Competitiveness, Innovation & Strategic Investment

Business Angels Initiative

Planned for 2026.

The Commission will expand early-stage finance by strengthening Europe’s business angel community and its cross-border reach. Building on the Startup and Scaleup Strategy, support will target angel networks, syndication, and matchmaking platforms to improve deal flow, diversify funding across regions, and crowd-in private capital alongside EU instruments such as InvestEU and the EIC. Actions will address obstacles that limit cross-border angel investment and long lock-in periods, promote co-investment with venture funds, and encourage inclusive participation of women investors and founders.

Clean Industrial Deal State Aid Framework (CISAF)

CISAF sets simplified rules for Member States to back decarbonisation, clean-tech manufacturing and energy, while preserving the Single Market. It clarifies when grants, tax credits and accelerated depreciation are compatible, favours competitive tenders, and permits funding-gap methods. It aligns with the Net-Zero Industry Act to build EU value chains and invites proportionate European-preference criteria consistent with EU law, while crowding in private capital through risk-sharing schemes. The framework complements guidance on CfDs/PPAs and cross-border forward capacity allocation, giving industry and administrations longer planning horizon and legal certainty to invest at speed and scale.

Corporate Restructuring Study

Planned for 2026.

The Commission will run an EU-wide, firm-level study to assess how corporate restructuring rules shape startups’ and scaleups’ ability to adapt, pivot and grow, and to identify where frameworks unintentionally hinder innovation and investment. It will benchmark Member States on time, cost and outcomes of restructuring; analyse interactions across insolvency, labour, tax and corporate law; and surface best practices that preserve viable businesses while lowering failure costs. Using company-level datasets and case studies, the study will propose targeted reforms. Its findings will directly feed the Quality Jobs Roadmap and the Fair Labour Mobility Package, aligning market dynamism with social protections.

EU Listing Act Package

The package makes public markets an attractive exit route for Europe’s growth companies by cutting red tape, reducing listing costs and simplifying supervisory processes. Full, uniform implementation across the Union is prioritised, with delegated and implementing acts kept simple to boost liquidity and the supply of capital. Beyond listing, it foresees measures to support the IPO journey and to build secondary markets for private capital, including multilateral intermittent trading of private company shares, expanding exit options and investor participation. Together, these steps deepen Europe’s equity-financing ecosystem.

European Competitiveness Fund (ECF)

The EU’s investment engine for 2028–2034 will consolidate 14 programmes under a single rulebook and access point to back projects from research to scale-up, deployment and manufacturing. It will operate through four policy windows—clean transition, digital leadership, health/biotech/bioeconomy, and resilience/security/defence/space—and mobilise the full EU financial toolbox, including an ECF InvestEU instrument, alongside project advisory and SME services. The Fund’s indicative envelope is €234.3 billion, with Horizon Europe tightly connected for a seamless journey from idea to market. Overall, the ECF de-risks private capital, cuts fragmentation, and accelerates high-impact investments with EU value added.

European Corporate Network

Planned for 2026.

The Commission will establish a pan-EU network that brings large companies, corporate venture investors and procurers into the startup ecosystem to accelerate adoption of European innovation. The network will advise on policy, run structured matchmaking with startups, and promote open-innovation partnerships. Members will make a voluntary commitment to prioritise European startups when they invest, partner or procure—especially where public funds are used or when operating critical research or technology infrastructures. By linking corporate demand, capital and distribution to innovators, the network aims to shorten time-to-market, create first-customer pathways, and keep strategic technologies scaling in Europe

European Innovation Investment Pact

Planned for 2026.

The Pact will mobilise long-term institutional capital for Europe’s most innovative companies and funds. In coordination with the EIB Group, the Commission will convene pension funds, insurers and other asset owners to make voluntary allocations to EU funds-of-funds, venture capital vehicles and direct investments in unlisted scaleups. Commitments will be benchmarked, transparent and aligned with strategic technologies, complementing InvestEU, the EIC and the Scale-Up Europe Fund. The Pact will drive pan-European deployment, crowd-in private capital through de-risking structures, and deepen capital markets by expanding late-stage equity supply and patient growth finance.

General Block Exemption Regulation (GBER) Review

Planned for Q4 2026.

The Commission will overhaul the GBER to cut red tape and streamline compatibility conditions while preserving a level playing field. The review fixes textual inconsistencies, updates definitions, and reflects new priorities (i.e. social-economy finance, training/employment aid, and SGEI/affordable housing) to ease use by SMEs, start-ups and granting authorities. It will reduce notifications, improve readability, and give Member States more design flexibility, with transparency and monitoring maintained. As the current GBER expires end-2026, the revision will also prolong its application.

InvestAI

The program will mobilise €200 billion to scale Europe’s AI capacity through a layered public-private fund that de-risks private capital with the EU budget and national co-financing. It will finance four AI gigafactories each with around 100,000 latest-generation AI chips, creating the world’s largest PPP for trustworthy AI and giving startups and industry broad access to compute. Initial EU contributions will come from Digital Europe, Horizon Europe and InvestEU, with cohesion funding from Member States. InvestAI complements the €10 billion AI Factories programme and serves as a pilot for strategic-technology financing under the Competitiveness Compass.

