SRI 360º Podcast - SoundSage

Four investors. Four asset classes. One question: where does real money actually go to work on climate?

In this compilation episode, I revisit conversations with four investors who put real money to work in the physical economy, across greenhouses, Indian agrifood, forests, and the fossil fuel reserves sitting on public markets. They approach climate from very different asset classes, and the contrast is the point.

Dave Chen of Equilibrium Capital treats farming as infrastructure — building and operating some of the largest high-tech greenhouses in North America, and buying technology only once it hits the cost curve. Mark Kahn of Omnivore, India’s pioneering agrifood VC, argues that mitigation is sexy and adaptation is gritty, and that a country about to become too hot to farm has no choice but to fund the gritty one. Radha Kuppalli Former MD, Impact & Advocacy at New Forests explains how a forest became two assets at once — timber and carbon — and how you underwrite a biological asset you cannot harvest for thirty years. And Mark Campanale, who coined the term “unburnable carbon,” lays out the thesis that halved the reserve life of the global oil and gas sector: the market is carrying far more fossil fuel than it can ever burn.

Together they map how capital is repricing land, forests, food, and fossil reserves — and where the returns are hiding in each.

In this episode we discuss:

Why one investor treats greenhouses like data centers — build, operate, and manage technology obsolescence
“Distributed abundance”: unhooking where food is grown from climate and geography
Why climate adaptation, not mitigation, is the urgent thesis for India’s smallholder economy
How a forest generates two revenue streams — timber and California carbon credits — at once
Underwriting a 30-year biological asset you can leave “on the shelf” to grow
The “unburnable carbon” thesis, and why $120 trillion of reserves back $7–8 trillion of market cap
Stranded assets: why building new fossil supply guarantees write-downs

Featured guests:

Dave Chen, CEO Equilibrium Capital
Mark Kahn, Managing Partner & Co-Founder, Omnivore
Radha Kuppalli, Former Managing Director, Impact and Advocacy, at New Forests
Mark Campanale, Founder & CEO, Carbon Tracker Initiative

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Additional Resources

Dave Chen — Equilibrium Capital
Equilibrium Capital: https://eq-cap.com/
Dave Chen bio: https://eq-cap.com/about-us/dave-chen/
Dave Chen on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dypchen1/
Listen to the full episode here: https://sri360.com/podcast/dave-chen/

Mark Kahn — Omnivore
Omnivore: https://www.omnivore.vc/
Mark Kahn on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-kahn-20490a/
Listen to the full episode here: https://sri360.com/podcast/mark-kahn/

Radha Kuppalli — New Forests
New Forests: https://newforests.com.au/
Radha Kuppalli on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/radha-kuppalli/
Listen to the full episode here:https://sri360.com/podcast/radha-kuppalli/

Mark Campanale — Carbon Tracker Initiative
Carbon Tracker Initiative: https://carbontracker.org/
Mark Campanale on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-campanale-1886203/
Listen to the full episode here: https://sri360.com/podcast/mark-campanale/

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A local-currency bond fund put roughly $600 million to work across some of the credit markets the world rates as riskiest — and lost about 1% of it, over 11 years.

That record belongs to Clemens Calice, who walked out of Goldman Sachs in 2009, in the middle of the financial crisis, with two colleagues and no business plan. What he built became Cygnum Capital — today a $1.5 billion platform across seven funds spanning local-currency debt, renewable energy, agriculture, and early-stage venture.

Clemens makes the case that the barrier to institutional capital in Africa was never risk-return — it's deal size, compliance burden across 54 fragmented jurisdictions, and the absence of intermediary infrastructure. He explains why local-currency lending, co-investment with domestic pension funds and insurers, and patient first-mover capital are the mechanisms that actually move a market from unbankable to bankable. Today that platform runs around 150 to 160 individual investments across the continent.

If you work in frontier market investing, climate finance, or blended finance structuring, this is a practitioner's case for what “honest,” evidence-led impact investing looks like on the ground — including where Clemens thinks the industry still overstates its own case.

Featured Guest:

Clemens Calice, CEO | Cygnum Capital Group Ltd

Listen Next:

Conversation with Nick O’Donohoe - Accidental Father of Impact: Nick O’Donohoe on Leading BSC, BII & Building Investability in the Emerging Markets (106)

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Key Takeaways:

• A platform running around 150 to 160 individual investments across the continent — a scale most institutional investors don't associate with Africa-focused funds.

• A local-currency bond fund with $600M deployed over 11 years and a ~1% cumulative loss rate — in markets rated extremely weak from a credit perspective.

• Why the real barrier to African institutional capital is deal size and compliance burden across 54 jurisdictions, not risk-return.

• How the 20/20/60 blended-finance capital stack actually works, deal by deal.

• Why Clemens rejects the term “impact investor” in favor of “responsible investor,” and what “honest impact investing” means in practice.

• The Copperbelt Energy bond: from 178% oversubscribed on its first tranche to 238% on its second.

• Why gas is, in his view, sometimes a necessity for grid stability — and where he draws the line.

Here's what you're in for:

00:00 – Cold Open — Leaving Goldman in 2009: Starting a Firm with No Business Plan

02:56 – Lion's Head: Origins, Name & the South African Connection

06:23 – Emerging Markets as the Only Skill & the Tanzania Farm Detour

10:54 – 200 Chickens in Nairobi: Understanding the Smallholder Farmer

16:03 – Growing Up in Vienna, ETH Zurich & Into Banking by Accident

19:12 – Asian Crisis, INSEAD, New York & Goldman Sachs

22:03 – Cygnum Today: $1.5B AUM, Seven Funds & Four Continents

24:23 – Asset Management & Investment Banking: How the Two Sides Feed Each Other

25:45 – Investor Base & Crowding In Private Capital

28:09 – Rejecting "Theory of Change" for "Responsible Investor"

31:13 – The African Local Currency Bond Fund & KfW Partnership

29:07 – Why Local Currency: Eliminating Systemic Risk & a 1% Loss Rate Over 11 Years

42:58 – Blended Finance Demystified: The 20/20/60 Capital Stack

48:42 – African Risk Premiums & Why Private Capital Hasn't Arbitraged the Gap

52:36 – Cygnum as Intermediary: Removing Non-Financial Barriers to Scale

54:16 – Africa Go Green Fund: Energy Efficiency as the Underfunded Opportunity

57:24 – Clean Cooking, E-Mobility & Green Buildings: What's Scaling & What's Not

01:00:19 – Going First: Telecom Towers, CrossBoundary Energy & the Copperbelt Bond

01:05:51 – African Infrastructure Risk: Perception vs. Data Reality

01:07:52 – Honest Impact Investing & the "Responsible Investor" Label

01:11:12 – Gas, Baseload & the Case for African Economic Sovereignty

01:16:05 – The Lion's Head Split & the Rebrand to Cygnum

01:18:56 – Platform Growth: 20–25% Annually & What Has to Change

01:21:28 – Pre-Roll Clips & Rapid Fire

01:26:09 – Closing & How to Connect with Cygnum Capital

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Matilda Ho was banned from the kitchen for the first 25 years of her life. Her mother’s rule was simple: cooking is what you do when you fail at school. She now runs China’s first food tech venture fund.

I’m joined by Matilda Ho, Founder and Managing Director of Bits x Bites — a $100 million fund vintaged in October 2020, 15 companies backed, Series A and B, and a board seat as a condition of every check. Her LPs are sovereign funds from Singapore, the Middle East and China, agrifood strategics, and family offices.

Her argument is that the food system cannot be fixed at the checkout. She spent five years at BCG and IDEO advising food companies, and one project — working out how likely a Chinese meat processor was to have another scandal — turned up roughly half a million food safety incidents a year. She built an online grocery to fix it one shopper at a time, then concluded that would take longer than her lifetime. The leverage was upstream.

What she found upstream is a manufacturing advantage most investors outside China have not priced. Seventy percent of the world’s vitamins, two-thirds of its amino acids and more than 80% of its stevia are already made there — much of it in brownfield plants with fermentation tanks sitting idle. Where European biotech founders cannot fund scale-up, she can buy it cheap.

She is equally blunt about what does not work. Beyond Burger’s peas travel from Canada to Suzhou to California, and the margin never survives the trip. China already has tofu — clean, plant-based and 2,000 years old. So she funds certainty over moonshots: functional ingredients, animal health, matcha. And in a market where government money is now the largest source of innovation capital, her first exit was a stake sold to a provincial government vehicle.

In this episode we discuss:

Why the food system cannot be fixed at the checkout, and what changes upstream
Half a million food safety incidents a year — the consulting project that exposed them
Biomanufacturing as China’s unpriced edge: overcapacity, brownfield sites and idle fermentation tanks
Why alternative meat fails on unit economics in a country that already has tofu
China’s “visible hand” — how government money became the largest source of innovation capital
Selling a portfolio company to a provincial government vehicle, and why DPI beats IRR in China
Why she will not write a check without a board seat
Backing wartime CEOs, and what a decade of bad hires taught her about founder diligence

Featured guest:

Matilda Ho, Founder and Managing Director at Bits x Bites

Listen Next:

AgTech Profits Meet Planet: Where Climate Impact and VC Returns Align

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Key Takeaways:

Fixing food at the checkout does not scale. Matilda built an online farmers market and learned that people only change how they eat after a life event — a birth, a diagnosis. A movement, she says, but not a viable business model. The leverage sits upstream in the supply chain.
The supply chain is the problem. In China a vegetable passes through roughly seven hands before it reaches a table. A third of food rots on the farm, another third in transit, and the rest is wasted in fridges and warehouses.
China’s arithmetic is brutal. Around 20% of the world’s population and under 7% of its arable land, feeding 1.4 billion people. More than 85% of soybeans are imported, mostly to feed chickens and pigs.
Biomanufacturing is China’s quiet edge. Europe’s biotech founders struggle to fund scale-up. China has the opposite problem — overcapacity, brownfield sites and idle fermentation tanks, plus the plant managers who know how to run them. 70% of global vitamins, two-thirds of amino acids and over 80% of stevia are already produced there.
Cost is king and taste is king. Beyond Burger’s peas grow in Canada, get processed in Suzhou, then travel to California for final formulation. The gross margin never works. And as she puts it, China already has tofu — clean, plant-based, cheap, and 2,000 years old.
Government money is now the largest source of innovation capital in China. Local governments run fund-of-fund structures and back specialized GPs rather than investing directly. Her own first exit was selling a stake to a provincial government vehicle at Series B, in year five of the fund.
In China, DPI matters more than IRR. IRR can be manipulated; cash returned to LPs cannot. Most domestic funds have only a five-year life, which forces short-term decisions. Her USD fund has ten to twelve years.
Back wartime CEOs, not peacetime ones. Growing revenue tenfold when money was free is not a replicable track record. She looks for humility, grit, and founders who keep going when 99% of the signals say stop.
Software alone does not work in agriculture. Farmers will not pay for something invisible. Her Beijing crop-model company had to bundle seeds and inputs with the software; two-thirds of its revenue now comes from selling the inputs.
Drones changed the economics for smallholders. A tenth of the chemical input, up to half the water saved, and profits up around 30% on cash crops — plus a whole new job class of drone operators. Most growth is now outside China, in North America, Brazil and Argentina.
Agrifood is under-invested. It accounts for less than 5% of total venture funding. Her ambition is that generalist fund managers eventually treat it as a sector worth a seat.

Additional Resources

Matilda Ho LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matildaho/

Bits x Bites LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/bits-x-bites

Matilda Ho on X: @matildajyho

Bits x Bites: https://bitsxbites.com/

Matilda Ho’s TED profile: https://www.ted.com/speakers/matilda_ho

Related SRI360° Episodes:

Beyond the 2/20 Model: Disrupting VC & 25% IRR from Climate Adaptation in Southeast Asia

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Sanjeev Krishnan spent thirty years arriving at one conclusion: the clean economy's binding constraint isn't technology, it's capital structure. He watched brilliant technologies, brilliant people and brilliant visions get broken on the wheel of misaligned capital — not because the science failed, but because the financing never fit what they were trying to build.

That gap is the heart of this episode of SRI360. His core belief is simple: the thing holding back the clean economy is not technology. It is capital structure. Get the financing right, and the building can follow.

I’m joined by Sanjeev Krishnan, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of S2G Investments, a nearly $3 billion platform across eight funds, investing at the seams of food, energy, and ocean systems. S2G has backed more than 120 companies. Sanjeev has spent his whole career on one question: how do you change an economic system using markets?

Sanjeev was born in Bangalore in pre-liberalization India and moved to Grosse Pointe, Michigan, at age nine — his first time ever on a plane. He studied development economics, transferred to the London School of Economics, and joined JPMorgan just in time to watch the dot-com boom collapse from the inside. His team in Europe went from 120 people to 15. He was one of the 15 who kept their job.

What came next taught him how capital really works in the physical world: building mobile networks across Africa, cutting the cost of a Hepatitis B vaccine by roughly 80–90% at the World Bank’s IFC, and five hard years inside “clean tech 1.0,” watching good companies fail for reasons that had nothing to do with their technology. In 2014, he co-founded S2G with Lukas Walton.

Today Sanjeev invests at the seams — the gaps between asset classes and between sectors that most investors overlook. In this conversation we cover why capital structure is the real constraint, how he thinks about the wave of AI and energy demand, and why he is betting on the oceans, the part of the planet we have barely measured.

In this episode we discuss:

Why capital structure, not technology, is what really holds back the clean economy
The “missing middle” — too big for venture, too small for private equity, and where good companies get stranded
What “investing at the seams” of food, energy, and ocean systems actually means
Fit-for-purpose capital, and why biotech figured it out but climate has not
The five forces behind his “Age of Adaptation” thesis
Why he reframes climate as a 10,000-year economic megatrend, not a moral crusade
His bet on the oceans, and the company measuring water almost no one else can

Featured guest:

Sanjeev Krishnan, Co-Founder and Managing Partner at S2G Investments

Listen Next:

AgTech Profits Meet Planet: Where Climate Impact and VC Returns Align

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Key Takeaways:

Capital structure is the constraint, not technology. Across thirty years, Sanjeev watched good companies with real products fail because the money backing them was shaped wrong for what they were building.
The missing middle is where good companies get stranded. A business with real revenue and real profits can still be too capital-intensive for venture and too small for private equity control. Venture wants a power law. These companies just grow steadily. So nobody funds them. In May, S2G closed a billion-dollar fund built for exactly this gap.
Fit-for-purpose capital means matching the money to the reality. US biotech built a system that can take an unproven, clinical-stage company public and attract hundreds of millions. Climate has never built its equivalent. That, Sanjeev argues, is the real gap.
Every great transition needed a financial invention first. The joint stock company made oceanic trade possible. Bond syndicates built the railroads. The venture partnership funded the microchip. In each case someone built the financial container before the future arrived.
Impact does not have to be concessionary. At the IFC, his team helped cut the cost of a Hepatitis B vaccine by roughly 80–90% — from $2.50 a vial — while margins stayed above 60–70%. Cheaper, faster, better, and profitable at the same time.
Invest at the seams. The best opportunities sit between asset classes and between sectors, where a typical energy investor would dismiss it and a food investor would call it something else — so nobody underwrites it.
Climate is a 10,000-year economic megatrend, not a moral crusade. Humans take useful energy and turn it into useful materials — fire, agriculture, fossil fuels. And the next chapter will still be extractive: it needs copper, cobalt, nickel, lithium.
Busts are where the returns are made. You learn more in the bust cycles than the boom cycles. Markets overshoot both ways, and the companies that survive get forced into product-market fit and a real P&L.
The oceans are the least measured part of the planet. We know more about space. Sanjeev co-founded Apeiron Labs in 2022 to close a data gap between 6 and 200 meters — data that matters for weather, offshore wind, insurance, and defense.

Additional Resources

Sanjeev Krishnan LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sanjeev-krishnan-0b1148/

Sanjeev Krishnan at S2G: https://www.s2ginvestments.com/team/sanjeev-krishnan

S2G Investments: https://www.s2ginvestments.com/

S2G “Financing Reality” report: https://www.s2ginvestments.com/insights/report-financing-reality

Builders Vision: https://www.buildersvision.com/

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What does it take to move impact investing from individual transactions to a system? And what does that mean for the field when the global development finance landscape shifts so dramatically in such a short period of time?

In this episode, Elizabeth Boggs Davidsen traces a career that begins in the corridors of Washington political power and ends up in Khartoum during a military coup, and later in refugee camps on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border — before running through twenty years at the Inter-American Development Bank, the UNDP's SDG Impact Standards, and the US Development Finance Corporation under the Biden administration.

She breaks down what everyone gets wrong about impact investing — that it's about a transaction, a fund, a project, when it's really about building a system — and makes the case for why GSG Impact's model of locally-rooted national partners, domestic capital mobilisation, and the forthcoming Impact Economy Index represents a fundamentally different approach to the problem.

If you work in impact investing, blended finance, or development policy — or if you want to understand how a $5 trillion SME finance gap in emerging markets actually gets closed — don't miss Elizabeth's practitioner case for why good deals do not automatically create good markets.

Featured Guest:
Elizabeth Boggs Davidsen, CEO and Executive Director, GSG Impact

Listen Next:
Conversation with Leslie Maasdorp: From Apartheid to the BRICS Bank to BII — Leslie Maasdorp's Journey Through Development Finance

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Here’s what you’re in for:

00:00 – Intro & Trailer

01:02 – Scott's Introduction & Guest Framing

03:22 – Welcome & Introduction

03:30 – Three Generations: The Boggs Family & Early Lessons in Catalytic Capital

06:53 – Women Who Built Careers & Choosing International Development

08:01 – Georgetown, Madeleine Albright & Joining the UN

10:10 – First Posting: Khartoum, Sudan & the Power of Local

14:05 – Joining the IDB: Microfinance, OMJ & 20 Years of Lessons

21:20 – The Parachute Problem: What Development Finance Gets Wrong

23:25 – UNDP: Building the SDG Impact Standards

27:15 – The DFC: Policy Team Under Biden

28:25 – Joining GSG Impact: Field Builders for the Impact Economy

32:10 – Impact Economies vs. Impact Investments: The Core Thesis

34:15 – Priority 1: National Partnerships & the Ghana Case Study

36:20 – Priority 2: Impact Transparency & Frameworks Proliferation

41:20 – Does Impact Investing Outperform? The Growth Data

42:35 – Priority 3: $800M SME Finance Target & the Impact Economy Index

47:30 – Index Launch, Guardrails & the Race to the Top

49:15 – Geopolitical Reset: ODA Down 25%, USAID Gone, UK Aid Cut

53:05 – China: Avoided or Engaged?

