In July 2026, the European Investment Bank (EIB), the European Space Agency (ESA) and Intesa Sanpaolo have signed an agreement designed to improve access to finance for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) operating across Italy’s space supply chain.
The agreement marks the first signature under the ESA-EIB Space Lending Facility, an initiative announced in November 2025, and is expected to enable approximately €300 million in financing for Italian space SMEs. By combining financial resources, risk-sharing mechanisms and sector expertise, the partners aim to support growth and strengthen the competitiveness of the European space sector.
The deal was announced during the conference "Finance and Aerospace: Challenges in Creating Italian Global Champions", held in Turin, Italy, at Intesa Sanpaolo’s Skyscraper, and attended by representatives from European and Italian institutions, industry and the financial community.
Through the initiative, the EIB will provide €150 million in funding, which is expected to generate up to €300 million in financing with the Italian bank Intesa Sanpaolo. The bank is already one of the institutional partners of ESA BIC Turin, the incubation program for space start-ups managed by I3P, the Innovative Companies Incubator of Politecnico di Torino, with the technological support of Politecnico di Torino and LINKS Foundation.
The initiative represents a new step in ESA’s efforts to strengthen Europe’s space economy by helping innovative companies access the resources needed for growth, industrialisation and international expansion.
Facilitated by ESA’s Ventures and Financing Office, the agreement reflects the agency’s broader efforts to improve access to finance for the European space sector through closer engagement with financial institutions and investors.
Acting as a bridge between ESA’s technical expertise and the financial community, the Office works to remove investment bottlenecks and help companies secure the funding needed to scale their activities and bring innovations to market.
ESA will contribute technical and industrial expertise while helping raise awareness of the financing opportunities available to space companies.
Commenting on the agreement, ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher noted that access to capital remains one of the most significant barriers to growth for many space SMEs and highlighted the importance of providing companies with pathways to expand and compete internationally.
This challenge is particularly relevant in the space sector, where long development cycles and reliance on highly specialised technologies can make access to traditional financing more difficult, particularly for smaller businesses.