InvestEU Amendment (Omnibus II)

Lifts the EU guarantee by EUR 2.5 billion, provisioned from EFSI surpluses and reflows, to mobilise EUR 25 billion. It is paired with extended combinations of legacy instruments and targets EUR 50 billion additional investment in this MFF. It adds an InvestEU financial instrument under the Member State compartment, enabling funded equity and deployment in non-euro currencies, and encourages swift national transfers. Simplifications reduce reporting and adjust SME rules, delivering EUR 350 million in cost savings. The extra capacity will back higher-risk equity, debt and guarantees for Clean Industrial Deal priorities (i.e. clean-tech manufacturing, grids and energy infrastructure, clean mobility, and recycling) including a Clean Tech Guarantee Facility via the EIB Group.

Lab to Unicorn Initiative

Planned for 2026.

The Lab to Unicorn Initiative will turn Europe’s scientific excellence into scaled companies. From 2026, the Commission will back a network of leading university-rooted startup and scale-up hubs to collaborate across borders, opening shared access to services, infrastructures and corporate demand. A common blueprint will standardise licensing, royalty/revenue-sharing and equity models for universities and inventors, while capacity-building strengthens technology-transfer offices and embeds venture-builder roles in research organisations and universities. The Initiative will issue guidance on State-aid and IP rules so public institutions can grant IP and infrastructure access lawfully. Together, these measures compress time-to-market and raise Europe’s scale-up success rate.

New IPCEIs

New IPCEIs will reinforce Europe’s strategic capabilities in AI and computing through two coordinated projects: one advancing beyond-state-of-the-art research and first industrial deployment of federated, distributed AI services; the other building large-scale computing infrastructure and services. These initiatives complement national efforts, use public-private partnerships, and fast-track innovation and deployment across the digital stack. To speed delivery, the Commission will establish a support hub to accelerate design and launch, and work with the EIB to create a one-stop shop for grant preparation and financial structuring. The approach will also back IPCEIs in circular advanced materials for clean technologies and strengthen decarbonisation.

Rescue & Restructuring Guidelines

Planned for 2026.

The Commission will recalibrate state-aid rules so viable startups and scaleups can access temporary support without being misclassified as “undertakings in difficulty.” The review will update static financial tests that penalise high-growth, R&D-intensive firms, clarify eligibility, and enable bridge financing, liquidity support or restructuring aid where appropriate. Safeguards against propping up non-viable firms will remain, with stronger proportionality, time-limits and burden-sharing. Clearer guidance for universities and research organisations complements the effort, reducing uncertainty when IP or infrastructure is involved. The reform removes unintended barriers to growth while preserving a level playing field.

Scaleup Europe Fund

Planned for 2026.

A market-based, privately managed vehicle deployed via the EIC Fund to bridge Europe’s late-stage equity gap for deep-tech scaleups. It will mobilise substantial private capital and make direct equity investments in strategic sectors (i.e. AI, quantum, advanced semiconductors, biotech, clean tech, defence and space) reinforcing technological sovereignty and economic security. Operating without prejudice to the next MFF, the Fund will coordinate closely with InvestEU and complement the European Tech Champions Initiative (including ETCI 2.0), alongside EIB Group instruments. By tackling fragmented capital markets and financing needs with ticket sizes above €100 million, it will help Europe retain and scale its most promising companies.

Securitisation Framework Review

The review aims to update the Securitisation Regulation and CRR (with LCR/Solvency II adjustments) to revive a market that frees bank capital for lending, especially to SMEs. It simplifies due-diligence and transparency, introduces risk-sensitive capital treatment (floors and a revised p-factor), strengthens supervisory convergence, and preserves core safeguards such as risk-retention and the ban on re-securitisation. The package is embedded in the Savings & Investments Union agenda (paired with reforms to trading and post-trading, insolvency and tax barriers, and investor-exit options like intermittent trading of private shares) to integrate EU capital markets and crowd in private finance.

Shareholders Rights Directive

Potential review in Q4 2026.

As part of the Savings and Investments Union, the Commission will assess whether to revise the Shareholders Rights Directive to make it easier and cheaper for investors, intermediaries and issuers to operate across borders. The review would target fragmentation in shareholder identification, voting and corporate-action processes, reduce duplicative requirements, and support a more integrated market for listed equity. By improving participation and lowering administrative costs, the initiative aims to deepen liquidity, broaden access to public markets for growth companies and strengthen EU competitiveness, complementing measures on listings, funds distribution and market infrastructure.

Sovereignty Seals (STEP)

To amplify the Innovation Fund’s impact, the Commission will mobilise additional financing for projects awarded a STEP Sovereignty Seal by creating stronger synergies between EU instruments and Member-State schemes. It will align funding criteria between the Innovation Fund and national support to speed State-aid decisions for STEP-labelled projects and encourage governments to commit co-financing, maximising deployment across EU regions. The STEP seal will function as a streamlined fast lane for bankable industrial decarbonisation and clean-tech investments, improving predictability, reducing transaction costs, and crowding in private capital through de-risking, while safeguarding competition and cohesion across the Single Market.

TechEU Investment Programme

Planned for 2026.

The Commission, together with the EIB Group and private investors, will deploy TechEU to close Europe’s late-stage financing gap for disruptive innovators, using debt, equity and quasi-equity delivered directly and via financial intermediaries. It targets scale-ups in AI, clean tech, critical raw materials, energy storage, quantum, semiconductors, life sciences and neurotechnology, complementing InvestEU and the Clean Industrial Deal. TechEU will also support exit pathways and late-growth rounds, and anchor a deeper pan-European market through ETCI 2.0 to crowd-in institutional capital. The programme aims to build industrial capacity, de-risk strategic projects and mobilise significant private investment at scale.