55:25 – Rapid Fire

59:30 – Closing & How to Connect with GSG Impact

Connect with SRI360°:

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Most people think a green or sustainable label on a bond means it is good for the planet. Often, it does not. A label only tells you what the issuer says it will do with the money. It does not prove that real change happens on the ground.

That gap is the heart of this episode of SRI360. I'm joined by Elizabeth Alm, Senior Investment Analyst and Portfolio Manager at Saturna Capital, the oldest and largest Sharia asset manager in the United States. Elizabeth helps run the firm's global sustainable bond fund and its Islamic income fund. Her core belief is simple: that bonds play a central role in financing the transition to a cleaner economy.

Elizabeth did not take the usual path into finance. She studied economics and anthropology at NYU and once dreamed of becoming an archaeologist. It took her 50 interviews to land her first job. She opened Excel for the first time on her first day of work, and her first week on a trading desk was the week Bear Stearns collapsed in 2008. Eleven years at Wells Fargo followed, working in municipal bonds as climate risk slowly began to show up in credit.

Today she puts less weight on third-party ESG scores and looks for what she calls “climate alpha” — value the market has not priced in yet. In this conversation we cover how sukuk (Islamic bonds) work, why investors who are not Muslim are buying them, and what she learned on a month-long research trip across the Middle East that ended just five days before the Israel-US-Iran war broke out.

In this episode we discuss:

Why a bond's label tells you the plan, not the real-world impact
How sukuk (Islamic bonds) work, and why they must be backed by real assets
Why investors who are not Muslim are buying sukuk
A bond she loves: Tabreed, the UAE cooling company that cuts emissions
Why sovereigns with high physical climate risk are 18% more likely to default
How satellite monitoring helped identify and mitigate 30,000 child-labor cases in a cocoa supply chain
The wave of AI data-center debt, and why she is cautious about it

Featured guest:

Elizabeth Alm,Senior Investment Analyst and Portfolio Manager at Saturna Capital

Listen Next:

Patrick Drum — Saturna Capital (Episode 16): Saturna's Patrick Drum on Islamic Finance, Faith-Based Investing, Sustainable Outcomes, ESG and More

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Most investors assume an ESG rating tells them how sustainable a company is. It doesn’t. An ESG rating measures the financial risk environmental, social, and governance factors pose to the company — not the company’s actual impact on people and the planet.

That distinction sits at the center of this episode of SRI360. I’m joined by Samantha Duncan, Founder and CEO of Net Purpose, a data platform now supporting clients managing approximately twenty trillion dollars in assets and built to measure what ESG ratings don't.

Samantha's story starts at Goldman Sachs, where she worked on healthcare M&A through the 2008 financial crisis, watching transactions that changed the cost of pathology and shut down rural medical centres get evaluated on one metric and one metric only: earnings per share. Reading about Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen Bank at the height of that disconnect was the thing that finally pulled her toward the door — and in 2009 she resigned and moved to Trujillo, Peru, to run a microfinance program for a children's NGO — an experience that taught her, counterintuitively, that charging the women she worked with commercial interest rates was more empowering than giving them aid on charitable terms.

From there she joined LeapFrog Investments as Head of Impact, building one of the industry’s first rigorous frameworks for measuring social and financial performance together. It was there, buried in spreadsheets manually extracting numbers from PDFs, that she hit what she now calls “Excel hell” — the realization that the industry lacked the data infrastructure to make its sustainability commitments real. That realization became Net Purpose, founded in 2019 to do for sustainability data what Bloomberg and FactSet did for financial data.

In this episode we discuss:

• Why ESG ratings measure financial risk to the company, not the company's impact on the world

• How Net Purpose calculates the percentage of a company's revenue that is genuinely sustainable

• What it means that only 16% of a global index is truly sustainable — and why the other 84% is a financial risk problem, not just a moral one

• The October 2025 acquisition of the SDI Asset Owner Platform, co-founded by APG, PGGM, AustralianSuper, and BCI

• Why sustainability, impact, and ESG still need clearer shared definitions

• What it will take for impact measurement to become as mainstream as profit

Featured guest:

Samantha Duncan, Founder and CEO of Net Purpose

Listen Next:

• Tamer El-Raghy — Acumen ARAF: Investing for Impact in Frontier Markets: https://sri360.com/podcast/tamer-el-raghy/?utm_source=episode&utm_medium=audio&utm_campaign=136

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What does it take to build a multilateral development bank from scratch — and then lead one of the world's oldest DFIs through a structural reset of the entire development finance system?

In this episode, Leslie Maasdorp traces a career that begins in a South African prison cell and runs through Nelson Mandela's government, Goldman Sachs International, and thirteen years in global investment banking, before arriving at the founding team of the New Development Bank in Shanghai — where he spent nine years building a $40–45 billion balance sheet institution with a AA+ credit rating from S&P and Fitch.

He breaks down how BII's newly launched 2026–2031 strategy is designed to crowd in pension funds, insurers, and sovereign wealth capital at scale — and why perceived default risk in emerging markets is systematically overstated relative to actual performance.

If you work in institutional capital allocation, blended finance, or emerging market infrastructure, don't miss Leslie's practitioner case for why the donor-recipient model is broken and what the next architecture of development finance needs to look like.

Featured guest:

Leslie Warren Maasdorp, CEO and Executive Director of British International Investment (BII), the UK's publicly-owned development finance institution

You can reach out to Leslie through:
LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/leslie-maasdorp-874424352
Website: www.https://www.bii.co.uk/en/

Listen Next:

Conversation with Mohamed Okasha : Africa’s Unbanked: Where FinTech Is Finding the Most Resilient Returns

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Here’s what you’re in for:
00:00 – Intro & Trailer

01:06 – Guest Introduction & Scott's Framing

03:09 – Goldman Sachs & Early Investment Banking Career

06:58 – Lessons from the 2008 Financial Crisis

08:15 – Building the New Development Bank in Shanghai

11:24 – NDB: Mission, Structure & AA+ Credit Rating

16:07 – Personal Life, Covid & Russia-Ukraine at NDB

19:40 – Arrested Under Apartheid: Detention Without Trial

21:59 – Prison, Solitude & Graduating with Distinction

25:08 – Growing Up in Bethelsdorp & the Road to Activism

32:15 – Trade Unions, London Scholarship & Joining the ANC

38:53 – Building Post-Apartheid South Africa

44:42 – Joining BII: The World's Oldest DFI

46:51 – What BII Does & How It Deploys Capital

53:31 – BII's Mandate to Experiment & the Case for Reform

57:17 – BII's 2026–2031 Strategy: Mobilizing Private Capital

01:02:22 – First-Loss Structures & the Allianz ACE Fund

01:05:53 – Inside the Investment Machine: Growth, Catalyst & Kinetic

01:09:17 – Risk, Returns & Crowding In UK Pension Capital

01:15:11 – Climate Finance: The Ayana Case Study

01:17:22 – Mission 300: Electrifying Africa by 2030

01:20:13 – Growth Investment Partners Zambia & BII's Entrepreneurial Model

01:24:56 – The Big Picture: $2.4T Climate Gap

01:26:48 – Rapid Fire

01:29:44 – Closing & How to Connect with BII

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What does it take to build a billion-dollar fintech company and then walk away from it to start over during a global pandemic?

In this episode, Mohamed Okasha shares the story behind helping to build Fawry into Egypt’s first tech unicorn—and then leaving shortly after its landmark IPO to launch DisrupTech, a first-time venture capital fund during COVID-19.

He breaks down what matters more than big ideas and what is often the ultimate competitive advantage in Africa’s startup ecosystem.

If you're curious about what helps founders grow stronger companies, don’t miss Mohamed’s practical lessons on investing, leadership, and decision-making from both an operator and investor perspective.

Tune in to learn more about:

[00:03:30] Why Mohamed decided to leave Fawry after its billion-dollar IPO to start a venture fund during COVID.
[00:05:05] The importance of making decisive moves during pivotal moments in life.
[00:08:54] The role Mohamed’s parents played in encouraging risk-taking.
[00:18:53] How routine and discipline help Mohamed succeed.
[00:20:45] What Mohamed saw at Vodafone that no one else could see.
[00:25:45] How his team built trust with their clients.
[00:31:27] Why Fawry kept “one leg in the physical world and one leg in the digital world” during the transition to digital payments.
[00:52:30] What makes a good founder in Africa versus a good founder in the USA.
[01:03:00] The importance of advisory rather than relationships.
[01:06:40] How Mohamed builds startups that make each other stronger.
[01:09:15] How he encourages collaboration between founders without forcing partnerships.
[01:15:00] What backseat leadership looks like to Mohamed.
[01:21:37] What people should expect as an investor in African companies.
[01:30:16] Why many global investors could be overlooking major opportunities in underserved markets.

Resources:

Mohamed Okasha: LinkedIn
DisrupTech Ventures
Fawry

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Scott Arnell’s Book: Sustainable & Responsible Investing 360

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Impact investing is entering a more disciplined, outcomes-driven phase, and it’s more complex than it first appears. In this episode of Sustainable & Responsible Investing 360, I sit down with Amel Karboul, Founder and CEO of the Education Outcomes Fund, to explore how capital can be tied directly to measurable results.

Drawing on her experience working with governments, philanthropies, and impact investors, Amel explains why traditional funding models often fail to deliver real impact, and how outcomes-based financing aims to realign incentives across the system. Rather than paying for activities, this model pays for results, introducing both greater accountability and new challenges.

We explore the tensions at the heart of this approach, from balancing different stakeholder expectations to addressing concerns around investor returns in low-income markets. We also discuss the risk of narrowing impact to what can be measured, and how thoughtful design can mitigate those trade-offs.

Looking ahead, we examine what it will take for outcomes-based models to scale, from simplification and standardization to the potential emergence of more tradable forms of impact.

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Scott Arnell’s Book: Sustainable & Responsible Investing 360

Amel Karboul on LinkedIn
Amel Karboul: Ted Talk

Education Outcome Fund Website

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Impact investing is entering a new phase, and it’s more nuanced than the headlines suggest. In this episode of Sustainable & Responsible Investing 360, I sit down with returning guest Eric Rice for his third appearance to unpack what’s really happening across global markets.

Drawing on his experience at Wellington Management and BlackRock, and now in private markets with SEAF (Small Enterprise Assistance Funds), Eric explains why this moment reflects divergence rather than decline. While the US has stepped back from ESG language, Europe, Japan, and other regions are accelerating capital deployment and regulatory support.

We explore the limits of impact capital in replacing development aid, especially in the wake of shifts at USAID, and why commercial discipline remains central to the model. We also discuss the growing role of pension funds, the expansion of investable opportunities, and the shift toward financial materiality.

Looking ahead, we turn to climate adaptation and resilience as emerging areas of focus, offering opportunity, but still evolving in terms of scale and structure.

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Eric Rice Episode 009: https://sri360.com/podcast/eric-rice/

Eric Rice Episode 088: https://sri360.com/podcast/eric-rice-2/

Scott Arnell’s Book: Sustainable & Responsible Investing 360

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What does climate investing look like when it actually delivers returns?

In this special compilation episode of Sustainable & Responsible Investing 360, I bring together three investors approaching the climate opportunity from very different angles, yet arriving at a similar conclusion.

First, Ben Guest of Gresham House explains why battery energy storage is the missing piece of the renewable energy transition. As intermittent power sources like wind and solar scale, storage becomes essential to balancing the grid, and a compelling infrastructure investment with double-digit return potential.

Next, Nancy Pfund, founder of DBL Partners, shares over two decades of experience in what she calls “double bottom line” investing. As an early backer of companies like Tesla, she demonstrates that incorporating environmental and social considerations doesn’t dilute returns; it can enhance them by expanding the opportunity set.

Finally, Lena Thiede of Planet A Ventures introduces a more rigorous approach to impact. With an in-house science team conducting lifecycle assessments on every investment, her firm ensures that climate impact is not just intended, but measurable, and tied directly to performance.

Three perspectives across infrastructure, venture capital, and science.

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Ben Guest full episode: https://sri360.com/podcast/ben-guest/

Nancy Pfund full episode: https://sri360.com/podcast/nancy-pfund/

Lena Thiede full episode: https://sri360.com/podcast/lena-thiede/

Scott Arnell’s Book: Sustainable & Responsible Investing 360

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What if the real constraint in impact investing isn’t a lack of capital… but how that capital is structured?

This is a compilation episode built from three conversations, each tackling a different part of the same question. What is catalytic capital? How do you create the conditions for it? And what happens when you deploy it at scale?

You’ll hear from Yasemin Saltuk Lamy, Head of Investment Strategy at Legal & General, who helped define impact investing during her time at J.P. Morgan and later led the Catalyst portfolio at British International Investment. She breaks down catalytic capital as capital that steps into spaces others won’t, and explains how structuring it as junior or first-loss capital can transform “too risky” opportunities into investment-grade assets for institutional investors.

From Stephen Muers, CEO of Better Society Capital, who shares how the UK built the infrastructure to support this kind of investing. Drawing on a unique funding model that includes dormant bank accounts and private bank capital, he explains how catalytic capital can be used to grow entire markets, not just individual portfolios, and why the UK’s social impact investment market has expanded more than 12-fold.

And from Michele Giddens, Co-Founder and CEO of Bridges Fund Management, who shows what execution looks like in practice. Starting with a £40 million fund anchored by £10 million of government catalytic capital, Bridges has gone on to mobilize over £2 billion in private investment while delivering competitive, often double-digit returns.

If you’re thinking about how capital can be deployed more intentionally, whether as an investor, policymaker, or operator, this episode offers a clear and practical lens into how catalytic capital works, and why it matters.

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Over the past several weeks, I have had the opportunity to speak with four leaders working at the intersection of capital, climate, and system-level change, each bringing a distinct perspective on what it takes to move from intention to real-world impact.

Across these conversations, we explored everything from outcomes-based financing and government-backed impact models to regenerative finance and ownership structures, to early-stage climate investing in Southeast Asia. What connects them is a shared recognition that the current system, whether ESG frameworks, traditional venture capital, or public spending models, isn’t quite delivering on its promise.

Here are the guests featured in the episode:

Francisco “Chico” Jardim, General Partner at SP Ventures

We talked about how this model has scaled globally, why it works best in complex social challenges like homelessness and criminal justice, and what still needs to happen to move from pilots to true system-wide adoption. Chico also shared his perspective on impact transparency and why better data and accountability are critical to unlocking larger pools of capital.

Full episode: https://sri360.com/podcast/francisco-jardim/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCFFg26zo6E&pp=0gcJCdgKAYcqIYzv

Nick Hurd, Chair & Senior Adviser, GSG Impact

Nick brings a deeply critical lens to traditional ESG and even parts of the impact investing ecosystem. His core argument is simple but uncomfortable: doing “less harm” isn’t the same as creating meaningful positive change.

Full episode: https://sri360.com/podcast/nick-hurd/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bagsC5n6sDs

Laura Ortiz Montemayor, Founding Partner at SVX Mexico & Managing Partner, Regenera Venture Fund

Laura is focused on one of the most underfunded areas in climate investing: adaptation. While most capital continues to flow toward mitigation, she’s working to back founders building solutions for the climate impacts that are already here.

Full episode: https://sri360.com/podcast/laura-ortiz-montemayor/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlLOScRChwk

Alina Truhina, Founding and Managing Partner at Utopia Capital Management

Throughout these conversations, Alina plays a critical role in connecting the dots, probing where ideas hold up, where they fall short, and how they translate into real-world investment decisions. Alina shares insights about climate adaptation, impact investing, and how venture capital often struggles to understand and engage with regions where climate risk is already part of everyday life.

Full episode: https://sri360.com/podcast/alina-truhina/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=olIygxJSpMI&t=2s

Taken together, these four perspectives offer a window into a field in transition, one that’s moving beyond labels and frameworks toward deeper questions of structure, accountability, and long-term impact.

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In climate investing, credibility is often associated with breakthrough technologies or large-scale energy infrastructure. This episode challenges that assumption by asking a different question: what if some of the most compelling climate investment opportunities lie within the everyday realities of farming?

My guest this week is Sarah Nolet, Co-Founder and General Partner at Tenacious Ventures. With a background that spans systems engineering, hands-on farming experience, and venture capital, Sarah now leads an investment firm focused on building climate resilience across global agri-food systems.

In our conversation on Sustainable & Responsible Investing 360, Sarah explains why traditional venture capital models often struggle in agriculture, and why solutions must be designed around the physical constraints farmers face every day.

We also discuss:

Why the “productive middle” of commercial agriculture offers significant climate and investment return potential
How organizing investment theses around enduring market needs helps avoid technology hype cycles
Why measuring real climate outcomes, not just sustainability practices, creates stronger alignment between impact and financial performance

The conversation reframes climate-smart agriculture as a pragmatic investment opportunity, one where improving farmer economics can drive both measurable climate outcomes and competitive venture returns.

Featured Guest

Sarah Nolet, Co-Founder and General Partner, Tenacious Ventures

Episode Resources:

Sarah Nolet on LinkedIn
Tenacious Ventures Website

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Climate finance conversations often focus on mitigation. However, the question Tamer El-Raghy raises is more structural: what if one of the most compelling climate investment opportunities lies in helping smallholder farmers adapt?

In this episode of Sustainable & Responsible Investing 360, I’m joined by Tamer El-Raghy, Managing Director of the Acumen Resilient Agriculture Fund (ARAF).

