HDB Guarantee Fund TEPIX ΙΙΙ

The program is addressed to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (definition of SMEs (Annex I of EP 651/2014) , which operate legally in Greece, except for off-shore, holding groups participating in other companies, companies in the financial sector, public bodies and their subsidiaries, local government organizations and their subsidiaries, with:

• Eligible NACE CODE (a relevant list has been posted on the Hellenic Development Bank's website)
• Maintain an establishment and operate in Greece legally and have been established up to the time of submitting the financing application to the Bank.
• They are not considered as an undertaking in difficulty (as defined in point 18 of article 2 of Regulation 651/2014), at the time of submitting the application for funding to the State Aid Information System.
• Comply with the eligibility criteria and the state aid cumulation limits as set out in the respective State Aid Regulations.
• They are considered creditworthy in accordance with the Bank’s current credit policy and internal procedures.
• They have not been subject to collective insolvency proceedings and do not meet the conditions under the domestic legislation under which they may be subject to collective insolvency proceedings at the request of their creditors.
• They are bank aware (they owe <90 days) at the time of submitting the financing application to the Credit Institution.
• They are companies for which there are no grounds for exclusion of article 40 of law 4488/17 (A 137/139/17),
• There is no pending recovery order of previous illegal and incompatible state aid based on an EU or WEU decision
• They hold valid tax and social security certificates, at the time of submitting the application at the HDB’s KYC platform, as well as the time of the loan’s disbursement. Moreover, they do not have any insolvency issues, based on Teiresias information, at the time of submitting the application at the HDB’s KYC platform, as well as the time of the loan’s disbursement
• In case the enterprise has previously joined HDB (formerly ETEAN) programs that have expired or are in force, it should not demonstrate adverse transactional behavior in debt repayment, such as a loan contract termination or relevant overdue debts over ninety (90) days or in the case of adverse transaction behavior the recipient has fully repaid his debt before submitting the application for funding or in the event of adverse transaction behavior: (a) in the case of a guarantee scheme, the amount of a guarantee owed has not been paid; Once the said debt has been confirmed to the competent Tax Office, it has been included in a regulatory regime, which continues to be in force on the date of submission of the application
• They have not been excluded by an exclusion decision from the EIB both at the time of submitting a financing request to the EXO and at the time of concluding the Final Recipient Agreement in accordance with the EIB's Exclusion Policy (https://www.eib.org/en/about/accountability/anti-fraud/exclusion/index).
• They have been registered in the Register of Beneficial Beneficiaries of article 20 of Law 4557/2018 (Α΄ 139), as applicable, before the date of submission of the financing application, except in the cases of beneficiaries who are expressly exempted from the relevant obligation and provide relevant documentation.
• They have completed the self-assessment process for the ESG Criteria in the ETA's ESG Tracker and have submitted the ESG Tracker Performance Report in PDF format to Piraeus Bank when submitting the financing application, where the company's performance against these criteria is reflected.

Especially for the General Entrepreneurship Fund, which will operate under the GBER especially on the Article 21, the final beneficiaries must meet, the following additional eligibility criteria:

• Eligible undertakings shall be undertakings that are unlisted SMEs and fulfil, at the time of the application, at least one of the following conditions:

1. they have not been operating in any market,

2. they have been operating in any market for any of the following:

1. less than 10 years following their registration; or
2. less than 7 years after their first commercial sale

3. they require an initial investment which, based on a business plan prepared in view of a new economic activity, is higher than 50 % of their average annual turnover in the preceding 5 years. By way of derogation from the first sentence, that threshold shall be limited to 30 % with regard to the following investments, which shall be considered initial investments into a new economic activity:

1. investments significantly improving the environmental performance of the activity in accordance with Article 36(2),
2. other environmentally sustainable investments as defined in Article 2(1) of Regulation (EU) 2020/852,
3. investments aiming at increasing capacity for the extraction, separation, refining, processing or recycling of a critical raw material listed in Annex IV.

4. The financing may also cover follow-on investments made in eligible enterprises, including after the eligibility period referred to in paragraph 3, point (b), if the following cumulative conditions are fulfilled:

1. the total amount of risk finance referred to in paragraph 8 is not exceeded,
2. the possibility of follow-on investments was provided for in the original business plan,
3. the enterprise receiving the follow-on investments has not become a ‘linked enterprise’, within the meaning of Article 3(3) of Annex I, with another undertaking other than the financial intermediary or the independent private investor providing risk finance under the measure, unless the new entity is an SME.

Especially for the Start-ups Entrepreneurship Fund, which will operate under the GBER especially on the Article 22, the final beneficiaries must meet, the following additional eligibility criteria:

• Are small or micro businesses
• shall be any unlisted small enterprise up to 5 years following its registration, that fulfils the following cumulative conditions:
  (a )it has not taken over the activity of another undertaking, unless the turnover of the overtaken activity accounts for less than 10 % of the turnover of the eligible undertaking in the financial year preceding the take-over,
  (b) it has not yet distributed profits,
  (c) it has not acquired another undertaking or has not been formed through a merger, unless the turnover of the acquired undertaking accounts for less than 10 % of the turnover of the eligible undertaking in the financial year preceding the acquisition or the turnover of the undertaking formed through a merger is less than 10 % higher than the combined turnover that the merging undertakings had in the financial year preceding the merger.
• Must be in operation for no more than 5 years, starting from the commencement of their business activity or the moment at which tax payment for its economic activity becomes due (whichever of the above occurs first).
• If the borrower is a business resulting from the merger of 2 or more eligible enterprises, the 5-year operational period begins from the commencement of the oldest of the merged enterprises.
• Businesses must be established, meaning they must have a legal form and a VAT number or have commenced operations in the case of a sole proprietorship, on the date of submission of the loan application in the OPSKE.