SACE launches its 2026-2028 Strategic Plan:Export and strategic projects at the core of support for Italy’s competitiveness

SACE, the Italian Export Credit Agency owned by the Ministry of Economy and Finance, presents SACE50, the 2026-2028 Strategic Plan, which sets out the priorities and role of the Group in supporting the competitiveness of Italy’s economic system over the next three years.

Approved by SACE’s Board of Directors and developed following a listening process involving more than 400 companies, the Plan comes at a time of rapid global transformation, marked by heightened geopolitical uncertainty and the growing importance of economic security, the reshaping of global value chains and competition over strategic raw materials and energy. This is compounded by the need to relaunch investment in strategic infrastructure, sustainable transition and new technologies.

In this contest, through new Plan, SACE will support companies by making available approximately €150 billion in new commitments for the 2026-2028 period, broken down into around €40 billion in 2026, €51 billion in 2027 and €58 billion in 2028. The overall level of commitments is in continuity with the previous three-year period, but with a different composition, consistent with the new strategic priorities identified: strengthening SACE’s role in supporting the international expansion of Italian companies and enhancing its ability to intervene in high-impact national initiatives of systemic relevance.

The 2026-2028 Strategic Plan aims to strengthen SACE’s role as a lever of the country’s industrial and economic policy, while accompanying the Export Credit Agency towards the 50th anniversary of its foundation in 1997.

“The 2026-2028 Strategic Plan will accompany SACE towards its 50th anniversary, fully enhancing the company’s original mission of supporting exports and the international expansion of Italian companies, which have always been key drivers of the country’s growth. In a context in which economics and geopolitics are increasingly interconnected, we are strengthening our commitment to support Made in Italy worldwide and contribute to Italy’s competitiveness, working in synergy with institutions, the financial system and all players across the country’s economic ecosystem,” stated Guglielmo Picchi, Chairman of SACE.

 “Today we are proud to present the 2026-2028 Strategic Plan, which not only enhances SACE’s historical mission of supporting exports and internationalisation, but also marks a step change in public support for Italian companies. In an increasingly complex global scenario, SACE is evolving towards an approach focused on additionality, selectivity and measurable impact, aimed at accompanying companies in international markets, strengthening the competitiveness of supply chains and directing the public guarantee towards new investments in Italy. This will be achieved by leveraging its multiplier effect and mobilising private capital, in line with and in coordination with European guarantee instruments, with the aim of concentrating public resources on markets, supply chains and investment projects capable of generating tangible benefits for the country’s growth,” said Michele Pignotti, Chief Executive Officer of SACE.

The strategic pillar focused on exports, internationalisation and supply chains

The Plan strengthens SACE’s role in supporting Italian companies in their growth journeys across international markets, with a particular focus on the diversification of export markets, the strengthening of production supply chains and support for the sectors with the highest potential for Made in Italy.

The Plan aims to support supply chains with strong export and internationalisation potential. The core supply chains identified are: automation and capital goods, infrastructure and construction, the blue economy and shipbuilding, defence and aerospace. These are complemented by other strategic Made in Italy sectors, including digital and microelectronics, automotive, agri-food, chemicals, energy, steel and metallurgy, and textiles.

The objective is to strengthen not only direct exporters, but the entire Italian productive ecosystem, including companies that are part of value chains with an international focus. In this way, support for exports becomes a lever to consolidate the competitiveness of Italy’s industrial supply chains.

Diversification will also be geographical, supporting opportunities in high-potential emerging markets, including Asia, the Middle East and North Africa, and Latin America, while renewing the commitment to consolidating industrial and commercial relations in so-called cross-border supply chains, namely production chains integrated between Italian and foreign companies, in advanced economies.

The strategic pillar focused on the Archimede Guarantee

Within the new strategic framework, domestic market operations through the Archimede Guarantee take on specific importance. The Archimede Guarantee represents the main instrument for deploying the State guarantee to promote additional investment in strategic initiatives for the country.

Over the three-year period, these interventions are expected to grow progressively to approximately €14 billion per year, for a total of around €32 billion, with a focus on highly relevant operations and on institutional investor portfolios to be selected on the basis of additionality, economic sustainability and relevance for the production system.

The objective is to support projects and supply chains that are relevant to the country’s competitiveness, economic security and resilience, while encouraging the mobilisation of institutional investors and, more broadly, private capital. This will also be achieved through portfolio structures, debt instruments and synergies with European guarantee and financing instruments, particularly with the EIB and the InvestEU programme, also in coordination with CDP and other institutional partners. Priority areas include strategic and social infrastructure, industrial and digital innovation, the energy and environmental transition, climate adaptation, industrial modernisation and local public services, with a focus on dossiers of high systemic relevance.

Implementation: levers and enabling factors

To achieve the mission and targets set out in the Plan, SACE will rely on four levers and two key enabling factors. These include the evolution of its service model towards an advisory approach, the strengthening and expansion of its product and service offering, the enhancement of complementarity among the Group companies, and the consolidation of partnerships with the public, financial and institutional system, also with a view to increasing the overall capacity for intervention.

These levers will be supported by two main enabling factors: the strengthening of skills and human capital, and the evolution of the digital ecosystem and IT infrastructure, aimed at improving operational efficiency, process quality and the ability to respond to companies’ needs.

The first lever concerns the evolution of the service model towards an advisory approach, with a high level of sector specialisation and end-to-end oversight of customers and strategic supply chains. This will allow SACE to provide more targeted support to companies in their export and internationalisation journeys, thanks to an integrated network of 23 offices in Italy and around the world. This export advisory model is based on the enabling analyses produced by SACE’s Research Department, which identify export trends, risks and opportunities for the benefit of companies’ strategies and key stakeholders.

The second lever concerns the range of products and services. SACE already ranks among the most advanced Export Credit Agencies in terms of its offering, and the Plan further strengthens its action through the introduction of new initiatives. These include instruments to support the import of critical raw materials, the attraction of foreign investment in strategic sectors, and Piattaforma Italia, designed to support supply-chain investments and promote greater diversification of companies’ funding sources, including through channels that complement the banking system.

The third lever is represented by the complementarity among the Group companies, enhancing the offering of SACE BT — credit insurance, surety bonds and property insurance — SACE Fct — factoring — and SACE SRV — business information and credit recovery — in an integrated manner consistent with SACE’s new mission and strategic priorities, thereby expanding the Group’s ability to respond to companies’ needs.

The fourth lever is the strengthening of partnerships with the public, multilateral and financial system, as well as with other institutional players — including ICE, CDP, SIMEST and Confindustria — in order to maximise additionality, translate strategic priorities into concrete operations and expand intervention and financing capacity, including from a blended finance perspective and in coordination with European partners.

These levers are complemented by two essential enabling factors: people and talent, and the digital and IT ecosystem. Enhancing SACE’s people, their skills and their ability to contribute to the evolution of the institutional mission is an essential condition for the success of the Plan. At the same time, the evolution of IT infrastructure and the targeted use of artificial intelligence will help strengthen process efficiency, the quality of data analysis and the speed of response to companies and financial intermediaries.

Key figures

From an economic and financial perspective, the Plan provides for cumulative gross premiums of approximately €5.7 billion over the three-year period, with an average annual growth rate of around 22%, a gross result increasing to approximately €680 million in 2028 and a capital strength profile confirmed by a Solvency Ratio steadily above 270% throughout the entire Plan horizon.