Spanish soccer giants Barcelona have agreed a €1.45-billion ($1.6-billion) financing deal for their Espai Barça project that will see work begin to renovate the iconic Camp Nou stadium.
The LaLiga club agreed the financing with a total of 20 investors, and the figure will cover the full cost of the works for Espai Barça.
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The team said the agreement is “with some of the main prestigious financial entities around the world.”
Barcelona revealed that the financing has different installments to be paid progressively at five, seven, nine, 20, and 24 years, with a flexible structure, including a grace period.
The Catalan side will start to make repayments once work has been completed on the stadium, using income generated by Camp Nou, which it forecasts to be around €247 million per year.
The club also stated that its assets were not used as a guarantee and a mortgage was not taken out on the stadium.
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By GlobalDataThroughout the process, Barcelona said its board of directors and the club’s own teams "were joined in their efforts by key partners," such as Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, JLL, Pérez-Llorca, DLA Piper, Key Capital Partners, Legends, and IPG 360.
Barcelona awarded a contract to Limak Construction in January for the remodeling of Camp Nou, with the Turkish construction firm itself recently appointing UK-based Woo Architects to carry out the redevelopment of the stadium.
Woo Architects will be working in conjunction with Spanish company Ghesa, Australian engineer Robert Bird Group, and crowd movement specialist Movement Strategies to form Limak Construction’s design and delivery team in renovating the 99,354-seat capacity venue.
The company’s three-year engagement began last month (March) with a view to completion by 2026. Work on the stadium is expected to begin in June once the current 2022-23 top-flight LaLiga season concludes.
The Espai Barça project also includes a new Palau Blaugrana arena, which was completed last month, and the Campus Barça development.
The 7,585-capacity Palau Blaugrana is home to the basketball, handball, roller hockey, and futsal divisions of the club.
It was announced last year that Barcelona will play their home games at the city’s Olympic Stadium during the 2023-24 season while Camp Nou is renovated, a move that will cost the club up to €20 million.
The LaLiga outfit struck a one-season deal with Barcelona City Council. The Estadi Olímpic Lluíz Companys has a capacity of 60,713.
Camp Nou is already the largest stadium in Europe and its capacity will increase to 105,000 once refurbishments are completed, making it the third-largest stadium in the world behind North Korea’s Rungrado 1st of May Stadium and India’s Narendra Modi Stadium.
Plans also include installing a new roof and efforts to increase sustainability by incorporating a district heating and cooling system.
The stadium is presently named Spotify Camp Nou under a lucrative, wide-ranging partnership with the Swedish audio streaming giant signed last year, which also includes shirt sponsorship.
Barcelona are on course to win their first league title since the 2018-19 season as they sit 11 points clear at the top with just eight games to go.
