The Fund of Funds (FoF) and the Managing Authority (MA) of the Enterprise Competitiveness and Innovation Programme (ECIP) 2021-2027 at the Ministry of Innovation and Growth (MoIG) have signed a Financing Agreement. On behalf of the Fund, the document was initialled by Martin Gikov and Kamen Slavov as representatives of the Management Board, and by Iliana Ilieva, Director General of the Directorate General for European Competitiveness Funds at the MoIG on behalf of the Managing Authority of the ECIP 2021-2027. This is the first and largest mandate to be assigned by the Ministry of Innovation and Growth to the Fund.

The amount of money entrusted to the Fund of Funds for management under the Agreement exceeds BGN 1.2 billion. The resources will be actively used to support the entrepreneurial ecosystem and small and medium enterprises in Bulgaria.

More than BGN 1 billion of the total amount of funds will be allocated to financial instruments, and for the first time an additional BGN 263 million has been made available for grants, which can be combined with these instruments. The sum earmarked for financial instruments will mobilise additional private capital of at least BGN 400 million. BGN 533 million is planned to be channelled to private equity investments, and BGN 730 million is intended for lending to Bulgarian companies on preferential terms.

The main priorities of the ECIP are "Innovation and Growth" and "Circular Economy". The resources under the programme will support the achievement of smart and sustainable growth of the Bulgarian economy through a diverse portfolio of financial products targeting innovation; digitalisation and contributing to the introduction of the Industry 4.0 stages; increasing the competitiveness of enterprises; supporting the modernisation of family businesses as well as those in the creative industries; stimulating energy efficiency measures and building renewable energy capacity in the relevant sectors; and promoting the development of renewable energy sources.

The Fund of Funds is to launch the selection of intermediaries to implement the financial instruments as soon as possible in order to ensure that the resources reach the final beneficiaries in a timely manner.