Italian companies Almaviva and Fabrick have been awarded responsibility for developing the official app for the European Central Bank’s (ECB) Digital Euro initiative. The contract, structured as a temporary joint venture between the two firms, was granted through a restricted tender process open to European companies. The agreement runs initially for four years, with an option to extend for up to a decade. In the first two years, the focus will be on designing the app and testing different use cases for the currency.
The following two years will concentrate on completing development and moving towards operational stability. Potential extensions would cover system maintenance, additional functionality, and supporting a wider user base. The total value of the framework agreement is capped at around EUR 153 million.
Scope of the project
The app is intended to provide a uniform payment experience across the European Union, allowing citizens to make transactions via smartphones, tablets, or smartwatches. Officials from the ECB noted that the digital euro is not meant to replace cash, but to complement it by offering a secure and accessible payment method for use in shops, online, or peer-to-peer transfers.
Almaviva and Fabrick’s responsibilities include building a technological infrastructure that allows payment service providers to integrate with the platform through software development kits (SDKs) and application programming interfaces (APIs). Representatives from both companies said this framework is designed to support interoperability and facilitate adoption across the European payments ecosystem.
The digital euro project is presented by the ECB as a step towards enhancing financial inclusion, improving resilience against cyber threats, and reinforcing monetary sovereignty within the euro area.
