refocus the provisions in the draft guidelines on the compatibility of risk finance aid to avoid unnecessary overlaps with the Commission Notice on the Notion of State Aid; - align the definition of ‘innovative mid-cap companies’ in the draft guidelines with the definition of ‘innovative enterprises’ in the General Block Exemption Regulation (‘GBER’).
The new guidelines will be adopted at the end of 2021.
Link to the public consultation: https://bit.ly/2SYlGld (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)