Tamer leads one of the first investment vehicles dedicated to climate adaptation in agriculture across Africa, backing early-stage companies that help farmers improve productivity, stability, and resilience in the face of changing climate conditions.

We discuss why agriculture remains chronically undercapitalised despite its central role in global food systems, and how blended finance structures, including first-loss capital from development institutions, can unlock mainstream investment into frontier markets.

Tamer also explains why successful agribusiness models often function as platform businesses, bundling financing, inputs, technical support, and market access to solve multiple farmer constraints at once.

What stayed with me is the simplicity of his impact lens: when farmers move from mud huts to brick houses, it signals something deeper than income growth. It reflects stability, dignity, and the foundations of long-term resilience.

Featured Guest
Tamer El-Raghy, Managing Director of the Acumen Resilient Agriculture Fund (ARAF)

Episode Resources:

Tamer El-Raghy on LinkedIn
Acumen Resilient Agricultural Fund Website.

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In venture capital, credibility is often framed around access, networks, and pattern recognition. This episode challenges that foundation by asking a harder question: what if the industry’s biggest blind spot is also its most persistent source of mispriced opportunity?

My guest this week is Sharon Vosmek, CEO and Managing Partner of Astia. With more than two decades of early-stage investing experience, Sharon has built one of the most structured bias-mitigation processes in venture through Astia’s Expert SIFT methodology. A documented and disciplined system designed to eliminate individual, network, and process bias from investment decisions.

Sharon explains why the gender gap in venture funding is better understood as a market inefficiency, and how removing warm-introduction gatekeeping meaningfully expands high-quality deal flow.

We also discuss:

How to recognize and eliminate pattern-matching bias in investment decisions
The alpha thesis: Why inclusive teams generate 4x average returns
How to reframe impact investing in the U.S. market by emphasizing values-based returns

This conversation examines inclusive investing not as concessionary capital, but as a rigorous venture discipline designed to capture overlooked alpha.

Featured Guest
Sharon Vosmek, CEO & Managing Partner, Astia

Episode Resources:

Sharon Vosmek on LinkedIn
Astia Website
Astia on Instagram
Astia 25th Anniversary White Paper
Previous SRI360 episode with Sharon Vosmek:

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In fixed income, credibility is tested differently, and real world metrics like liquidity, scale, and benchmark scrutiny leave little room for storytelling. This episode examines how impact strategies can operate inside mainstream credit markets without weakening financial discipline or diluting measurable outcomes.

My guest this week is, Matt Lawton, Matt is the Head of Impact Fixed Income at T. Rowe Price, where he leads global credit and emerging market blue bond strategies. With more than 15 years across credit research and portfolio management, Matt has helped build one of the industry’s most structured approaches to impact investing in public markets.

Matt explains how narrowing a broad benchmark to impact-aligned issuers creates focus without conceding returns, and why additionality must be identified ex ante, and not assumed.

Tune in to learn more about:

Why a 60/40 primary-secondary split protects credibility
How the five dimensions of the impact framework for underwriting dual objectives
What a four-pillar ESG bond test reveals about greenwashing
Why impact must deliver market-rate returns by 2030
This conversation is impact investing applied with credit discipline, measurement rigour, and institutional accountability.

Featured guest:

Matt Lawton, Head of Impact Fixed Income at T. Rowe Price

Additional Resources:

Matt Lawton LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/mattmlawton/
T. Rowe Price Website: https://www.troweprice.com/
T. Rowe Price ESG: https://www.troweprice.com/en/uk/about-us/esg/esg-investing
T. Rowe Price on https://linkedin.com/company/t--rowe-price/

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Most climate investment still flows toward mitigation, technologies designed to reduce future emissions. Far less capital is directed toward climate adaptation, despite the fact that many regions are already living with the physical, economic, and social consequences of climate change.

This imbalance is especially visible in emerging markets, where climate risk, rapid economic growth, and limited institutional infrastructure collide.

In this episode of SRI360, I’m joined by Alina Truhina, Founder and Managing Partner of Radical Fund and Utopia Capital Management.

Alina has spent her career building and backing early-stage companies across Southeast Asia and Africa, with a focus on climate adaptation, venture capital, and how businesses actually get built in emerging markets.

We discuss why traditional venture capital models often fail in emerging markets, why climate adaptation is harder to measure (but no less urgent) than mitigation, and why supporting founders in these environments requires far more than simply writing a check.

Tune in to learn more about:

Why climate adaptation remains underfunded compared to mitigation
How measurement and incentives shape where climate capital flows
Why traditional venture capital models struggle in emerging markets
What founders in climate-exposed regions need beyond just funding
How capital design influences risk, resilience, and long-term outcomes

Featured guest:

Alina Truhina, CEO and Managing Partner of The Radical Fund and a Partner at the multi-regional investment platform Utopia Capital Management

Listen Next:

Conversation with Nick Hurd: How Paying for Outcomes Unlocks Impact Investing Returns

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What happens when sustainability strategies fail to address real climate risk and long-term investment outcomes?

In this episode of SRI360, I am speaking with Laura Ortiz Montemayor about impact investing, climate risk, and regenerative finance, and why sustainability alone may no longer be enough for investors focused on long-term value creation.

Drawing from Laura’s experience in traditional finance and her work building regenerative investment strategies in Latin America, the conversation explores how capital allocation shapes systems, and why rethinking how capital is deployed matters as much as where it flows.

The conversation is especially relevant for investors navigating climate finance, nature risk, and sustainable investing in emerging markets.

We talk about:

the difference between sustainability and regeneration in impact investing
why changing what we invest in isn’t enough without changing how capital is deployed
how capital shapes systems, and risk, over time
what regenerative finance looks like for investors focused on long-term outcomes

Featured guest:

Laura Ortiz Montemayor, founder of SVX México and Managing Partner of Regenera Ventures

Listen Next:

Conversation with Helen Avery, Director of Nature Programs at the Green Finance Institute (GFI)

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The biggest risk investors face right now isn’t just climate change, geopolitics, or emerging-market volatility. The real threat in impact investing is inertia. Capital stays in familiar places because big asset owners can get satisfactory returns elsewhere. So, unless incentives and information change, inertia wins.

This episode is about why social investment keeps getting stuck, even when good people across government, finance, and communities are trying to do the right thing – and what actually has to change for money to start moving.

It focuses on where incentives misfire and how to scale impact investing and social investment beyond pilot projects.

I’m joined by Nick Hurd, former UK minister and now Chair of GSG Impact. Nick has worked across government, finance, and civil society. He helped build the UK’s social investment market, pioneered early social impact bonds, and later stepped away from politics after deciding markets offered more leverage than ministries.

We talk about:

how outcome-based finance works in practice
how social investment moves risk off taxpayers
where social impact bonds work (and where not)
why climate finance must account for communities, not just emissions

Featured guest:

Nick Hurd, Chair & Senior Adviser at GSG Impact

Listen Next:

Conversation with Sir Ronald Cohen
Conversation with Nick O’Donohoe

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Agrifood and AgTech investing in Latin America is still widely misunderstood. That gap between perception and reality is creating real opportunity for patient, specialized investors who understand agriculture as a long-term operating business, not a short-cycle investment theme.

Volatility here is often mistaken for weakness. But as this conversation makes clear, agribusiness has kept growing through recessions, pandemics, and political transitions. In many cases, it’s been one of the most resilient parts of the economy.

I’m joined by Francisco Jardim, General Partner at SP Ventures. He’s spent nearly two decades building one of the region’s earliest agrifood venture capital platforms, investing across agriculture innovation, climate resilience, and food security in Brazil and across Latin America.

We talk about:

Why tropical agriculture operates differently from temperate agriculture in US and European systems
How climate and AgTech investors often misprice Latin America
Why Brazilian agribusiness continued growing through macro shocks
How to scale sustainable agriculture without sacrificing productivity or food security

Tune in to hear why Latin American agrifood and climate tech may be one of the most compelling risk-return opportunities of this generation.

Featured guest:

Francisco "Chico" Jardim, General Partner at SP Ventures, one of the earliest venture firms built inside Brazilian agriculture

Listen Next:

Conversation with Daniel Izzo, CEO of Vox Capital, Brazil’s first impact investing firm

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Catalytic capital is often described as concessional capital, sometimes accepting lower returns. But this framing overlooks what matters most. In practice, catalytic capital steps in first, absorbs the risk others can’t, and makes institutional capital comfortable enough to follow.

If you’re involved in capital allocation, this matters because catalytic capital isn’t about charity. It’s about structuring risk so institutions can invest in assets they normally couldn’t because of regulatory and rating rules.

This episode focuses on how catalytic capital functions inside impact investing portfolios under real regulatory and balance-sheet constraints.

It revisits key points from my earlier conversation with Yasemin Saltuk Lamy who built and scaled the Catalyst Portfolio at British International Investment from roughly £300 million to about £1.6 billion.

Tune in to learn:

Why who goes first matters more than how much capital goes in
When catalytic capital actually crowds in institutional investors
How credit enhancement changes regulatory eligibility
How impact measurement shapes capital allocation decisions
Why impact trades off with liquidity, not financial returns

Featured guest:

Yasemin Saltuk Lamy, Head of Investment Strategy for the Institutional Retirement division of Legal & General (L&G) and former Deputy CIO and Head of Asset Allocation and Capital Solutions at British International Investment (BII)

Listen Next:

Full conversation with Yasemin Saltuk Lamy

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Forestry is often treated as just timber production. But in this 2-in-1 compilation about sustainable forestry, you’ll hear a different way of thinking. One that looks beyond timber to carbon, biodiversity, water, and resilience.

I revisit key moments from two earlier episodes that look at sustainable forestry as a serious investment strategy and a practical example of nature-based investing. They show how forests can deliver competitive returns, hedge inflation, and reduce portfolio risk while addressing climate and biodiversity pressures.

In one conversation, Bettina von Hagen talks about how better forest management can make forests more valuable over time. In the other, Charlotte Kaiser explains why climate and biodiversity loss are now showing up as real risks for investors.

Together, they show how decisions made on the ground connect with institutional capital in the real world. You’ll hear:

How sustainable forestry creates value beyond timber production
Why forests function as an inflation hedge and portfolio stabilizer
How climate-smart forestry improves resilience without sacrificing returns
How carbon markets and conservation expand financial optionality
How biodiversity, carbon, and community outcomes are measured

If you want solid information before deciding whether forests belong in a portfolio, this episode is a good place to start.

Featured guests:

Bettina von Hagen, Managing Director & CEO at EFM Investments & Advisory
Charlotte Kaiser, Head of Impact Finance at BTG Pactual’s Timberland Investment Group (TIG)

Listen Next:

Full conversation with Bettina von Hagen
Full conversation with Charlotte Kaiser

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The apparel industry is a $3 trillion market. But a massive share of what it produces goes straight to waste.

That combination points to mispriced inputs and broken systems. And to real opportunities for circular economy solutions that work on both the business side and the environmental side.

In this end-of-year gift to listeners, I'm revisiting a conversation that shows where to look for investment opportunity: at overproduction, reverse logistics that don’t work, and at a system where brands often find it cheaper to write off returned product than resell it.

These are highlights from an earlier conversation with Karla Mora, founder of Alante Capital, an early-stage venture fund focused on circular economy solutions and sustainable supply chains across the apparel industry.

Karla works directly with brands, manufacturers, and material innovators to understand where waste is created and where capital can change outcomes.

You’ll hear:

How overproduction creates immediate waste in apparel
Where circular economy investments can scale today
How venture returns and impact align in this sector

Listen in.

—

Featured guest:

Karla Mora: Founder and Managing Partner at Alante Capital, an early-stage venture fund backing scalable circular economy solutions in apparel and consumer supply chains

—

Listen Next:

Full conversation with Karla Mora

—

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Green bonds sound simple until you try to separate the real ones from the 50 shades of green flooding today’s market.

This episode offers an insider framework to distinguish credible green bonds from greenwashing, understand what real additionality looks like in fixed income, and make more confident capital-allocation decisions in a label-driven market.

It revisits early conversations with Marilyn Ceci and Romina Reversi, leaders who helped build the green bond market before sustainable finance went mainstream. Both worked inside JP Morgan as issuers, investors, and regulators were still defining standards, reporting, and impact measurement.

You’ll hear how green bonds evolved from a niche experiment into a scalable fixed-income market, and what that evolution reveals about transparency, liquidity, and investor trust today.

This episode explores:

Why green bonds became a strategic communication tool for issuers
How disclosure itself was treated as impact
What standards actually enabled scale and liquidity
Why nuclear energy re-entered the green bond conversation

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Featured guests:

Marilyn Ceci: Managing Director and Senior Advisor to the Center for Carbon Transition at JP Morgan and co-author of the Green Bond Principles
Romina Reversi: former founding member of JP Morgan’s ESG DCM team, now Managing Director and Head of Sustainable Investment Banking Americas at Crédit Agricole CIB

—

Listen Next:

Full conversation with Marilyn Ceci
Full conversation with Romina Reversi

—

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Blended finance is making hard deals in emerging markets investable. It drives real infrastructure development where capital markets are thin.

And when the work involves emergency aid and building businesses, you need someone who’s seen how money really works in emerging markets.

Few people know how to make those pieces fit together better than my guest today. Talmage Payne has spent three decades proving that mission-first investing can deliver both measurable social impact and competitive returns.

Talmage is the founder of multiple social ventures across Southeast Asia and West Africa. He now serves as chairperson of TapEffect, a piped water utility delivering clean water to rural communities. There, households pay for the service, and the company delivers an 8-9% IRR.

Today, we talk about how to blend grants, equity, and debt to scale essential services and how smart impact measurement keeps both investors and operators accountable.

Join us to learn:

What actually drives infrastructure investing success in low-income areas
Why good intentions aren't enough for viable social ventures
How to structure capital to crowd in commercial investors

This is a conversation about what actually works backed by real numbers. Tune in.

—

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Additional Resources:

Talmage Payne LinkedIn

TapEffect website

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My guest is Mark Kahn, Managing Partner at Omnivore, a $295 million venture capital firm investing in startups across agriculture, food, and the rural economy in India, focused on climate risk resilience.

In this episode, we talk about how venture capital can be redesigned to fund climate adaptation in the real economy, and still deliver real returns.

Mark shares what he’s learned from over a decade investing in agritech and climate adaptation in India, and why institutional investors continue to underestimate the opportunity in emerging markets.

We also discuss:

how Omnivore balances financial returns with measurable impact
why fintech for inclusion is key to rural transformation
why fund managers need to build for climate resilience, not just growth

Tune in to hear why India may be the most logical and overlooked bet in climate-smart venture capital. And why it's time to fund adaptation before it's too late.

—

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Additional Resources:

Mark Kahn LinkedIn
Omnivore Website

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Richard Brandweiner, Chair of Impact Investing Australia and a longtime institutional investor, joins the show to discuss the realities of impact investing at scale. He reflects on universal ownership, system-level risks, blended finance, and what it truly takes to align capital with real-world outcomes and fiduciary expectations.

Richard shares lessons from leadership roles at Perpetual, Aware Super, LeapFrog, Pendal, and Regnan, and why hope isn’t a strategy when designing investment frameworks meant to deliver measurable impact.

A candid conversation for investors, asset owners, and practitioners who want an honest look at where sustainable finance is working, and where it isn’t.

—

Intro (00:00)
Parents’ WWII survival shaped Richard’s moral compass (03:54)
Studied economics at the University of New South Wales (08:06)
Trading shares through the 1987 market crash in high school (10:44)
Career in Perpetual Investments and creating the first sustainable fund (13:15)
Becoming CIO at First State Super in 2013 (17:34)
Affordable housing fund idea sparked impact focus (19:34)
Structural issues in asset owner systems (33:29)
Transition from CIO to Leapfrog impact role (38:35)
Challenges launching institutional-grade impact fund (42:04)
Becoming BT CEO and integrating Regnan’s early ESG legacy (43:54)
At Regnan, the impact case is the investment case (48:29)
Regnan’s measurement approach and SDG taxonomy (54:18)
Impact Investing Australia - mission and focus (58:37)
Making impact the third axis in finance (01:04:55)
Ethical vs ESG vs impact investing (01:09:22)
How Australian Ethical outperforms with values-led investing (01:12:16)
Governance for Aboriginal community investment and autonomy (01:14:00)
Structural barriers to scaling impact investing globally (01:21:38)
Communication and accounting gaps in environmental costs (01:32:08)
Rapid-fire questions (01:35:37)
Contact info (01:47:14)

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Additional Resources:

Richard Brandweiner LinkedIn
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In this episode, I talk with Ron Homer – Chief Strategist for Impact Investing at RBC Global Asset Management, and one of the earliest architects of community development investing in the United States.

Ron’s perspective was shaped in Bedford-Stuyvesant, where he watched a thriving neighborhood decline not because of its people but because mortgage support and investment disappeared. That experience set him on a five-decade mission to help redirect capital back into places that had been overlooked.

He went from banking in Boston to co-founding Access Capital Strategies, where he flipped mortgage-backed securities into something that actually supported low- and moderate-income communities.

In 1997, he co-founded Access Capital Strategies with the goal of creating market-grade, fixed-income products that were community-aligned. His idea was to use the same mortgage-backed security structure that powered Wall Street, but build it around loans made to low- and moderate-income borrowers.

The model showed that you could structure institutional-grade portfolios that delivered both financial performance and community impact.

In 2008, Access Capital Strategies was acquired by RBC Global Asset Management. When the global financial crisis hit shortly after, Ron’s portfolios outperformed, especially for clients like New York City. “We were the highest performing investment – made 10% – because people who had 30-year fixed-rate mortgages and were buying them for shelter didn’t default.”

Today, Ron leads RBC’s U.S. impact investing strategy, part of a fixed income platform with about $80 billion AUM. His team oversees about $3 billion in community investment strategies. These include customized portfolios primarily composed of agency-backed mortgage securities targeted at low- and moderate-income borrowers, as well as allocations to SBA loan securitizations and municipal bonds.

