<p>The Community guidelines on State aid to promote risk capital investments in small and medium-sized enterprises (hereafter "the Risk Capital Guidelines") set out the conditions that Member States should respect when granting State aid to promote access to risk capital for SMEs in their early development stages, particularly with a view to ensuring that such aid targets a proven equity gap and does not crowd out financial markets. The Risk Capital Guidelines apply from 18 August 2006.</p>
<p>Since 29 August 2008, certain provisions of the Risk Capital Guidelines have been included in Commission Regulation (EC) No 800/2008 of 6 August 2008 (General Block Exemption Regulation, the GBER).</p>
<p>In view of the expiry of the Risk Capital Guidelines and the GBER on 31 December 2013, the purpose of the present consultation is to invite Member States and other stakeholders, such as investors, financial intermediaries and final recipients, to provide input for the revision of the Risk Capital Guidelines, notably information on market developments concerning the supply of equity and debt finance to viable SMEs, feedback on the application of the Risk Capital Guidelines and their effects in terms of facilitating SME access to risk capital.</p>
<p>Target group</p>
<p>Public authorities, citizens, companies and organisations are welcome to contribute to this consultation. Contributions are particularly sought from public authorities deploying financial and fiscal instruments for facilitating SME access to finance and other stakeholders, such as investors, financial intermediaries and final recipients.</p>
<p><a href="http://ec.europa.eu/competition/consultations/2012_risk_capital/index_en.html">Access to the questionnaire</a></p>
January 2018
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