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Definitions For the purposes of this Regulation, the following definitions apply:

(1) ‘InvestEU Programme’ means the InvestEU Fund, the InvestEU Advisory Hub, the InvestEU Portal and blending operations, collectively;

(2) ‘EU guarantee’ means an overall irrevocable, unconditional and on demand budgetary guarantee provided by the Union budget under which the budgetary guarantees in accordance with Article 219(1) of the Financial Regulation take effect through the entry into force of individual guarantee agreements with implementing partners;

(3) ‘policy window’ means a targeted area for support by the EU guarantee as laid down in Article 8(1);

(4) ‘compartment’ means a part of the EU guarantee defined in terms of the origin of the resources backing it;

(5) ‘blending operation’ means an operation supported by the Union budget that combines non-repayable forms of support, repayable forms of support, or both, from the Union budget with repayable forms of support from development or other public finance institutions, or from commercial finance institutions and investors; for the purposes of this definition, Union programmes financed from sources other than the Union budget, such as the EU ETS Innovation Fund, may be assimilated to Union programmes financed by the Union budget;

(6) ‘EIB Group’ means the EIB, its subsidiaries and other entities established in accordance with Article 28(1) of Protocol No 5 on the Statute of the European Investment Bank annexed to the TEU and the TFEU (the EIB Statute);

(7) ‘financial contribution’ means a contribution from an implementing partner in the form of own risk-taking capacity that is provided on a pari passu basis with the EU guarantee or in another form that allows an efficient implementation of the InvestEU Programme while ensuring appropriate alignment of interest;

(8) ‘contribution agreement’ means a legal instrument whereby the Commission and one or more Member States specify the conditions of the EU guarantee under the Member State compartment, as laid down in Article 10;

(9) ‘financial product’ means a financial mechanism or arrangement under the terms of which the implementing partner provides direct or intermediated financing to final recipients using any of the types of financing referred to in Article 16;

(10) ‘financing and investment operations’ or ‘financing or investment operations’ means operations to provide finance directly or indirectly to final recipients through financial products, carried out by an implementing partner in its own name, provided by the implementing partner in accordance with its internal rules, policies and procedures and accounted for in the implementing partner’s financial statements or, where applicable, disclosed in the notes to those financial statements;

(11) ‘funds under shared management’ means funds that provide for the possibility of allocating a portion of those funds to the provisioning for a budgetary guarantee under the Member State compartment of the InvestEU Fund, namely the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the Cohesion Fund to be established by a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on the European Regional Development Fund and on the Cohesion Fund for the years 2021-2027, the European Social Fund Plus (ESF+) to be established by a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on the European Social Fund Plus (ESF+) (the ‘ESF+ Regulation for 2021-2027’), the European Maritime, Fisheries and Aquaculture Fund (EMFAF) to be established by a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on the European Maritime, Fisheries and Aquaculture Fund and repealing Regulation (EU) No 508/2014 and the European Agriculture Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) to be established by a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council establishing rules on support for strategic plans to be drawn up by Member States under the Common agricultural policy (CAP Strategic Plans) and financed by the European Agricultural Guarantee Fund (EAGF) and by the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) and repealing Regulation (EU) No 1305/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council and Regulation (EU) No 1307/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council (the ‘CAP Strategic Plans Regulation’);

(12) ‘guarantee agreement’ means a legal instrument whereby the Commission and an implementing partner specify the conditions for proposing financing and investment operations in order for them to be granted the benefit of the EU guarantee, for providing the EU guarantee for those operations and for implementing them in accordance with this Regulation;

(13) ‘implementing partner’ means an eligible counterpart such as a financial institution or other financial intermediary with whom the Commission has concluded a guarantee agreement;

(14) ‘important project of common European interest’ means a project that fulfils all the criteria laid down in the Commission Communication on Criteria for the analysis of the compatibility with the internal market of State aid to promote the execution of important projects of common European interest or any subsequent revision of that Communication;

(15) ‘advisory agreement’ means a legal instrument whereby the Commission and the advisory partner specify the conditions for the implementation of the InvestEU Advisory Hub;

(16) ‘advisory initiative’ means technical assistance and advisory services that support investment, including capacity building activities, provided by advisory partners, by external service providers contracted by the Commission, or by executive agencies;

(17) ‘advisory partner’ means an eligible counterpart such as a financial institution or other entity with whom the Commission has concluded an advisory agreement for the purpose of implementing one or more advisory initiatives, other than advisory initiatives implemented through external service providers contracted by the Commission or through executive agencies;

(18) ‘investment platform’ means a special purpose vehicle, managed account, contract-based co-financing or risk-sharing arrangement or an arrangement established by any other means by which entities channel a financial contribution in order to finance a number of investment projects, and which may include:

(a) a national or sub-national platform that groups together several investment projects on the territory of a given Member State;

(b) a cross-border, multi-country, regional or macro-regional platform that groups together partners from several Member States, regions or third countries interested in investment projects in a given geographic area;

(c) a thematic platform that groups together investment projects in a given sector;

(19) ‘microfinance’ means microfinance as defined in the relevant provisions of the ESF+ Regulation for 2021-2027;

(20) ‘national promotional bank or institution’ means a legal entity that carries out financial activities on a professional basis which has been given mandate by a Member State or a Member State’s entity at central, regional or local level to carry out development or promotional activities;

(21) ‘small and medium-sized enterprise’ or ‘SME’ means a micro, small or medium-sized enterprise within the meaning of the Annex to Commission Recommendation 2003/361/EC ();

(22) ‘small mid-cap company’ means an entity that is not an SME and that employs up to 499 employees;

(23) ‘social enterprise’ means a social enterprise as defined in the relevant provisions of the ESF+ Regulation for 2021-2027.