And the results are measurable: over 50,000 individual homes financed, tens of thousands of affordable multifamily units, and for institutional clients like the City of New York, quarterly reports that track each dollar to the specific mortgage, census tract, borrower income level, and racial demographics, down to the loan level.

But data only tells part of the story. What keeps Ron going is something deeper: the ripple effect.

He believes homeownership and small business act as beacons within communities. “If you have one or two people who take pride in their home, maybe that becomes three people and four people and five people." That’s how change takes root, with visible progress that others want to join.

Ron also sees what he calls “conditioned helplessness”, a kind of behavioral resignation that sets in when people stop believing their efforts will make a difference.

“Some people think the only way to get money is through concessions. But the community doesn’t need concessions. They need access.”

Ron didn’t invent impact investing. But he helped prove it can work, not just morally, but financially. And he did it by choosing reform over revolution, trusting the data, and never letting go of the lesson from Bed-Stuy: that pride and ownership, applied the right way, can change everything.

Tune in.

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Additional Resources:
- Ron Homer LinkedIn

RBC Global Asset Management

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My guest today is Eva Yazhari – General Partner at Beyond Capital Ventures and one of the most original thinkers in the world of impact investing.

Trained on Wall Street, Eva left finance to found Beyond Capital, turning her expertise toward building impact-driven markets.

Beyond Capital Fund was structured as a nonprofit, a 501(c)3 – not to do charity, but to meet the moment. She describes it as “almost like a Trojan horse” – a structure that made her approach more acceptable to early supporters, even as she operated with full VC rigor.

She knew in 2009 that most investors did not yet believe emerging markets could deliver both returns and impact. So she created a structure that was more palatable – donors could get a tax deduction, while she quietly ran the fund like a VC from day one. There were no grants. No concessionary capital. They always behaved like a VC.

The result was a top‑quintile track record: a 0.3% loss ratio, markups, and over 100 million people reached through portfolio companies’ products and services.

But the nonprofit structure also kept the firm smaller than it needed to be. “I think it was the right thing to do, but I think it was a little bit of a mistake in the growth of the firm.”

In 2019, someone approached her after a talk and simply asked, “How do we invest?” – and that was the moment she knew the market was finally ready.

She and her team launched Beyond Capital Ventures, a for‑profit venture fund, carrying forward the same thesis with a structure that allowed investors to participate directly in the returns.

Today, Beyond Capital Ventures invests in early-stage companies across East Africa and India. It’s one of the few woman-led impact VC firms globally, with a team that’s 70% based in the markets they invest in.

Eva’s approach is hands-on, thesis-driven, and unafraid to push boundaries. She refuses deal flow from Europe or the U.S. because she believes the best opportunities come from being on the ground. As she says, “I’d rather the principal who runs our Nairobi office meet a founder while filling up his water bottle, than us meet them through some other channel.”

Beyond Capital has pioneered something radical in VC: the equitable venture structure. 10% of the GP’s carry is allocated to portfolio founders. Not only does it create community – it’s created collaboration. That motivates companies across her portfolio now to share customers, talent, and capital.

She measures impact as rigorously as she measures financial performance. Her team uses a three-tier framework aligned with IRIS and SDG metrics. And she’s clear-eyed about what success looks like. “Everybody is focused on sourcing better and investing better. Nobody is focused on adding value, and that is exactly where everything goes right or wrong.”

Eva’s career is proof that creativity, service, and capital don’t have to be separate. And that you can build something that lasts if you’re bold enough to hold them together.

Listen in.

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Additional Resources:
- Beyond Capital Ventures website
- Eva Yazhari LinkedIn
- Eva Yazhari Instagram
- Book ‘The Good Your Money Can Do’
- The BCV Podcast

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My guest today is Jamie Friedland, a former U.S. Treasury trader turned sustainability analyst at AXA Investment Managers – one of the world’s largest and most active players in sustainable investing.

He joined AXA Investment Managers – now part of BNP Paribas Group – in March 2022. Within the group, BNP Paribas Asset Management oversees over €716 billion in assets, while the broader platform manages around €1.5 trillion globally.

Approximately 90% of listed assets are classified under Article 8 or 9 of the EU’s Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation, meaning they integrate sustainability or have a dedicated sustainable objective (Source: BNP Paribas/ AXA Investment Managers (Core) as of end of 2024).

At AXA, Jamie works in a central ESG role, focused on public investments and helping integrate sustainability across equities, fixed income, infrastructure, and alternatives.

The results are detailed – and sometimes strict. AXA applies hard exclusions in its green bond strategies. Nuclear energy, for example, is allowed in conventional mandates and in unlabeled strategies that hold green bonds. But it’s left out of AXA’s official green bond funds – because some clients have made it clear they don’t want it included in the list of eligible projects.

This is the real balancing act – between client preferences, shifting regulation, and ESG data that’s still catching up. Jamie likens it to steering a tanker: slow to move, but once it shifts, the weight behind it is massive.

Still, ESG doesn’t operate in a vacuum. The backlash – especially in the U.S. – has been loud, often political, and sometimes confusing. Jamie’s answer is disarmingly simple: ESG is just data. And more information is always better than less.

Today, he’s here to walk us through how one of the world’s largest asset managers turns ESG from principle into portfolio decisions. Tune in.

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DISCLAIMER: This communication does not constitute, on the part of AXA Investment Managers, a solicitation or investment, legal or tax advice.

Due to its simplification, this document is partial, and opinions, estimates, and forecasts herein are subjective and subject to change without notice. There is no guarantee forecasts made will come to pass. Data, figures, declarations, analysis, predictions, and other information in this document is provided based on our state of knowledge at the time of creation of this document. Whilst every care is taken, no representation or warranty (including liability towards third parties), express or implied, is made as to the accuracy, reliability or completeness of the information contained herein. Reliance upon information in this material is at the sole discretion of the recipient. This material does not contain sufficient information to support an investment decision.

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Additional Resources:
- Jamie Friedland LinkedIn

AXA Investment Managers website
Full-year 2024 earnings
BNP Paribas Asset Management
Point of No Returns 2025: A responsible investment benchmar

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My guest today is Laura Segafredo – Chief Growth Officer at NatureAlpha, and a systems thinker who’s spent the last twenty years connecting science, policy, and capital to build tools that help finance face the realities of the climate crisis.

Laura began her career as an energy economist in Europe and California, contributing to major climate policy efforts like the Paris Agreement.

She then spent nearly a decade at BlackRock, where she helped transform ESG from a niche concern into a $500 billion force across fixed income and index investing. She led the creation of green bond tools, sustainability frameworks, and data standards that shaped the firm’s global strategy.

But as ESG became increasingly politicized, innovation stalled, and Laura decided it was time to chart a new path. She took a leap – from the world’s largest asset manager to NatureAlpha, a small startup using geospatial data to bring nature into investing.

There, she’s helping investors understand how companies depend on and impact natural systems – like water, soil, and biodiversity – and what happens when those systems start to break down. Most portfolios have never seen this data. Now they can.

NatureAlpha’s core product is Geoverse 2.0 – a geospatial AI tool that analyzes 8.5 million asset locations worldwide, tagging each with indicators of ecosystem health and how much a company depends on nature. It uses a quadrant model to flag the danger zone: places where companies are highly dependent on ecosystems – like rivers, forests, or soil – that are already deteriorating. That’s where risk concentrates – high dependency, low resilience.

The idea is to turn that risk into insight. Geoverse doesn’t just map individual assets – it scans entire portfolios, helping investors see exposures they’ve never seen before.

Through partnerships with data providers and platforms like ICE – and collaborations across the wider investment ecosystem – NatureAlpha is working to make its nature-related insights more accessible to investors within the tools they already use.

That unlocks what Laura calls the “double dividend”: portfolios that reduce nature-related risk and keep pace with market returns.

Still, Laura doesn’t overpromise. If there’s one lesson she’s carried from the ESG battles, it’s this: be transparent about what you know, and even more about what you don’t.

Today, she’s studying eco-theology, writing essays, and speaking to philosophers, post-growth economists, and faith leaders.

My conversation with Laura goes way beyond ESG.

It’s about what shifts when you zoom out from carbon and start seeing nature not as scenery, but as infrastructure. When rivers, forests, and soil stop being externalities and start showing up on the balance sheet.

If you tune in, you'll also hear what made her lose faith in market-based climate solutions, what the biggest lie the industry tells itself, and why the next big revolution in investing may be a moral one.

Because in the end, Laura’s not trying to build better ratings or cleaner tickers. She’s trying to build a better world – one that we might actually want to invest in.

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Additional Resources:
- Laura Segafredo LinkedIn

NatureAlpha website
Moral Revolution Podcast

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My guest is Nidhi Chadda, founder and CEO of Enzo Advisors – a female- and minority-led sustainability and climate advisory firm that helps companies and investors integrate ESG factors into strategy and performance.

She’s a former Wall Street portfolio manager who believes ESG isn’t about politics – it’s about disciplined risk management and long-term value creation grounded in data.

Before launching Enzo, Nidhi built a career that spanned investment banking, consulting, and asset management – always driven by a desire to understand what truly creates value in business.

It all came together years later at RBC, when she encountered ESG research that reframed sustainability as a core driver of financial performance.

That’s when it clicked – ESG wasn’t just about mitigating risk; it could actually drive value creation. She immediately signed up to help bring that approach into U.S. investment strategies.

Her team built a scorecard of over 20 ESG factors – human capital, environmental exposure, governance – and tied them directly to outcomes like revenue growth and cost savings. It was a data-first approach that opened a new chapter.

In 2020, Nidhi left a high-paying job managing billions to start her own ESG consulting firm, Enzo Advisors, a female- and minority-led sustainability consulting firm based in New York.

It was a risky moment. But she knew the field was shifting. ESG was moving from a “nice to have” to a core part of operational resilience.

And Enzo’s mission was to help small and mid-sized companies operationalize ESG and show them how ESG could actually make them stronger, more resilient, and more valuable over time.

Nidhi calls it Sustainability 2.0 – less about saying the right thing, more about doing the right thing... and measuring it.

At the center of her strategy are three things companies can actually measure:

Revenue growth: Winning new customers and entering new markets
Cost savings: Cutting waste, using energy more efficiently, and improving supply chains
Cost of capital: Getting better loan terms or investor interest by reducing risk and improving governance

But she doesn’t stop there.

She’s also Chief Impact Officer at Richmond Global Sciences, where she helps advance RGS Rift – a data-driven platform that applies impact-weighted accounting principles to quantify a company’s environmental, customer, and employee impact in financial terms.

It’s built on a concept called impact-weighted accounting, which is just a fancy way of saying: let’s measure how companies help or harm people and the planet – and translate that into real numbers.

She doesn’t get sucked into the political drama around ESG. Instead, she helps companies and their boards zero in on what actually moves value.

And she’s hopeful. AI is making data better. Investors are asking smarter questions. And the whole conversation is shifting – away from buzzwords, toward real business fundamentals like risk and performance.

If you strip away the noise, the labels, the acronyms – what you’re left with is a simple idea: ESG, done right, is just disciplined business. Nidhi Chadda knows how to make it work in the real world – and in this episode, she shares exactly what that takes.

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Additional Resources:
- Nidhi Chadda LinkedIn

Enzo Advisors LLC website

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My guest today is Michael Etzel – a partner at Bridgespan, and one of the key architects behind a shift that’s still unfolding: the effort to bring hard-nosed analytical discipline to a field once seen as closer to charity than capital.

Michael came to this work from the social sector, back when “impact investing” wasn’t yet a defined field. At Bridgespan, he began advising philanthropists and foundations – and over time, that work expanded to include some of the world’s largest asset managers as they started asking how capital could solve problems philanthropy couldn’t.

His idea was pretty simple: to put impact first.

Our conversation starts with that principle – and where it sits between two poles. On one side: traditional philanthropy willing to lose money in service of outcomes. On the other: finance-first investing chasing market-rate returns. Impact-first lives in the messy middle. The kind where the first diligence question isn’t “What’s the IRR?” – it’s “What’s the problem we’re solving?”

Michael was one of the architects of the Impact Multiple of Money, or IMM – a six-step process designed to estimate and compare the social or environmental value created for every dollar invested. It starts with what a business produces, connects those outputs to real-world outcomes, and draws on academic research to ground the analysis. The result is a dollar-based estimate of impact – not to put a price on people’s lives, but to give investors a common language for understanding what value really means.

Michael breaks it down in plain terms. He and his team actually put numbers to impact – they start with what a business produces, figure out what real-world benefits come from that, adjust for the risks, and then compare it to the money invested.

The IMM framework is now used across TPG’s Rise and Rise Climate funds, together managing tens of billions of dollars in assets. It’s become part of how they underwrite investments, sitting right alongside financial measures like IRR and MOIC when evaluating performance.

And the best part – it’s open source. The full method and case studies are published in Harvard Business Review (“Calculating the Value of Impact Investing”), so anyone can see how the math works.

But for Michael, this work has never been just about frameworks. It’s about decision-making – what actually happens inside organizations when impact moves from a good idea to something real.

In this conversation, we also got into some of the bigger questions shaping the future of the field:

Fiduciary duty, and why that concept needs a serious reset
How much progress still depends on individuals, not market forces
And why one of the most overlooked disciplines in this work is simply knowing how to say no

Tune in!

*** Impact investing services are provided by Bridgespan Social Impact, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of The Bridgespan Group.

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About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

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Additional Resources:
- The Bridgespan Group website

Michael Etzel Biography
Michael Etzel LinkedIn
Calculating the Value of Impact Investing

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My guest today is Daniel Izzo, co-founder and CEO of Vox Capital – Brazil’s first impact investing firm.

When Vox launched in 2009, the term "impact investing" barely existed in Latin America. There was no roadmap, just a few people who believed business could do more than serve the top of the pyramid.

Daniel teamed up with Kelly Michel, co-founder of Artemisia, an accelerator for social entrepreneurs. Kelly introduced him to Antonio Ermírio de Moraes Neto, a young investor from one of Brazil’s most prominent business families. Together, the three launched Vox Capital.

When Vox began in 2009, few understood what they were trying to do – and fewer believed in it. “People thought it was cute... crazy... or got angry at us.”

The infrastructure wasn’t there. Most investors ignored 85% of the population outside their own social class. Daniel understood why – but he also knew what they were missing.

His team wasn’t avoiding Brazil’s social challenges, but solving them. They focused on early-stage companies that could scale – businesses built for scarcity, but still desirable for all.

The breakthrough came from the results. Their second fund proved returns were possible – over 30% IRR – and suddenly, the skepticism began to fade. Today, Vox manages over $300 million across VC, credit, and real estate – all aiming to unlock opportunity for Brazil’s low-income communities.

They invested early in a medical education company that slashed the cost of specialist training from $10,000 to $1,000 and made it available online. They also backed Latin America’s leading ventilator maker, years before COVID hit. When the pandemic overwhelmed Brazil’s hospitals, that company supplied over 80% of the ventilators procured by the Brazilian government during the crisis.

But Vox isn’t just about writing checks. They take board seats, offer strategic advice, connect founders with new markets, and help navigate major crises.

Today, they’re leaning into catalytic capital, reforestation, regenerative agriculture, and environmental finance – the next frontier for impact.

In Brazil, where deforestation and unsustainable land use drive climate damage, Daniel sees a huge long-term opportunity. Not just to earn returns, but to restore ecosystems.

When I asked him what he’d fix with a magic wand, he went straight to mindset. “It’ll only be good for everyone, when it’s really good for everyone.” He believes ultra-wealthy families have a responsibility to mobilize their capital for collective survival.

This is a conversation about what it takes to build in a place where the challenges are complex, the urgency is real, and the opportunity is bigger than most people realize. Daniel makes the case that the next era of capital won’t just be about returns – it’ll be about restoration, resilience, and responsibility.

Tune in.

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About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

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Additional Resources:
- Vox Capital website

Daniel Izzo LinkedIn
The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid: Eradicating Poverty Through Profits

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My guest today is Nick O’Donohoe CMG – former CEO of British International Investment, co-founder of Big Society Capital, and one of the early figures to frame impact investing as a financial discipline.

Nick spent nearly three decades in global banking – first at Goldman Sachs, then at JPMorgan, where he rose to become Global Head of Research.

When the crisis hit in 2008, Nick left JPMorgan to explore whether finance could be used to serve people who had never been served by it at all.

That search took him to Bellagio, where the Rockefeller Foundation had gathered a small group of investors, philanthropists, and bankers to explore a new idea – something that would eventually become known as impact investing.

Nick brought a small research team – and the ability to put JPMorgan’s name on something. He offered to write a report explaining what impact investing could be: who it was for, how it might work, and why it mattered.

That report – Impact Investments: An Emerging Asset Class – was the first of its kind. It gave the idea a name, a structure, and a platform. For the first time, the field became legible – to banks, to investors, and to the wider world.

A few years later, he left banking to co-found Big Society Capital (now known as Better Society Capital) with Sir Ronald Cohen. Their mission was to use dormant assets to back the UK’s social sector.

Big Society Capital backed early-stage social enterprises, co-founded intermediaries, and pushed for legal structures that could attract blended capital.

In 2017, Nick became CEO of CDC Group – later British International Investment – the UK’s development finance institution. His mandate: deploy billions in public capital into emerging markets, while balancing risk, return, and development goals.

Under his leadership, BII invested in solar and wind, hospitals, digital connectivity, agribusiness, and venture capital. Most of that capital flowed into Africa, South Asia, and parts of the Caribbean.

He also launched the Catalyst Portfolio – where expected returns were zero or even negative. He introduced an Impact Score to measure social and environmental outcomes with the same rigor as financial ones.

During his time at BII, over 60% of the portfolio went into African countries. He believes capital needs to be structured differently to reach the people and places that need it most. That’s where development finance has to step in – to fill the gaps the market won’t touch on its own.

Now Nick is about to start as a Senior Fellow at the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at the Harvard Kennedy School, where he’ll be focused on what comes next.

If I had to sum up our conversation in one word, it would be risk – financial, political, and moral. But we talked about much more.

Tune in to hear from Nick O’Donohoe firsthand.

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Additional Resources:
- Nick O’Donohoe CMG LinkedIn

British International Investment website
Impact Investments: An Emerging Asset Class

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In this episode, I sit down with Mark Campanale, founder of Carbon Tracker and Planet Tracker, best known for introducing one of the most disruptive ideas in climate finance: the carbon bubble.

Mark’s journey began in his 20s, crossing the Sahara and working in a famine camp, where he first saw how capital, policy, and poverty were deeply linked. After years supporting fair-trade cooperatives in East Africa, he shifted to sustainable finance in London, co-launching the Jupiter Ecology Fund and founding the Social Stock Exchange – until a loss of mission led him to step away.

Around that time, he noticed a dangerous blind spot: fossil fuel prospectuses running hundreds of pages mentioned climate change in only a handful of lines. That raised a critical question: how much of the global carbon problem was sitting on corporate balance sheets?

No one had run the numbers. So he did.

He joined forces with Nick Robins and James Leaton to launch a nonprofit and publish a report – renamed last-minute to Unburnable Carbon.

The idea was simple – and terrifying.

We have a finite carbon budget if we want to stay under 2°C of warming. But the reserves held by fossil fuel companies – already financed, already capitalized – far exceeded that budget.

Mark compared it to a game of musical chairs – but the players were oil majors, national oil companies, and gas producers, all scrambling for the planet’s last remaining carbon budget. There aren’t enough seats for everyone to win.

That meant much of the fossil fuel industry’s projected value was based on resources the world couldn’t afford to burn. If countries kept their climate promises, those reserves would stay in the ground. And markets weren’t ready for that.

The report didn’t just land. It exploded.

Rolling Stone headlined it “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math,” and the term carbon bubble went global. University campaigns launched, the Financial Times ran a feature, and even analysts at JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs called Mark in to brief them.

He hadn’t meant to start a movement, but once it took off, he knew it needed structure. So he built Carbon Tracker – an independent research group now analyzing over 75 companies, using a traffic-light system to show whether business plans align with the Paris Agreement. Their reports, downloaded tens of thousands of times each month by banks and regulators, speak market language to translate climate risk into financial terms.

One of their biggest impacts is that the industry’s reserves life has fallen from 50 years to just 23. It didn’t happen by accident. It happened because investors stopped believing those reserves would ever be developed.

The idea of “stranded assets” has expanded beyond fossil fuels through Planet Tracker, Mark’s second initiative applying the same forensic lens to oceans, land use, and natural systems. By following overlooked data, he exposed a deeper conflict between financial markets and the planet’s future.

Mark is not the loudest voice in the room. But his work has made some of the most powerful institutions take a second look.

This is his story.

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Additional Resources:
Mark Campanale LinkedIn

Mark Campanale Twitter/X

Carbon Tracker Initiative

Planet Tracker

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In this episode, my guest is Jonathan Hirschtritt, Head of Sustainability & Investment at GCM Grosvenor – a leading global alternative asset manager for more than five decades.

The firm manages over $80 billion across the full spectrum of alternatives and has built one of the most comprehensive impact and sustainability investing platforms in private markets.

In 2017, Grosvenor brought Jonathan in to work on strategy and operations, later moving into the role of Deputy COO. Four years later, leadership asked him to take on something very different: to formalize and build Grosvenor’s sustainable and impact investing platform.

The firm already had a long history with underrepresented managers and other initiatives, but this mandate meant creating a dedicated team, new frameworks, and a full reporting system from scratch.

“This was a brand new area… no one really had done impact reporting or sustainable reporting compared to financial reporting.”

Today, Jonathan runs Grosvenor’s sustainable and impact platform – representing roughly a third of the firm’s AUM. It’s spread across private equity, infrastructure, credit, and real estate.

It’s a returns-first model, fully discretionary, but built to be customized. In fact, more than 70% of Grosvenor’s capital is deployed through separate accounts designed around a client’s specific objectives – whether that means climate, affordable housing, labor outcomes, or education.

Jonathan makes a sharp distinction between “sustainable” and “impact,” and for him it comes down to two things: intentionality and measurement. In short, if a GP accidentally does good, that’s great. But that’s not impact unless it was designed that way – and unless you can prove it.

What struck me in our conversation is how much of Grosvenor’s model is built on customization. Every mandate begins with the client’s own theory of change – whether that’s climate, social infrastructure, labor outcomes, or diversity – and then the team constructs an investment program to match.

Jonathan doesn’t talk like a marketer. He talks like a builder. Someone who’s spent years designing a platform that balances customization and scale – and believes that the future of impact is about doing the hard work behind the scenes, even when no one’s watching.

In our conversation, he showed how the real work starts before a dollar is invested – aligning on objectives, setting outcomes, and building them into portfolio construction.

We also discussed:

the challenges of data reporting
the distinctions in ESG terminology
the leverage of private capital
why impact only scales when it moves in lockstep with performance
the growing role of AI
what rising energy demand might mean for infrastructure and climate strategies

Tune in.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

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Additional Resources:
🔹 Jonathan Hirschtritt LinkedIn

🔹 GCM Grosvenor website

🔹 “Strengthening Outcomes: Impact and Financial Value at Exit,” published by ICM, Morriso

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In this episode, my guest is Timothy Rann, Managing Partner of Mercy Corps Ventures. He leads what is likely the only venture capital fund in the world to have emerged from within a humanitarian NGO. When the fund was first created, Mercy Corps itself was a $600 million-a-year organization working in more than 40 conflict and climate-stressed countries.

After years of building businesses in fragile markets such as Cambodia, Vietnam, and Afghanistan, he and his wife moved to Jakarta, where he was recruited to help launch what became Mercy Corps Ventures. The original idea was to create “the equivalent of Google X inside a nonprofit.”

But that venture-building model proved too expensive. Tim and his team pivoted and convinced the board to let them invest directly in startups serving the Global South.

From those beginnings, Mercy Corps Ventures has scaled into a family of four funds with more than 60 portfolio companies across Africa, Latin America, and Asia.

Their first fund was evergreen, seeded by family offices and corporates, later joined by institutions like USAID and Proparco. It’s already produced a unicorn and multiple exits.
The second fund, now aiming for $50 million, focuses on climate adaptation and resilience.
The third fund is the Venture Lab. It puts small grants behind frontier ideas – everything from anticipatory cash transfers to glacier restoration.
And the fourth is a Web3 fund. Its purpose is simple: to test whether decentralized finance can lower costs and expand access in emerging markets.

Mercy Corps Ventures has what they call a resilient future thesis. The idea is to back startups that help communities in emerging markets adapt to climate change and recover faster from shocks.

Their thesis is built around three verticals:

adaptive agriculture and food systems
inclusive fintech
climate-smart technologies

Instead of waiting years for perfect research to act on, they put capital to work now. They test what works and learn along the way. As Tim puts it, “We need to take as much impact risk as commercial risk within the realm”.

It’s this willingness to test, fail, and adapt that’s helped MCV move from an experiment inside a nonprofit to one of the most innovative impact investors in the Global South today.

In this interview, Tim talks about what it takes to back founders in fragile markets, why impact investing sometimes means taking risks no one else will, and why boring products like factoring can unlock climate resilience.

Tune in to hear more about his remarkable journey.

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About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

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Additional Resources:
🔹 Mercy Corps Ventures website

🔹 Mercy Corps Ventures LinkedIn

🔹 Timothy Rann website

🔹 Timothy Rann LinkedIn

🔹 Range of Motion Project (ROMP)

🔹 Support Timothy to help ROMP patients

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Most investors now accept that climate risk is financial risk. But what about nature loss? What about the fact that half of global GDP is tied to the natural world – from soil health to pollination to forest carbon – and yet almost none of that value is priced into markets?

If climate was the first wake-up call, nature is the second.

In this 3-in-1 compilation, we revisit past episodes with investors at the forefront of this shift. Each one is building strategies to bring natural capital into the financial mainstream – through listed equities, real assets, or nature-based carbon credits.

Here are the featured guests:

Martin Berg, CEO of Climate Asset Management

Martin is pushing to bring natural capital out of the margins and into the financial mainstream.

With over $650 million raised and three funds under management, Martin’s building a new category of real asset investing – one that spans sustainable agriculture, forestry, and nature-based carbon.

The firm’s strategies include land acquisition and restoration in developed markets, as well as carbon credit partnerships with smallholder farmers in emerging markets. Each is tailored to a different type of investor – but they share the same goal: aligning financial returns with measurable improvements in natural ecosystems.

Full episode

Ingrid Kukuljan, Former Head of Impact & Sustainable Investing at Federated Hermes

At the time of recording our original interview, Ingrid was Head of Impact and Sustainable Investing at Federated Hermes. In that role, she launched the Biodiversity Equity Strategy – the first biodiversity-themed fund in the listed equity space.

Her team screened nearly 9,000 listed companies – the standard MSCI All World benchmark – and found only about 150 that qualified as biodiversity champions: businesses aligned with at least one biodiversity-linked SDG and actively working to preserve or restore nature.

The gap was striking. Ingrid pointed out that 80% of the UN Sustainable Development Goals depend on biodiversity, yet fewer than 20% are on track – and in the past 50 years, we’ve decimated biodiversity globally.

Her team used a detailed KPI framework across emissions, water use, land conversion, and waste, making the case that public equities can play a vital role in financing nature-positive outcomes – and in helping restore ecosystems without compromising returns.

Full episode

Helen Avery, Director of Nature Programmes at the Green Finance Institute (GFI)

Helen is working to make nature investable. As Director of Nature Programmes at the Green Finance Institute, she leads the GFI Hive – a dedicated platform focused on removing the barriers that keep private capital from flowing into nature.

That means shaping the building blocks of nature markets – like biodiversity net gain, mitigation banking, and nature-based carbon – and helping define the standards, infrastructure, and policy frameworks that make them investable at scale.

Helen’s team supports the UK’s nature markets and investment readiness funds, partners with farmers and NGOs to build new business models, and works closely with corporates through the TNFD to help them assess their risks and dependencies on nature.

Full episode

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The traditional view of bonds focuses only on financial returns. But social bonds turn that model on its head by aligning capital with solutions to pressing social challenges. Social bonds link financial success directly to positive societal change.

Across these 3 conversations from past guests of the SRI360 podcast, a common thread emerges. When you design investment strategies to solve real problems and hold yourself accountable for the outcomes, you can unlock new sources of alpha, resilience, and long-term value.

Social impact bonds show how shifting incentives can deliver better results for both investors and society.

Here are the featured guests:

Sir Ronald Cohen, Co-Founder and President of GSG Impact

Sir Ronald Cohen’s story begins in traditional venture capital, where he saw firsthand both the power and the limitations of finance. While VC could create jobs and generate wealth, it could also widen the gap between those at the top and everyone else. Could capital markets be redesigned to actively close those gaps instead?

The answer took shape in the form of the social impact bond – a financial instrument where investor returns are tied directly to measurable social outcomes. The first was used to reduce reoffending among UK prisoners, shifting the risk from taxpayers to investors and incentivizing real results over box-ticking.

From there, Sir Ronald Cohen went further, creating “impact accounting” – a framework to measure corporate social and environmental performance in monetary terms. It’s a practical idea because people understand numbers more than anything else; hence, the approach to valuing impact is the same as valuing profit.

Full episode

Adam Swersky, Former CEO, Social Finance

Adam Swersky’s work at Social Finance has been instrumental in the creation and scaling of social impact bonds and similar outcomes-based financing models. Adam explains how bringing finance into the equation can force a greater focus on measurable outcomes, driving partnerships that are laser-focused on solving acute social problems.

From the Peterborough Prison Program to the Mental Health Unemployment Partnership, Adam’s experience demonstrates how applying capital to social issues creates a discipline around results, sustainability, and long-term impact.

Full episode

Simon Bond, Former Executive Director of RI Portfolio Management, Columbia Threadneedle Investments

At Columbia Threadneedle, Simon managed the UK and European Social Bond Funds – large-scale, diversified portfolios where every bond issued was tied to a clear, measurable social benefit.

This is not philanthropy disguised as investing. These funds delivered market-rate returns while financing projects like affordable housing, education, public health, and climate resilience. Simon calls it “positive inclusion” – actively seeking out issuers whose activities deliver net social gain.

Every investment was assessed not just on financial merit, but on its documented social outcomes. And because these are public market instruments, the scale was enormous, allowing institutional investors to channel billions into projects that might otherwise be underfunded, without sacrificing liquidity or returns.

Full episode

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We’ve spent decades talking about the shift to renewables – building more wind, more solar, more clean energy capacity. And that’s important. But it’s also only half the story.

Because once that energy is generated, what happens next is where things start to get complicated – how it's stored, how it's moved, and how much of it actually gets used. Right now, the answer to that last question is… not much. In fact, the majority of global energy still gets lost before it ever reaches an end user.

This week, we’re revisiting two past conversations – both of them centered on the part of the energy transition most people don’t see.

One looks at the massive, under-addressed problem of energy waste – and the business models turning that waste into investment-grade infrastructure. The other zooms in on large-scale battery storage and what it takes to keep a renewable-heavy grid stable.

These are two very different approaches to the same problem: not just how we generate clean energy, but how we manage it after it’s made. Because if we don’t solve that part, the rest doesn’t work.

Here are the featured guests:

Jonathan Maxwell, Founding Partner and CEO of Sustainable Development Capital (SDCL)

Jonathan Maxwell founded SDCL with a simple observation: the world isn’t just short on clean energy – it’s wasting most of the energy it already has. While the market poured trillions into new renewables, Jonathan zeroed in on the overlooked half of the story: how energy is used, moved, and lost before it ever reaches the point of need.

He started SDCL in 2007 as an advisory shop, designing environmental infrastructure funds for clients like HSBC and the World Bank. But by 2012, the firm became an investor, building and financing projects that cut waste, generate energy on-site, and make buildings, industry, and transport far more efficient.

Today, SDCL manages $2.5 billion in assets across over 50,000 properties in 10 countries. Their portfolio spans projects from industrial heat recovery to citywide biogas and low-carbon power for data centers. The common thread is delivering cheaper, cleaner, more reliable energy, without requiring customers to put up the capital themselves.

Full episode

Ben Guest, the Managing Director of Gresham House New Energy Division, Gresham House Energy Storage Fund

Ben Guest leads Gresham House’s New Energy Division, home to the UK’s largest battery storage portfolio. His team controls close to a quarter of the market – a position built on one core idea: if renewables are going to power the future, they need somewhere to live when the sun’s not shining and the wind’s not blowing.

Battery storage is that missing piece. Because wind and solar don’t produce power all the time. But the grid still has to stay balanced every second of every day. That’s what these battery projects do – they take in power when there’s too much, release it when there’s not enough, and do it over and over, many times a day.

Ben’s team is hands-on from start to finish. They find sites near key substations, secure planning and grid connections, oversee construction, run operations, and work with optimizers to trade power for the best returns.

At the time of this conversation, they were managing more than £1.4 billion, with returns well above their 10% target for two years in a row.

Full episode

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Healthcare is filled with breakthrough claims. But most of what gets funded doesn’t make it anywhere near a hospital ward, a low-income patient, or a parent juggling three jobs. The gap between what’s possible and what’s actually useful is real, and these two investors are trying to close it.

This week, we revisit two conversations with fund managers who are focused on problems that actually matter: the rising cost of care, the complexity of getting it, and the systems that still leave too many people behind. Their portfolios include diagnostics that reduce medical error, wearables that predict seizures, virtual platforms that help people manage chronic illness, and yes – even robotics that could expand access to fertility care.

But this isn’t just about cutting-edge tech. It’s about a bigger question: What role do businesses – and the investors backing them – play in creating health? Because at the end of the day, a healthier population isn’t just good policy. It’s good business, too.

Here are the featured guests:

Dr. Tara Bishop, Founder and Managing Director of Black Opal Ventures

Tara Bishop is investing at the collision point – where healthcare and technology meet, and where legacy capital still struggles to keep up. At Black Opal Ventures, she’s backing startups that don’t just make care more digital – they make it more intelligent, more precise, and more accessible.

Black Opal is one of the few female- and minority-led VC funds in the health-tech space. Tara and her partner Eileen Tanghal bring deep domain expertise – medicine on one side, deep tech on the other – and they’re targeting high-impact companies that address the big four in healthcare: cost, quality, access, and security.

Every investment is built around the same goal: getting the right care to the right patient at the right time – at a cost that works. And they’re delivering Black Opal double-digit returns in the process.

For Tara, impact means solving problems that have outlasted decades of reform – inside what she calls a “behemoth of an industry” that affects lives at scale and rarely rewards innovation that puts patients first.

Full episode

Kieron Boyle, Chair of the Impact Investing Institute

Kieron Boyle has spent years making the economic case for better health. At Guy’s and St. Thomas’ Foundation, he helped turn an 800-year-old endowment into a £100 million impact portfolio – funding everything from healthier food startups to housing for women and children at risk. Not because it’s charity. Because it's smart investing. Because a healthier society is more productive, more resilient, and more investable.

His work started with a simple question: most of what drives health doesn’t happen in hospitals – so why should health investing stop at hospital walls? The team backed medical technologies and life sciences, yes – but also addressed the wider commercial determinants of health: food, air, housing, debt. Then they went further, pioneering a dual mandate that put health and financial return on equal footing.

Now, as Chair of the UK’s Impact Investing Institute, Kieron is scaling that thinking. He’s working with long-term investors (including pension funds and sovereign wealth) to align trillions in assets with the outcomes that actually shape wellbeing: healthier people, stronger communities, and more sustainable systems.

Full episode

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What do an AI-powered investment engine, a grassroots organizing platform, and a nature-tech-focused VC have in common?

They’re all built on the conviction that technology should be in service of real-world problems – not just market efficiency or shareholder return. And increasingly, investors are stepping up not only to fund that kind of innovation, but to actively shape it.

In this 3-in-1 compilation, we revisit past episodes with investors who are doing exactly that: using capital to steer technological progress toward social and environmental outcomes.

Here are the featured voices:

Paul Miller, Managing Partner and CEO at Bethnal Green Ventures

Paul Miller launched Bethnal Green Ventures in 2012 – before “tech for good” was even a phrase most investors recognized.

At the time, brilliant developers were stuck building tools for banks and ad agencies, while the problems they wanted to solve – climate, health, inequality – sat on the sidelines. Paul saw the gap and built something to fill it.

Bethnal Green Ventures backs founders using technology to create measurable, intentional social and environmental impact. Everything BGV backs falls under one of three themes: building a sustainable planet, a healthy society, and better lives. That’s included backing startups working on grid flexibility software for the energy transition… digital tools to streamline public healthcare… and workplace platforms helping frontline workers organize and advocate for change.

Full episode

Xavier Lorphelin, Managing Partner at Serena Capital

Xavier Lorphelin co-founded Serena on a simple premise: entrepreneurs shouldn’t work for VCs – VCs should work for entrepreneurs. From day one, the firm has been run like a startup itself, combining capital with hands-on operating support and the belief that founders deserve more than a check.

That belief still holds. But in recent years, Serena’s mission has sharpened. Alongside its general tech funds, the firm now manages two vehicles dedicated to sustainability: a fully SFDR Article 9 impact fund, and a new early-stage fund with a significant allocation to climate tech. Both are anchored in Serena’s broader mission: to support innovative entrepreneurs in the service of a better world.

For Serena, climate is only the beginning. The firm is doubling down on “Nature Tech” – tools that help companies measure and manage biodiversity, water, and soil health in real time. Their thesis is clear: digital infrastructure can enable breakthroughs in how we preserve natural systems, from AI-powered biodiversity monitoring to ground-based sensors that track ecosystem change.

Full episode

Daniel Klier, former CEO of ESG Book

At the time of this interview, Daniel Klier was CEO of Arabesque S-Ray, the predecessor to ESG Book. He helped build one of the most ambitious platforms in ESG data – by combining three distinct engines: a sustainability-focused asset manager, a data provider tracking over 150 million ESG data points, and an AI system that customizes investment strategies in real time.

For Daniel, tech for good means infrastructure – the kind that can shift how trillions are allocated. ESG Book’s mission is to mainstream sustainable finance by making data transparent, machine-readable, and usable at scale.

Full episode

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What does it look like when billion-dollar funds put impact at the core of their investment strategy?

In this 3-in-1 compilation episode, we revisit conversations with investors managing tens of billions across public fixed income, public equities, private equity, and impact-focused real estate. Each one makes the case that environmental and social outcomes aren’t a tradeoff – but a source of lasting value and market-beating returns.

Meet the leaders turning billions into measurable impact:

Michele Giddens, Co-Founder and CEO of Bridges Fund Management

Bridges was launched in 2002 with £40 million – including just £10 million in catalytic capital. Today, it manages over £2 billion across private equity, impact real estate, and outcomes contracts.

From the start, its mission has been to invest in solutions that drive both a more inclusive economy and a more sustainable planet – ideally, both at once.

Michele describes their theory of change simply: addressing systemic social and environmental challenges isn’t a tradeoff – it’s a way to unlock high-performing markets. Whether it's converting inefficient office buildings into low-carbon co-living hubs or financing housing solutions for marginalized youth, Bridges targets overlooked problems with market-driven solutions.

Full episode

Ben Dear, Founder and CEO of Osmosis Investment Management

Osmosis was built on a simple but overlooked idea: companies that generate more economic value while using less carbon, water, and waste will outperform. Ben believed resource efficiency wasn’t just good for the planet – it could be a consistent, data-driven investment factor.

He was right. Today, Osmosis manages over $17 billion in global public equity strategies, all powered by their own proprietary environmental data. They collect and standardize metrics across carbon, water, and waste – giving them a lens on corporate performance that most investors miss.

Their low-risk flagship targets just 0.5–1% above benchmark returns – yet still outperforms two-thirds of global equity funds on Morningstar. Their higher-alpha strategies deliver 2–3% annually, while cutting portfolio footprints by up to 70%.

Check out the full interview:

Part 1

Part 2

Stephen M. Liberatore, Head of ESG and Impact for Global Fixed Income at Nuveen

Nuveen manages just over $1 trillion globally – and Steve oversees more than $20 billion of that in ESG and impact-focused public fixed income, across 38 distinct funds.

While most associate impact with private markets, Steve has built one of the world’s largest impact bond strategies by focusing on public debt. His theory of change is rooted in scale: in 2023, public fixed income financed over $800 billion in climate transition – ten times more than private equity and venture combined.

Every security in Steve’s portfolios must deliver a direct, measurable environmental or social outcome. That means no sustainability-linked bonds with vague KPIs. Instead, the team targets use-of-proceeds instruments that reduce financing costs for projects like clean energy, affordable housing, and ecosystem restoration – while delivering market-rate returns.

Full episode

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In this second compilation focused on emerging markets, we revisit conversations featuring three investors who are channeling substantial capital into regions where others hesitate to go – and they’re doing it with discipline, innovation, and deep local insight.

Each of these guests brings a different strategy and perspective, but all are working toward the same goal: building sustainable, scalable businesses that meet the needs of underserved communities.

And they’re doing it in ways that challenge the old assumptions: that impact comes at the expense of return, that emerging markets are too volatile to be investable, or that scalable solutions must come from the West.

Here are the featured voices:

Sandeep Farias, Founder and Managing Partner of Elevar Equity

Elevar backs what they call entrepreneurial households – more than 50 million families across emerging markets who’ve moved beyond the bottom of the pyramid. While they’re making economic progress, they still lack access to the products and services that support their ambitions and daily lives.

Sandeep and his team take a bottom-up, equity-focused approach to identify the “core solutions” these families prioritize – like education, healthcare, and agriculture – and invest in entrepreneurs building businesses to serve them.

With five funds deployed across India and Latin America, Elevar stays close to both customers and founders, spending time in the field to understand how people live, what they value, and where capital can make the greatest difference.

Full episode

Rochus Mommartz, the CEO of responsAbility

Rochus leads responsAbility – one of the world’s largest dedicated impact asset managers, with $5 billion under management and more than $15 billion deployed across emerging markets since inception.

His team doesn’t start with products. They start with problems – like the 500 million people in Africa who still lack electricity, or the small businesses across Asia and Latin America that can’t get financing. Then they find the companies solving those problems and shape capital to support their growth.

Rochus draws a clear line between real and perceived risk. Emerging markets aren't short on opportunity – they're just often misunderstood by investors who rely too much on spreadsheets and not enough on what’s actually happening on the ground.

Check out the full interview:

Part 1

Part 2

Sugandhi Matta, Chief Impact Officer at ABC Impact

Sugandhi helped launch ABC Impact with backing from Temasek and Temasek Trust – and helped shape it into the largest Pan-Asian private equity fund dedicated to impact.

From the start, her focus has been on building a strategy rooted in Asia’s realities – not imported from somewhere else. That meant starting with evidence: mapping the region’s most urgent needs, identifying where scalable solutions could take hold, and designing an impact framework from the ground up.

ABC now manages close to $1 billion across sectors like healthcare, financial inclusion, sustainable food, and climate resilience. They back mission-driven founders solving problems they’ve lived – and who have the resilience and discipline to scale.

Full episode

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The mainstream investment community has long viewed emerging and frontier markets as high-risk regions fraught with numerous challenges. However, with growing populations and expanding digital access, these regions are poised to become the economic powerhouses of the future.

In this compilation episode, we revisit 3 past conversations from Eliza Foo, Asha Mehta, and Monica Brand Engel, who are leveraging the power of impact investing to drive meaningful change across emerging economies.

Each of these guests shared how they are turning risks into opportunities in emerging markets while earning impressive returns for their investors.

By 2050, these regions will account for 70% of the global population and 50% of global GDP. This statistic alone shows the big opportunities that exist for businesses and investors alike.

But we can’t wish away the risks. Countries within these regions are often marked by political and economic volatility. In these conversations, we talk about evaluating these risks and overcoming challenges through innovative impact investing strategies.

Eliza Foo, Director, Impact Investing at Temasek

Eliza Foo is a leader at Temasek, one of the world’s most prestigious global investment firms, with a portfolio valued at USD $288 billion. Temasek invests across both public and private markets, operating with the flexibility of its own balance sheet, allowing them to pursue diverse opportunities across sectors, geographies, and asset classes.

As the head of Temasek’s Impact Investing team, Eliza plays a big role in the firm’s mission to create value for both current and future generations. Under her leadership, Temasek has championed innovative investments in emerging markets, focusing on critical areas such as financial inclusion, healthcare, agriculture, and climate change.

Full episode

Asha Mehta, Managing Partner & CIO at Global Delta Capital

Asha Mehta is a visionary leader at the intersection of impact and investment, with a deep commitment to unlocking the untapped potential in emerging and frontier markets. As the managing partner and CIO of Global Delta Capital, a US-based equity long-only investment manager, Asha and her team harness the power of capital to fuel social and economic development across international, emerging, and frontier markets.

Her work combines systematic investing in publicly listed equities with a strong focus on generating both alpha and measurable impact.

Full episode

Monica Brand Engel, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Quona Capital

Monica is an impact pioneer with a specialized focus on financial inclusion in emerging and frontier markets. Through Quona Capital, she leads investments in micro, small, and medium-sized businesses to drive economic growth and provide solutions to underserved and underbanked communities.

Quona focuses on innovative fintech solutions that bridge the financial infrastructure gap in these regions. By investing in digital payments, tailored lending platforms, accessible insurance, and neo-banking services, Quona enables millions of people to access financial tools previously unavailable to them. Her investments in emerging markets center on creating sustainable financial products that cater to the unique needs of local populations.

Full episode

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My guest today is Vojkan Brankovic, founder of Apeiron, a principal investment firm that is shaping the future of sustainable real estate investment. Founded in 2013, Apeiron has established itself as a leader in high-impact real asset opportunities, specializing in logistics real estate across Europe.

With over 30 years of investment management experience, Vojkan has positioned Apeiron at the forefront of logistics real estate investment, currently managing a portfolio of 500,000 square meters across strategic German locations spanning the full value chain from opportunistic and value-add to core+ strategies.

Vojkan's journey into real estate began far from the world of buildings and investments, with his early years spent between Sweden and Belgrade, Serbia, followed by time in the UK. This upbringing shaped much of his entrepreneurial mindset and leadership style.

Growing up in these diverse cultures gave him an early understanding of adaptability and collaboration, 2 key factors that would later influence how he built Apeiron. It was this exposure to different ways of thinking, working, and leading that laid the foundation for his approach to business.

While his background had always been in business and finance, he found his true passion in real estate. He saw it not just as a way to generate financial returns, but as an opportunity to make a positive environmental impact.

This vision was rooted in the recognition that the real estate sector, particularly logistics, was one of the largest contributors to global carbon emissions. But it was also where he saw the greatest potential for change.

What sets Vojkan apart is how he’s using real estate as a way to do good while making money. For him, it's about transforming inefficient buildings into assets that serve a greater purpose.

His vision for sustainable, technology-enabled logistics infrastructure has attracted partnerships with leading institutional investors from Korea and the Middle East, demonstrating the global appeal of Apeiron's differentiated investment approach.

One of the interesting features of Apeiron is its lean approach to business. While many firms in the real estate investment space operate with large teams and complex structures, Apeiron keeps things simple and efficient. With just 5 people in its team, the firm can make quick strategy decisions and stay nimble in an industry that’s often slow to change.

Through Apeiron, Vojkan is demonstrating that real estate doesn’t just have to be about buildings and profits—it can be about purpose, too.

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Additional Resources:

🔹 Apeiron Capital Limited Website: https://www.apeiron.com/

🔹 Vojkan Brankovic LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brankovic/

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Books mentioned:

🔹 “The Culture Map,” Erin Meyer: https://amzn.to/4lDLhI6

🔹 “The Edge: How competition for resources is pushing the world, and its climate, to the brink – and what we can do about it,” Jonathan Maxwell: https://amzn.to/3TrJ86r

The Culture Map: Breaking Through the Invisible Boundaries of Global Business

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In May, I spoke with four leaders who are reshaping what finance can do – and who it can serve.

In this compilation episode, I’ve pulled together the most powerful ideas, turning points, and takeaways from those conversations. If something resonates, you can dive deeper – the links to each full episode are below.

Here's the list of featured guests:

Nasir Qadree, Founder and Managing Partner of Zeal Capital Partners

Nasir launched Zeal in early 2020 – right as the pandemic began. For many, it seemed like the worst possible timing. For him, it was exactly the right moment.

He saw a market that wasn’t working for most entrepreneurs – and a venture ecosystem that kept recycling capital into the same places, the same profiles, and the same narrow definitions of potential.

Zeal’s model is built around what Nasir calls “inclusive investing” – a five-part framework designed to widen the lens on where and how capital gets deployed.

Full episode

Hadewych Kuiper, Managing Director at Triodos Investment Management

Hadewych joined Triodos right as the 2008 financial crisis hit. While other banks were collapsing under the weight of financial engineering, Triodos kept growing – because they weren’t in the business of making money with money. Their investments were grounded in the real economy, and that made all the difference.

Today, Hadewych leads the firm’s €6 billion portfolio across what they call five transition themes: food, resources, energy, society, and well-being.

Her mission is bigger than impact investing. It’s about transforming the financial sector itself.

Full episode

Romina Reversi, Managing Director and Head of Sustainable Investment Banking Americas at Crédit Agricole CIB

Romina started her career in equity derivatives at J.P. Morgan – a role she calls foundational for everything that came next. But in 2015, she pivoted into a niche team focused on green bonds. She was one of the earliest hires in J.P. Morgan’s ESG debt capital markets group, helping to shape the playbook as they went.

Now at Crédit Agricole, she leads sustainable investment banking for the Americas – overseeing ESG advisory, green and sustainability-linked financing, and supply chain solutions.

Her team helped launch the first U.S. corporate green bond tied to nuclear energy, and structured the world’s first sovereign bond with a step-up/step-down coupon tied to emissions and biodiversity targets.

Full episode

Michele Giddens, Co-Founder and CEO of Bridges Fund Management

Michele was asked to advise the UK Treasury’s Social Investment Task Force, chaired by Sir Ronald Cohen. That experience led directly to the founding of Bridges, with a white sheet of paper and £10 million in catalytic government funding. The idea: to show that financial returns and social impact didn’t have to be at odds.

Today, Bridges has over £2 billion in assets under management across private equity, real estate, and outcomes contracts. Every investment aligns with one of two goals: building a more inclusive economy or a more sustainable planet. Their theory of change is simple – use financial capital to tackle systemic challenges, and value creation will follow.

Full episode

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Today’s guest is Mark Hays, Director of Sustainable & Impact Investing at Glenmede — a firm managing $48 billion with a client-to-employee ratio that keeps conversations personal and strategy focused.

Mark’s journey into finance started early — running a lemonade stand to save up for a Sega Genesis and learning about markets through a third-grade stock project that didn’t go as planned. That early curiosity eventually led to a career spanning Cambridge Associates, OMERS, Flat World, and J.P. Morgan — where he became the firm’s first U.S. sustainable investing hire.

Now at Glenmede, Mark helps clients align their portfolios with their principles — not just in theory, but through tangible investments.

Glenmede offers investment management, wealth planning, fiduciary, and advisory services to high-net-worth individuals, families, endowments, foundations, and institutional clients.

It has $48 billion in assets under management, but keeps a 4-to-1 client-to-employee ratio and promises, in Mark’s words, “the experience of a $200 million family as a $10 million individual.” That approach means every client gets tailored advice, deeper conversations, and impact reporting that goes far beyond ESG scores.

Nearly 20 percent of AUM sits in strategies that fit Glenmede’s four-category investment taxonomy (Integrated, Mandated, Thematic, High-Impact Concessionary) and span almost every asset class.

Mark’s through-line is what he calls “sustainable prosperity” — the belief that helping those with the least doesn’t take away from others, but actually creates more opportunity and value for everyone.

At Glenmede, that vision shows up not only in where the money goes but in how clients are engaged. Mark and his team don’t just plug people into products — they guide multi-generational families through deep, often difficult conversations about values, legacy, and measurable impact.

That means starting with inquiry, moving through education, assessment, and implementation, and ending with real measurement — not in vague ESG scores, but in tangible results like gallons of water saved, emissions avoided, or communities reached.

Mark knows that impact is a moving target, but he also knows how to hit it: by staying curious, staying human, and staying honest about what money can and cannot do.

Tune in to hear how he turns that approach into measurable impact.

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Additional Resources:
🔹 Mark Hays LinkedIn
🔹 E-mail: mark.hays@glenmede.com
🔹 Glenmede Website

🔹 2025 Market Outlook
🔹 As You Sow Website
🔹 See if your investments are sustainable with this free tool.

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SRI360 interviews mentioned:

🔹Andrew Behar: Ep 27

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Books mentioned:
🔹 “Speed & Scale: An Action Plan for Solving Our Climate Crisis Now,” John Doerr
🔹 “The Key Man: The True Story of How the Global Elite Was Duped by a Capitalist Fairy Tale,” Simon Clark

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My guest today is Sugandhi Matta, Chief Impact Officer at ABC Impact – the largest Pan-Asian impact-dedicated private equity fund, with nearly $900 million in AUM.

Sugandhi began her career focused on growth and returns — first at Temasek, and later at Actis. But after a breast cancer diagnosis in her early thirties, she returned to work with a new question: What if she could apply her investing skills to businesses solving real problems?

That question led her to LeapFrog Investments — and eventually to ABC Impact, where she became one of the founding partners. From the ground up, she helped build a fund that integrates impact into every step of the investment process, from deal screening to reporting.

