- The fund is directed to promote growth of European scalable companies, reinforcing the continental strategic sovereignty.
- This investment demonstrates the implementation of CriteriaCaixa’s 2030 Strategic Plan, through its alternative investment portfolio.
Barcelona, September 7, 2026.- CriteriaCaixa, the holding company that manages the business assets of ”la Caixa” Foundation, has approved to commit €250 million to the Scaleup Europe Fund, which is being co-launched by the European Commission, together with CriteriaCaixa, and other European foundations and major institutional investors.
With an initial target size of €5 billion, the fund’s goal is to boost growth and consolidation of medium-sized European companies, especially in the deep tech industry, providing them greater opportunities to continue their scaling and growth processes.
As a key measure of the EU’s strategy for startups and scaleups, the fund is designed to address the capital gap in late-stage companies and to incentivize most promising scaleups to remain on Europe, strengthening the technology sovereignty of the continent, thus collaborating to the creation of global champions in their categories.
The Scaleup Europe Fund was launched with the backing of the European Commission. Its founding investors include some of Europe’s most prominent institutional investors, such as Novo Holdings, EIFO, Allianz, APG, Fondazione Compagnia di San Paolo, Santander and Wallenberg Investments. Over the past few months, the contractual agreements were finalized, the management company (EQT) was selected, and the fund was approved; it has a five-year investment period and has already executed its first transactions.
With this commitment, CriteriaCaixa pushes forward the deployment of its 2030 Strategic Plan. This investment in the Scaleup Europe Fund is part of Criteria’s alternative investment portfolio, aimed to provide diversification relative to the foundational portfolio (CaixaBank) and the significant investments portfolio (listed companies), and cannot account for more than 10% of total assets.
The alternative investment portfolio will be managed by three societies: InmoCaixa (real estate investments), Criteria Capital Risc (investments in early-stage companies), and Criteria PE Management (investment projects in mature unlisted companies via third-party funds). This last entity—a manager of private equity vehicles—has recently been authorized by the CNMV and will channel Criteria’s investment into the SEF.
CriteriaCaixa’s Chairman, Isidro Fainé, expressed: “CriteriaCaixa is deeply committed to European investor ecosystem, through collaboration with European institutions and other foundations and institutional investors, top generate a positive and sustainable impact on economy and society”.
CriteriaCaixa’s CEO, José María Méndez, reminded: “Our objective by taking part in this fund, as well as in other long-term investment vehicles, is to expand our support for more innovative companies and contribute to their scaling, aligned with our strategic plan”.
