The support for business in the European Union focuses on supporting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which are considered as an important pillar and stabilization factor of country economy and its regions. While SMEs are important for economic development, they have problems, especially with the access to finance and information. As a result, to address certain market failures, which affect SMEs most significantly, an extraordinary regime was put in place, encouraging EU Member States to provide assistance to SMEs without being in breach of the state aid rules. The favoured status of SMEs is highlighted in the revised General Block Exemption Regulation (GBER). The article focuses on the state aid for SMEs in EU Member States in accordance with EC Regulation no. 651/2014 declaring certain categories of aid compatible with the internal market in application of Art. 107 and 108 of the Treaty. The main objective of the paper is through an analysis of public support for SMEs to characterize and identify its trends through the prism of modernized state aid rules in the European Union with the emphasis on the area of revised GBER. The basic research methods include literature review method, analysis and comparison.
