Zagreb, 26 June 2025 – The Croatian Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (CVCA) hosted its flagship conference, SustainInvest 2025, at the Hotel Esplanade in Zagreb on 25–26 June. Bringing together over 100 global industry leaders, the two-day gathering served as a bold reaffirmation that sustainable investing is not the future of finance – it is finance, done right.
CVCA, which now counts 31 members – including 24 private equity and venture capital fund managers managing more than €4.5 billion in assets across Croatia, Slovenia, Bulgaria, Romania, and Poland – has become one of the most active national associations in Central and Eastern Europe. SustainInvest 2025 marks a high point in its advocacy for sustainability as a pillar of long-term value creation in private capital.
“Let us not leave this evening with just ideas. Let us leave with commitments—to challenge greenwashing, to pursue transparency, to support true innovators, and above all, to ensure that purpose is not the garnish, but the core,” said Mirna Marovic, President of CVCA, in her opening remarks.
Inspiration from the gala conference dinner: where performance met purpose
Held in the elegant Emerald Ballroom of the Hotel Esplanade, the SustainInvest Gala Conference Dinner on 25 June featured a series of visionary addresses under the conference theme: “Performance Meets Purpose – Without Compromise.” Each course of the gala dinner was curated to reflect sustainability, local provenance, and responsible excellence.
Renata Brkic, Managing Partner at Feelsgood Capital Partners, the conference’s Gold Sponsor. opened the evening with a powerful message: “How we invest in today shapes the world we will live in tomorrow.”
Her remarks were followed by Alan Herjavec, Member of the Management Board at the Croatian Bank for Reconstruction and Development (HBOR), who emphasised the bank’s deep-rooted approach to sustainability: “Sustainability is not a separate objective – it is a framework for how we operate, design products, and invest. By 2029, HBOR plans to direct over one billion euros into the green transition.”
The evening’s keynote speaker, Tariq Fancy, former Global Chief Sustainability Officer at BlackRock and Lecturer at Stanford Graduate School of Business, drew parallels between the sustainability movement and the early days of tech investing: “We’re in a moment where hype has been stripped away – just as it was after the dotcom crash. But this is where the real work begins. Sustainability is a megatrend that will reshape every sector over the coming decades. Its current challenges aren’t signs of failure; they are the necessary growing pains of capitalism’s creative destruction. Europe has a critical role to play – especially now, when U.S. leadership is retreating. The world cannot wait. We need bold, coordinated action.”
Attendees also heard from:
- Sir Ronald Cohen, President of the Global Steering Group for Impact Investment (GSG) and co-founder of Apax Partners, whose pre-recorded video urged alignment of capital with measurable social outcomes. Every participant received his book Impact: Reshaping capitalism to drive real change in Croatian translation.
- Robert Sroka, Partner at Abris Capital Partners, who reminded the audience that ESG must be linked to real value creation, not tick-box compliance.
- Louis Collet, Principal Environmental Advisor at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), who positioned ESG standards as essential tools for emerging markets transformation.
- Paul Stubbs, Emeritus Senior Research Fellow at the Economic Institute Zagreb, who reframed sustainability through the lens of equity and systemic change.
- Isabelle Canu, General Partner at Green European Tech (GET) Fund, who explored how greentech VC is driving industrial innovation.
- Danijel Višević, General Partner at World Fund, who urged that “climate innovation must meet ambition if we want to scale solutions for the planet.”
Workshop: rebuilding trust through standards and tools
The SustainInvest ESG & Sustainability Workshop, held on 26 June in Conference Room Paris, gathered practitioners for a technical session focused on ESG integration, regulatory compliance, and investor expectations. In his opening remarks, Pierre Matek, Managing Partner at Feelsgood Capital Partners, emphasised: “Feelsgood Capital Partners is an Article 9 SFDR venture capital fund with social impact, with its own methodology for measuring and evaluating the actual social contribution of our investments.”
Highlights included:
- Merilin Hörats-Beasley, Senior Sustainable Finance Expert at European Investment Fund (EIF), and Member of EU Platform on Sustainable Finance, who presented the EIF Climate Action and Environmental Sustainability Guidelines, key for GPs managing EIF-backed funds. These guidelines provide sector-specific eligibility and best-efforts allocation recommendations aligned with EU objectives.
- Erika Blanckaert, Head of Sustainability, Invest Europe, who detailed the Invest Europe ESG Reporting Guidelines (2024 Edition), including proportionality rules and KPIs for portfolio companies. Reporting is now mandatory for EIF-backed funds by April 30 annually.
- Alexander Knappe, CEO of ImpactNexus, showcased a digital ESG reporting tool endorsed by Invest Europe.
- Renata Brkic and Duro Gavran of Feelsgood Capital Partners, who led a session on Impact Investing in Practice, addressing how to measure impact effectively across venture portfolios.
The workshop was a timely response to concerns over regulatory dilution. CVCA’s leadership voiced strong criticism of recent EU developments: “SFDR was intended to fight greenwashing, not enable it,” said Mirna Marovic. “Instead of a disclosure regime, it became a labelling system that allows funds to declare Article 8 status without meaningful ESG exposure. Similarly, the EU Taxonomy has proven too complex to be usable at scale. We must reclaim the purpose of sustainability regulation: to enable real change.” She continued, noting that under current rules, financial market participants can opt out of Principal Adverse Impact (PAI) reporting unless they exceed 500 employees, undermining the goals of transparency and accountability. Pre-contractual templates have been reduced to compliance exercises—missing the point of contribution to sustainability.
A call to action
SustainInvest 2025 called on the private capital community to resist the pendulum swing away from ESG and Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DEI), and to reinforce sustainability as a driver of risk mitigation, long-term value creation, and resilient economies. In an era of rising volatility and geopolitical uncertainty, the conference urged investors to stay the course on sustainability—not as a trend, but as a fiduciary responsibility.
Organised by CVCA
SustainInvest 2025 was organised by the Croatian Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (CVCA), the national voice of private capital in Croatia. With members from across Central and Eastern Europe, CVCA supports fund managers, engages policymakers, and promotes responsible finance as a tool for economic transformation.
Partners and Supporters
Special thanks to Feelsgood Capital Partners (Gold Sponsor), and to our long-standing partner the Croatian Bank for Reconstruction and Development (HBOR) for its vital role in building Croatia’s investment ecosystem. Official partners of SustainInvest 2025 also included< azs Zagreb Stock Exchange (ZSE), Croatian Banking Association (HUB), Croatian Employers’ Association (HUP), CroAI, CroStartup, Bird Incubator, Smion, Narativ, Impact Nexus, and VentureXchange.
For more information and the full programme, please visit the event website: