Launch of ‘EU Blue Champions’ scheme to support innovative projects

A new pilot scheme, 'EU Blue Champions', is being launched by the European Commission in collaboration with the European Investment Bank (EIB). It will be supported by the BlueInvest platform.

Through this new initiative, the EIB Advisory Services, in collaboration with the EIB Projects Directorate, will provide financial advisory to selected projects in the blue economy. Each project selected should display the potential to contribute strongly to the EU Mission ‘Restore our Ocean and Waters’ and its three objectives to:

• Restore marine and freshwater ecosystems and biodiversity.
• Eliminating pollution.
• Decarbonising the blue economy.

The aim is to identify 20 innovative projects, which have the potential to interest public or private finance providers and possibly qualify for an EIB financing.

To be eligible, projects need to be aligned with at least one of the Mission’s objectives. Other selection criteria will depend on the lending product (e.g. venture debt, corporate loan, project finance) that the project might be considered for. These may include:

• Minimum investment size - depending on the type of lending product considered. In any case, each project should have a budget of over EUR 15 million total eligible project cost, of which the EIB could finance up to 50%.
• Having a sustainable business model and a clearly defined business plan.
• Having already raised finance from investors and currently being in need of a larger investment to scale up the business.

While a formal application process is not foreseen, interested project promoters are welcome to fill out the template with their details and submit it to the EIB Advisory team corporatefinanceadvisoryeib [dot] org (corporatefinanceadvisory[at]eib[dot]org) before 31 January 2024.