FCC Construcción, as a member of the UN Global Compact CFO Coalition for the SDGs, is contributing through its DigiChecks project to the report Business-Led Blended Finance: A Practical Playbook. This is the first document specifically designed to help companies move from being mere passive recipients of blended finance to becoming active architects of operations that strengthen economic resilience and align with the development priorities set by the countries themselves.

Blended finance has grown significantly over the last five years, rising from over 14,000 million dollars in 2020 to 24,000 million in 2024. However, almost all existing guidance on blended finance is aimed at capital providers: governments, development finance institutions (DFIs) and multilateral development banks (MDBs).

The Guide addresses a fundamental imbalance in the global blended finance market. Business leaders are key project developers and capital managers for blended finance, yet they have been left without a roadmap. The Guide identifies energy and infrastructure as the two main drivers of corporate engagement in blended finance, which together account for nearly three-quarters of corporate investment activity. It concludes that these sectors, subject to geopolitical pressures regarding energy security and supply chain resilience, constitute natural entry points for business-led approaches, as their long-term tangible assets align with both corporate sustainability commitments and investor mandates.

The case studies include the success story of FCC Construcción — which coordinated 13 organisations across five countries to streamline the granting of digital infrastructure permits through the EU’s ‘Horizon Europe’ programme — The case study on the DigiChecks platform provided valuable practical insights and helped demonstrate how blended finance can be used to tackle real-world financial challenges whilst generating a measurable impact.