Today, ABC Impact invests across four themes:

Climate and water solutions
Financial and digital inclusion
Better health and education
Sustainable food and agriculture

Sugandhi leads the firm’s impact team. They developed a proprietary system rooted in the five dimensions of the Impact Management Project and tailored to ABC’s sectors.

The internal language centers on three Cs: consistency, comparability, and communicability. It’s a disciplined approach – built to align intention, data, and outcomes across the portfolio.

Sugandhi's goal is to hold impact to the same standard as IRR.

However, she points out that the burden of proof is often uneven. Expected returns are taken at face value. Impact is asked to justify itself at every turn. Because investors don’t yet trust its metrics the way they trust financial ones.

The double standard isn’t just about data. It’s about gender, too.

As one of the few female investment leads in Asia’s private equity ecosystem, Sugandhi has had to thread her way through what she calls the “quiet skepticism” – the unspoken assumptions around risk appetite, ambition, or expertise.

Even now, she’s often the only woman in the room with GPs or LPs. She doesn’t lead with gender, but she’s aware of how it plays out. The skepticism is often unspoken, but present.

Over time, she’s learned not to internalize it. Instead, she focuses on the work, knowing that – fairly or not – being a woman in this space can mean having to prove yourself just a little more.

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Additional Resources:

ABC Impact website

ABC Impact LinkedIn

Sugandhi Matta LinkedIn

ABC’s 2020 Impact Report

ABC’s 2024 Impact Report

Insights from Dalberg and ABC Impact’s User-Centered Study

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SRI360 interviews mentioned:

💎 Stewart Langdon: Ep 17

💎 Eliza Foo: Ep 71

💎 Sharon Vosmek: Ep 07

💎 Tara Bishop: Ep 70

💎 4 Women-Led Funds: 4-in-1 Ep 86

💎 Sir Ronald Cohen: Ep 73

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My guest today is Michelle Arevalo-Carpenter, Co-Founder of IMPAQTO and General Partner at IMPAQTO Capital. Michelle is a human rights lawyer by training, a fund builder by calling, and one of the most compelling system-reimaginers I’ve ever had on the show.

Michelle’s journey has taken her from a small apartment in Quito to the halls of Oxford and the UN — and back again. What she learned along the way is that real change doesn’t come from reports or elite institutions. It comes from being close to the problem — and the people.

Back in Quito, Michelle started where many great entrepreneurial stories begin — with no office, no plan, just an instinct that something better could exist. Over a hundred coffees with local founders, she kept hearing the same themes: isolation, lack of support, funding that didn’t fit.

In response, she created IMPAQTO, Ecuador’s first coworking space for social ventures, not because she had a real estate vision, but because people needed a place to belong. “They weren’t paying for square meters,” she said. “They were paying to not be alone.”

From there, IMPAQTO grew — into an accelerator, a research platform, a voice in policy. But the biggest problem persisted: no capital. Or rather, the wrong kind of capital.

Local businesses needed $10K–$500K. They didn’t want to sell equity. They wanted to grow on their own terms. Too big for microfinance, too small for venture. “That’s the missing middle,” Michelle said. “That’s where we live.”

So in 2021, she launched IMPAQTO Capital, a revenue-based investment fund designed not to chase unicorns but to nourish sustainable growth. Michelle described it not as alternative capital, but as capital that’s appropriate for the context they’re operating in.

Rather than chasing foreign LPs, her team went local. They raised over half their first close from Ecuadorian and Andean-region families — people with lived experience inside the very systems the fund aims to change. “Our investors aren’t impact tourists,” she said. “They’re system insiders.”

What Michelle is building isn’t just a capital vehicle. It’s an ecosystem intervention — a cultural shift that treats belonging as a precondition for growth, and care as critical infrastructure. She’s also a co-founder of CLIIQ, a regional research and advocacy platform focused on unlocking catalytic capital for women-led businesses.

At IMPAQTO Capital, every deal is evaluated not just on returns, but on whether it preserves the dignity and agency of the founder. Every exit includes a “cap party” — a ritual of closure and celebration that says: You did it. You paid us back. We’re done. And we’re proud.

There’s a lot to learn from Michelle. About capital. About leading with trust and care. About staying rooted in a place and still seeing the whole system.

But mostly, about how change happens — not from the top down, but from the inside out. Slowly. With proximity. And with people who never forgot where they started.

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About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

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Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
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Additional Resources:

IMPAQTO Capital website

IMPAQTO Ecosystem Builder

Michelle Arevalo-Carpenter website

Michelle Arevalo-Carpenter LinkedIn

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This spring, I had the chance to talk with four incredible guests, each with a different take on what it really means to put money to work and invest in line with your values.

Across late March and April, we explored climate-smart timber, social finance powered by dormant bank accounts, fully impact-focused wealth advising, and how catalytic capital is reaching places most firms won’t go.

Here are the featured guests, along with links to their full interviews.

Yasemin Saltuk Lamy, Head of Investment Strategy at Legal & General (L&G)

Yasemin’s path into impact investing started at J.P. Morgan, where she helped build the firm’s Social Finance unit from scratch. At the time, even defining the term “impact investing” took months of debate. “We spent four months just on the word ‘intent,’” she told me.

That focus on intent stuck with her – from J.P. Morgan to Omidyar to BII – where she helped lead the Catalyst Portfolio, growing it from $300 million to $1.6 billion. Her work was all about finding places where capital didn’t naturally flow, and designing structures that would pull others in.

Full episode

Stephanie Cohn Rupp, Former CEO of Veris Wealth Partners

Veris Wealth Partners is one of the only wealth management firms out there that’s 100% impact. No ESG sideline, no separate division. The whole firm is built around aligning portfolios with values.

Another thing that stood out in my conversation with Stephanie was how methodical their process is. It starts with what they call “impact discovery” – getting into the client’s mission, history, beliefs – and then building an investment policy around that.

Full episode

Stephen Muers, Chief Executive Officer of Better Society Capital (BSC)

Stephen brings a systems lens to social finance, and that comes from experience. After years inside the UK government tackling big issues like energy policy, housing, and justice reform, he saw firsthand how strategy alone doesn’t shift systems.

At BSC, the mission isn’t just to make good investments. It’s to make social investment possible at scale.

But BSC isn’t trying to maximize its own portfolio. The goal is to grow the entire social investment market. Over the past decade, they’ve helped expand it twelve-fold across the UK. And yet, it still isn’t enough. The capital’s growing – but not at the pace the problems demand.

Full episode

Bettina von Hagen, Managing Director & CEO, EFM Investments & Advisory

At EFM, forests are managed as long-term, living assets. It’s not just about timber – it’s about carbon, conservation, and communities, all managed through a single strategy. The question isn’t “how much can we harvest,” but “what’s the best outcome for this acre?”

EFM’s approach is built on the five Rs: rotation, retention, reserves, restoration, and relationships. It’s how they manage over 200,000 acres with just 11 staff and 90 contractors – by treating each forest like a custom portfolio.

Sometimes that means harvesting. Sometimes it means carbon storage or tribal access. The goal is a forest that’s more valuable ecologically, socially, and financially than it was before.

Full episode

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My guest today is Eric Rice – back for his second appearance on the podcast.

When we first spoke, he was running one of the only public equity funds in the impact space available to retail investors. Now, that fund has been shut down, the capital returned, and Eric has moved to private equity – specifically, to SEAF, an investor in emerging market SMEs.

This time, we talked about what happened, why it happened, and what it says about the current state of impact.

Eric’s core thesis hasn’t changed. The theory of change he developed at Wellington and BlackRock was simple: invest in companies doing socially useful work – even if they don’t realize it yet – and help them grow into that identity.

This was never ESG, and Eric is clear on the difference. ESG, he says, is about how a company operates. Impact is about what it does. “We weren’t ESG investors by any means. We were thematic investors – we only invested in companies solving social or environmental problems.”

That distinction got lost. Once the political backlash against ESG took hold, especially in the U.S., nuance didn’t matter.

Texas and a group of red states targeted a handful of BlackRock funds they deemed “too woke” to qualify for state investment. Among the six funds flagged, three were ones Eric had led. The result was that legitimate impact strategies became collateral damage in a culture war that had little to do with what those funds were actually doing.

As Eric puts it, they were “a different animal from the beginning”, but their message got hijacked.

After that, the pivot to private markets wasn’t just strategic – it was necessary.

At SEAF (Small Enterprise Assistance Funds), Eric is focused on small enterprises in emerging Europe, particularly in agriculture and food. Why? Because productivity in that sector is 40% of Western Europe’s – and no one has modernized it.

Eric and I talked about the limits of measurement frameworks, the role of trust in evaluating managers, and why so many funds labeled “impact” aren’t actually doing anything different.

This conversation is about what happens when a theory of change collides with political reality. It’s about staying true to the work in an industry that often prioritizes marketing. And it’s about the shift from public markets to private ones – not because it’s easier, but because it offers more clarity, more control, and maybe even more impact.

Listen to the full story.

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Additional Resources:

🔹 SEAF website

🔹 SEAF LinkedIn

🔹 Eric Rice LinkedIn

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Previous SRI360 interviews mentioned:

💎 Eric Rice: Ep 09

💎 Maya Chorengel: Ep 50

💎 Rochus Mommartz: Ep 57 & Ep 58

💎 Sir Ronald Cohen: Ep 73

💎 Hadewych Kuiper: Ep 83

💎 Michele Giddens: Ep 85

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This 4-in-1 compilation episode is about capital that doesn’t flow on its own. It has to be pushed into places with no pitch decks and no polished management teams. The places where spreadsheets say “too risky,” but the need is obvious to anyone paying attention.

This is capital for the common good, yes – but it’s also capital that works. These aren’t grants. These are investments with measurable returns and track records to prove it.

In this episode, we revisit conversations with four guests who've built the policies and portfolios to make this kind of capital move.

Jenn Pryce, President and CEO of Calvert Impact Capital

Jenn describes Calvert Impact Capital as a bridge between retail capital and the places banks won’t go – solar in Sub-Saharan Africa, affordable housing in the U.S., even sovereign bonds too small for Wall Street to care about. With over $2.5 billion raised, their flagship Community Investment Note is accessible for as little as $20.

For Jenn, community investing isn’t about beating the market – it’s about redefining it. “We’ve learned the risk isn’t where people think it is,” she says. By working through local intermediaries and building data-driven track records, Calvert helps prove what’s possible.

Full episode

Ben Rick, Co-Founder of Social and Sustainable Capital (SASC)

Ben left the City not because he couldn’t succeed there – but because he did. After years at Goldman, UBS, and Lehman, the returns stopped justifying the worldview. “Surely there’s something I can do that’s better than this,” he told himself.

That became Social and Sustainable Capital, a private credit fund lending to UK charities – no shareholders, no profit motive, but plenty of contracts to deliver critical services.

SASC backs groups supporting domestic abuse survivors, people with disabilities, and youth exiting care – organizations with steady revenue but little access to traditional finance.

Full episode

Stephen Muers, Chief Executive Officer of Better Society Capital (BSC)

Stephen Muers came to Better Society Capital after a high-level government career – and brought with him a systems brain. At BSC, the mission isn’t just to make good investments. It’s to make social investment possible at scale.

BSC operates at the wholesale level, backing funds that then invest in frontline charities, social enterprises, and mission-driven lenders.

BSC is also focused on market transformation. In 10 years, they’ve helped grow the UK social investment market 12-fold. And yet, it still isn’t enough.

Full episode

Stewart Langdon, Partner and Co-Head of South Asian Investments at LeapFrog Investments

Stewart joined LeapFrog early, back when the firm was still raising its first fund. He came in to help move serious capital into places most investors overlook – India, Sub-Saharan Africa, Southeast Asia – and do it in a way that actually reaches people.

LeapFrog started with insurance. Not because it was easy, but because it mattered. Health shocks, accidents, lost assets – these were the things pulling families back into poverty. Then came credit. Then healthcare. Same model each time: back companies already trusted in their communities, and help them grow.

Full episode

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Sign up for the free weekly email update
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This 4-in-1 compilation episode focuses on a persistent disconnect between capital and capability: women are founding businesses at record rates and leading high-performing funds, yet the capital rarely follows.

In other words, women are underrepresented both in receiving and managing capital.

Today’s episode is about those pushing back against that trend – women-led investment managers and those intentionally channeling capital into women-led businesses.

Here are the featured guests:

Sharon Vosmek, CEO of Astia & Managing Partner of the Astia Fund

Sharon Vosmek doesn’t see gender equity in venture as a social goal – she sees it as a market inefficiency. With just 2–3% of VC funding going to women CEOs, she argues the system consistently overlooks high-potential founders.

At Astia, she’s investing in women-led startups with strong early traction, particularly in underserved sectors like women’s health. She also challenges the informal, male-dominated networks – boardrooms, golf courses – where most deals are still made.

Full episode

Dr. Tara Bishop, Founder and Managing Director of Black Opal Ventures

Tara co-founded Black Opal Ventures to invest where healthcare and technology collide – and where traditional VC often misses.

She and her partner, Eileen Tanghal, raised $63 million from institutional investors like Eli Lilly and JP Morgan, becoming one of the rare female- and minority-led funds in venture. Their portfolio reflects that identity: women-led companies, underserved markets, and problems overlooked by legacy capital.

Full episode

Tammy Newmark, CEO and Managing Partner of EcoEnterprises Fund

Tammy leads EcoEnterprises Fund, a women-run investment firm focused on nature-positive businesses across Latin America. For over two decades, she’s backed companies in sustainable agriculture, ecotourism, and agroforestry – many led by women and rooted in rural or Indigenous communities.

Gender equity isn’t the fund's focus, but it runs through the portfolio: in leadership teams, supply chains, and daily operations. About half of their investments meet 2X Challenge criteria – not because it’s the mandate, but because that’s who’s doing the work.

With $150 million under management, the fund combines financial discipline with long-term environmental and social goals.

Full episode

Stephanie Cohn Rupp, CEO of Veris Wealth Partners

Stephanie runs Veris Wealth Partners, one of the few wealth management firms built from the ground up to do just one thing: impact. With $2.3 billion under management and offices across the U.S., Veris has been majority women-led and women-owned since its founding in 2007.

It’s built entirely around impact – certified B Corp, net zero, and intentionally conflict-free – and applies that lens across every asset class, with a deep focus on racial equity, climate, gender, and community wealth.

For Stephanie, this isn’t about doing impact. It’s about being built for it.

Full episode

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The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

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Connect with SRI360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update.
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My guest today is Michele Giddens, Co-Founder and CEO of Bridges Fund Management — one of the early architects of impact investing, before the term was even coined.

Bridges now has over £2 billion in AUM invested in private equity and property, but back in 2002, it began with little more than a blank sheet of paper and a conviction that capital could — and should — be used to address some of society’s biggest challenges.

Michele and her co-founders, Sir Ronald Cohen and Philip Newborough, believed social and environmental impact didn’t have to come at the expense of returns. That belief has held firm for over two decades — and continues to shape how Bridges invests today.

After graduating with a PPE degree from Oxford, she skipped the corporate path and headed to Mexico City to teach English — the start of what became 15 years living and working abroad. From Hungary to Poland, Bangladesh to Mongolia, she followed the same instinct: a need to be close to where impact actually happens.

That drive brought her back to the UK in 2000 to advise the Treasury’s Social Investment Task Force, chaired by Sir Ronald Cohen. One of its key recommendations was to launch funds focused on underserved parts of the UK. Michele helped shape that idea — and stayed to build the first one.

Their first fund was £40 million, including £10 million in catalytic capital from the UK government, structured to take more risk and go in first. “One of the very best uses of taxpayer money,” she says — because it helped unlock over £2 billion in private sector investment since.

Today, Bridges operates across two verticals: building a more sustainable planet and a more inclusive economy. In property, that means co-living spaces, healthcare, and age-friendly housing. In private equity, it includes companies like AgilityEco, which helped 200,000 households reduce energy bills, and Talking Talent, which helps underrepresented employees rise through leadership.

Michele is clear-eyed about what impact can and can’t do. Some challenges need capital that’s more patient, more risk-bearing, or even concessionary. That’s why Bridges has built nonprofit arms to reach the edges of what the market can’t serve.

But she’s equally convinced — and backed by two decades of results — that plenty of investments deliver both meaning and double-digit returns, if you design for it.

That’s been the aim from the start — not to trade one off against the other, but to hold both to a high standard. Twenty years on, that idea hasn’t softened.

What Michele and her team have built isn’t just a firm. It’s a bridge. And over twenty years in, it still holds.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

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Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
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Additional Resources:

Michele Giddens LinkedIn

Bridges Fund Management:
- Website

LinkedIn
X (Twitter)
YouTube

The Bridges Spectrum of Capital - download here

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My guest is Romina Reversi, Managing Director and Head of Sustainable Investment Banking Americas at Crédit Agricole CIB — one of the banks that helped write the very rules of the green bond market, and has stayed near the center of gravity ever since.

Romina’s path into banking didn’t start with a mission to change the world. It started with a love of math — and a drive for precision — that took her from the University of Michigan straight onto JP Morgan’s derivatives desk.

She worked in equity structuring and sales, building a technical foundation and a strong client ethic. As she puts it, “All bankers know the product. But how do you actually serve your clients? That’s the real work.”

The pivot came in 2015. Romina took what she describes as a ‘leap of faith.’

She moved from derivatives into a new and mostly uncharted part of the bank: ESG debt capital markets. Back then, most CFOs and treasurers hadn’t heard of green bonds. Frameworks barely existed. She and a few others were flying around the world with a handful of PowerPoint slides, trying to explain what this market even was.

In her own words, “There was no playbook. We were literally inventing how to pitch.”

That blank page became her blueprint. Over the next several years, she helped structure more than 500 sustainable debt transactions — including Apple’s first green bond and Uruguay’s step-up, step-down sustainability-linked bond, the first of its kind in the world.

Romina joined Crédit Agricole in 2021. It’s a bank with deep roots in agriculture and a reputation as one of the earliest movers in green and sustainable finance. And today, she’s building out their Americas operation with the same mix of ambition, nuance, and rigor that brought her success at JP Morgan.

For Romina and her bank, sustainability is more than branding — it’s ‘truly ingrained in their DNA.’

Now leading the Americas team, Romina operates across the entire investment banking suite — bonds, loans, M&A, IPOs, ESG advisory, and beyond.

Her mandate isn’t just to sell green products. It’s to embed sustainable thinking across structures. To know when a KPI isn’t credible. To tell a client when the deal they want to do isn’t in their best interest.

Romina is thoughtful about risk. Transparent about pushback. And unafraid to challenge linear definitions of impact. For her, transparency itself — giving investors a clear view into where their capital is going — is a form of additionally.

In a market still grappling with backlash, confusion, and greenwashing fatigue, Romina is defining what credible, innovative, and client-aligned sustainable finance can look like.

In this conversation, we talked about using AI for biodiversity tracking, about injecting sustainability into private credit, about financing for nuclear and hydrogen and sustainable aviation fuel, and much, much more…

Tune in and find out what it means to be a sustainable banker for the next decade — not just a dealmaker, but a translator, a teacher, and a strategist.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

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Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
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Additional Resources:

Romina Reversi LinkedIn
CA CIB Twitter
CA CIB Website

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My guest today is Hadewych Kuiper, Managing Director at Triodos Investment Management — a pure-play impact investing firm since day one, with a 30-year track record of turning capital into systemic change.

However, Hadewych didn’t arrive in finance with a grand plan to change the system. Her journey began in a small town in the north of the Netherlands, where she was raised in a Protestant household that blended structure with a quiet rebellion against rigidity.

Her childhood was grounded, shaped by time in nature, and marked by her parents’ early divorce — a rupture that taught her independence before most children even understand the concept. From an early age, she absorbed values that now form the spine of her leadership: directness, responsibility, and a refusal to look away when something doesn’t make sense.

Hadewych studied business administration at Erasmus University, and she didn’t set out to change the finance world. But after a decade in corporate consulting, a simple question kept surfacing: what’s the point? That question — and her drive for clarity, integrity, and purpose — eventually led her to Triodos just as the 2008 financial crisis hit.

While big banks crumbled under complex products, Triodos stood firm, having never invested in what they didn’t understand. That same principle guides them today: if it’s not clear, it’s not worth the risk.

Today, Hadewych leads Triodos Investment Management, a €6 billion AUM firm built on that same philosophical foundation — but with a far broader mandate. The firm invests across five key transitions: energy, food, resources, societal systems, and well-being.

These aren’t just ESG and Impact categories — they’re deeply connected areas that drive real, systemic change.

Triodos made its first wind energy loan in 1986, right after Chernobyl. It began investing in financial inclusion in 1994, before microfinance was a formal asset class. Today, it’s working with UNICEF to pioneer child-lens investing — developing a framework to assess companies based on their impact on future generations.

Its portfolio includes solar-powered irrigation in Africa, seaweed protein startups in Europe, and financial institutions in Latin America that have grown from NGOs into regulated banks.

At Triodos, every investment must show not just expected returns, but why it matters. Whether it’s private equity, debt, or listed markets, the approach stays consistent: clear minimum standards, concentrated portfolios, and strong alignment between values and outcomes.

And yes, it walks away when deals don’t align, even if the financial return looks good. Especially then. Because “all money has impact — every euro, dollar, or pound. The question is whether it’s positive or negative, and whether you’re conscious of it.”

Few firms can claim a 30-year track record of pure-play impact investing. Even fewer have helped define the field and publish their standards for others to use. Triodos has done all of that — and more.

They’re on a mission to make impact investing the new normal. It’s an ambitious goal — and this episode shows what it takes to get there.

Tune in to find out!

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Additional Resources:

Triodos Website

Triodos LinkedIn

Hadewych Kuiper LinkedIn

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Today's guest is Nasir Qadree, Founder and Managing Partner of Zeal Capital Partners – a venture platform based in Washington, D.C., that’s reimagining how capital flows by focusing on inclusion, economic mobility, and systems change.

Nasir was raised in Atlanta between two very different worlds – one shaped by his hardworking mother and the other by his father’s presence among Atlanta’s elite. He grew up acutely aware of who gets access to opportunity and who doesn’t. That contrast became his driving force.

After earning his degree from Hampton University, Nasir entered the finance world during the 2008 crisis, working at Goldman Sachs and later State Street. But the turning point came when he co-owned a small café that became an informal hub for EdTech founders. He realized he wanted more than just returns – he wanted to drive change.

A fellowship with Education Pioneers led to a data role in Connecticut’s Department of Education, then to Village Capital, where he led global edtech investments. At AT&T, he managed a $400 million impact portfolio.

By 2020, he was ready to build something of his own.

He launched Zeal right in the middle of the pandemic, driven by a clear but radical idea: the way we allocate capital is broken. Too much money ends up in too few places — and in the hands of too few people.

Zeal’s answer is inclusive investing: a five-pronged framework that reimagines how, where, and who we invest in — starting with building diverse fund teams, backing overlooked founders, expanding beyond traditional VC hubs, focusing on sectors that drive economic mobility, and measuring real-world impact.

It focuses on three key areas for driving systems change: fintech, health equity, and the future of learning and work. But this isn’t about feel-good metrics. Zeal targets 3–4x net gross returns and outperformance.

Nasir believes — and the data supports — that diverse teams outperform because they see more. They solve bigger problems. And they go where others don’t. Zeal now has $186 million in AUM, with a growing reputation as one of the boldest emerging managers in the country.

And for Nasir, this is personal. When he sits across from a founder who's been overlooked, he sees himself — someone who’s been on both sides of the tracks and deserves to belong in every room.

And that belief isn’t just his mantra. It’s Zeal’s entire investment thesis.

Tune in to hear how Nasir is rewriting the rules of venture capital — and why inclusion isn’t charity. It’s a profitable strategy.

—

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Additional Resources:

Nasir C. Qadree:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Zeal Capital Partners:
Website
LinkedIn
Instagram
X (Twitter)
Kauffman Foundation’s white paper: ‘Access to capital for Entrepreneurs: Removing Barriers’
‘Race Influences Professional Investors’ Financial Judgments’

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In this episode, I’m talking with Bettina von Hagen, Managing Director & CEO of EFM Investments & Advisory. Since founding Ecotrust Forest Management 20 years ago, she’s been redefining forestry investment – consistently beating traditional market-rate returns while protecting ecosystems, communities, and future generations.

Bettina grew up in politically turbulent Lima, Peru, with a scholar father, an artist-entrepreneur mother, and a childhood shaped by earthquakes, curfews, and curiosity. Her love of systems thinking began with a trip to the Galápagos Islands at age 14 and eventually led her to study evolutionary biology before pivoting to business.

After earning her MBA at the University of Chicago, Bettina entered the world of commercial banking in the Pacific Northwest – right in the middle of the timber wars. But instead of picking a side, she asked a different question: How do we meet essential needs – like timber – without compromising ecosystems or future generations?

That question led her to Ecotrust, a nonprofit focused on conservation-based development. There, she helped launch Craft3, a triple-bottom-line lender, and Beneficial State Bank. But the real spark came in 2004, when she co-founded EFM within Ecotrust to pioneer sustainable forest investing.

By 2008, she bought a stake in the company and stepped in as CEO.

EFM now manages 200,000 acres and nearly $500M in assets, with a staff of just 11 people and a vast network of contractors. Their model isn’t just about timber. It’s about carbon credits, conservation easements, water protection, salmon runs, tribal partnerships, and restoring degraded ecosystems.

Bettina’s forestry strategy is built on what she calls the Five R’s:

Rotation: Letting trees grow longer for higher-value wood.
Retention: Leaving 10–30% of trees to support soil, seedbanks, and habitat.
Reserves: Protecting special ecological areas, like salmon-bearing streams.
Restoration: Rebuilding habitat, especially in fire-prone and aquatic systems.
Relationships: Partnering with tribes, local communities, and land trusts.

EFM’s forests generate revenue through multiple streams. When timber prices dip, they don’t rush to harvest – instead, they “store value on the stump.” Trees continue to grow, becoming more valuable over time. Carbon markets make this kind of patience financially viable.

By deferring cuts, selling carbon offsets, or securing conservation easements, EFM creates liquidity without compromising ecological integrity.

The results speak for themselves. Every fund exit has outperformed the NCREIF Timberland benchmark, and every acre under EFM’s care becomes more ecologically and socially valuable over time.

Forests don’t have to be sacrificed for growth. In Bettina’s hands, they are growth.

Tune in to hear how she’s building a forestry model that works – for investors, ecosystems, and future generations.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

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Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
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Additional Resources:

Bettina LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bettina-von-hagen/
EFM LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/efminvest/
EFM Website: https://efmi.com/

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Today's guest is Stephen Muers, CEO of Better Society Capital – the UK’s leading social impact-led investor. His path to impact started long before his career, shaped by his upbringing in a Quaker family rooted in values of equality, social conscience, and integrity.

Before stepping into the world of impact investing, Stephen spent years in the UK government working on complex policy challenges like prison reform, energy, and child poverty. But no matter how solid the strategies, he saw firsthand how culture often stood in the way of real progress.

That realization led him to seek change from a different angle – at Better Society Capital — the UK’s leading social impact investor, formerly known as Big Society Capital.

Founded with £400 million from dormant UK bank accounts (yes, really) and £200 million from the four main UK high street banks, BSC was built on an ambitious mission: not to grow its own assets, but to grow the entire UK social impact investment market.

Since 2011, that’s exactly what they’ve done — helping expand the market twelve-fold to over £10 billion. This capital now fuels social purpose organisations tackling everything from homelessness and domestic abuse to mental health and fuel poverty.

Stephen stepped into the CEO role shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic, juggling remote leadership and homeschooling his son — because why not tackle systemic change during a global crisis?

Today, he leads BSC’s work across four strategic verticals: Social and Affordable Housing, Social Lending, Social Outcomes, and Impact Venture.

Along the way, they’re also proving a critical point: impact and returns aren’t mutually exclusive. In fact, some of BSC’s most successful investments are delivering both — solid financial performance and deep social impact. A reminder that social investing, done right, doesn’t mean sacrificing returns.

As Stephen puts it, “The trade-off between social and financial returns is not linear.” And maybe that’s the real takeaway here — the future of finance won’t be about choosing sides. It’ll be about building markets where solving problems is part of the profit model, not separate from it.

Tune in to hear how BSC is making that future a reality.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

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Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
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Additional Resources:

Stephen Muers LinkedIn
Better Society Capital LinkedIn
Better Society Capital Website
‘Culture and Values at the Heart of Policy Making: An Insider’s Guide’

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My guest today is Stephanie Cohn Rupp, Chief Executive Officer of Veris Wealth Partners — one of the first impact-only wealth management firms in the world, and one of the rare few that has been majority women-owned or led since day one.

Stephanie was born in the U.S. and raised just outside Paris by parents who did medical missions in underserved communities. She learned early on that work should serve a bigger purpose.

That belief shaped her path — from microfinance in Central Asia to leadership roles at the Omidyar Network, Toniic, and Threshold Group.

But what she really wanted was a firm fully aligned with her mission — a place where impact wasn’t just a side offering but the whole point.

That’s exactly what she found at Veris. They weren’t just any firm – Veris was one of the first impact-only wealth management firms in the world. Majority women-led, deeply mission-driven, and at the time – looking for their next CEO.

It was a perfect match!

Stephanie stepped in, and today, she leads a team managing $2.3 billion in assets, all dedicated to an ambitious goal – to create a more sustainable, equitable, and just world.

Veris focuses on four core impact themes: climate solutions, sustainable agriculture, racial and gender equity, and community wealth building. They use a holistic approach, integrating environmental, social, and governance factors across all asset classes.

Unlike most firms, Veris doesn’t just offer impact investing – it operates as an impact investment itself. They hold themselves to the same standards on diversity, equity, climate, and inclusion that they expect from the investments they make.

It’s not always easy with the current political backlash against ESG in the USA and climate denial still making headlines.

Yet despite these headwinds, Stephanie has no dilemma - impact investing is here to stay. Because climate challenges, inequality, and injustice aren’t going anywhere. And will eventually affect us all.

So tune in and let Stephanie show you that impatience for change is actually the best growth engine around.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
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Additional Resources:

Veris Website
Veris LinkedIn
Stephanie LinkedIn

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My guest today is Yasemin Saltuk Lamy, Head of Investment Strategy at Legal & General (L&G), a London-based multinational financial services and asset management company. And believe it or not, her investment journey started when she was only 18.

Back then, she had been dreaming of studying in Senegal to experience a French-speaking African economy. But then, the University of Pennsylvania’s study abroad office made her an offer she couldn’t ignore: a $12,000 scholarship to study in Scotland.

For most students, that would have been a no-brainer – they would have spent it on books, rent, or maybe a bit of travel… But Yasemin saw it as an investment opportunity.

She did the math, figured she could live on $6,000, and put the rest into high-growth equities. It was 1998, the height of the dot-com boom. Her investment skyrocketed – until the bubble burst. Long story short, it took nearly a decade just to break even.

It was a tough experience at such a young age, but a powerful one. Watching markets rise and fall, she realized she wanted to understand the bigger picture – how economies impact people’s lives.

And she had a strong background for that. Born in Istanbul, Turkey, Yasemin grew up between two worlds. After a military coup d'état, her parents moved the family to the U.S., settling in Rhode Island.

Every summer, she returned to Turkey, experiencing firsthand the stark economic contrasts between her two homes. In the U.S., she valued independence and opportunity. In Turkey, she saw the power of family networks and community-driven economies.

But it wasn’t until she moved back to Turkey as an adult that she truly felt the financial instability of inflation. She then abandoned her plan to pursue a Ph.D. in pure mathematics and instead studied financial mathematics at King’s College London.

After starting out as a high school math teacher, Yasemin moved into finance, bringing with her a strong focus on leadership and impact. At J.P. Morgan, she helped launch the Social Finance Team, and later at British International Investment, she led the Catalyst Portfolio – using catalytic capital to de-risk investments and crowd in private capital for emerging markets and climate projects.

Now at Legal & General, she’s focused on bridging institutional capital with sustainable investments.

She’s using her experience with catalytic capital to make high-impact projects – especially in climate resilience and infrastructure – less risky and more attractive to traditional investors like pension funds and insurers.

In this interview, Yasemin breaks down how catalytic capital is transforming impact investing and why pension funds have a duty to invest in the right things to protect long-term asset value.

The future of finance isn’t just about returns – it’s about reshaping the system to work for people and the planet. Tune in to hear how Yasemin is making it happen.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
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Additional Resources:

L&G website
Yasemin LinkedIn

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My guest today is Jyotsna Krishnan, the CEO and Co-Founder of EPIC World focused on empowering what she has termed "the unseen middle." Jyotsna leads initiatives to change the financial systems for entrepreneurial households in India, creating replicable models for other regions that share similar market dynamics, like Latin America.

She recognized great potential in a segment that comprises 247 million households. According to EPIC World's estimates, there is a $100 trillion opportunity over the next 20 years to serve Indian entrepreneurial households and harness their economic vibrancy.

Educated at top institutions, Jyotsna Krishnan honed her financial expertise at HSBC but felt limited in impact. To drive real change, she joined Elevar Equity to support entrepreneurial households directly.

(Sandeep Farias, founder and managing partner of Elevar Equity was my guest in one of the previous episodes. Listen in to learn more.)

Often overlooked as the "bottom of the pyramid," these households were in fact dynamic risk-takers, problem-solvers, and creators of multiple income streams during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, despite their economic potential, they lacked access to quality healthcare, education, financing, and business services, mainly because businesses didn’t figure out how to serve them effectively.

That’s when EPIC World was born.

Founded by partners from Elevar Equity and a co-founder skilled in deep tech and data, it acts as a scaling engine. It bridges the gap between businesses, investors, and entrepreneurial households by offering deep market intelligence, real-time data, and aligned capital strategies. Their goal is to help 50 companies scale up to become blue-chip firms that serve these entrepreneurial households, recognized as key drivers of India’s growth.

And the numbers showing the market's potential are staggering: Entrepreneurial households in India alone contributed $8.8 trillion in transaction volume in 2023, and this figure rose to $10 trillion in 2024, with the potential to grow tenfold over the next 20 years.

Tune in for this interview with Jyotsna to learn more about the palpable change she's making and how inclusive economic practices can genuinely uplift entire communities, creating new leaders from those who were once misunderstood, undervalued, and overlooked.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
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Additional Resources:

Jyotsna Krishnan LinkedIn
EPIC World Twitter
EPIC World Website
Book: Desperately Seeking Shah Rukh: India's Lonely Young Women And The Search For Intimacy And Independence
Episode #72 with Sandeep Farias

Desperately Seeking Shah Rukh: India's Lonely Young Women and the Search for Intimacy and Independence

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Robert Kraybill is a well-known name in the impact investment space who has created innovative financial products that channel capital into improving livelihoods across emerging markets, particularly in South and Southeast Asia.

But his journey didn’t start there.

Robert’s first big career move was at Morgan Stanley. Fresh out of Princeton, he was ready to take on the world of investment banking. But before he even made it to his orientation session, he met Durreen Shahnaz – the woman who would later become his wife and, more importantly for this story, the founder of Impact Investment Exchange (IIX) and a global leader in social impact investing.

Starting as a banker at Morgan Stanley, Robert later led investment banking for Wasserstein Perella & Co. in Singapore and then transitioned to private equity at Marathon Asset Management, focusing on the Asia-Pacific region.

Then came 2008. The financial crisis hit, and Robert saw firsthand that it "exposed the hollow promise of traditional finance’s claim to make the world better through efficient capital allocation."

He knew there had to be a better way. So, he pivoted – to impact investing.

Fast forward to today, and he’s Chief Investment Officer at IIX, a Singapore-based enterprise that helps mission-driven businesses grow and scale their positive impact. In their words, they “build pathways to connect backstreets of underserved communities to the Wall Streets of the world”.

Alongside his wife, he is transforming financial systems and developing innovative solutions that drive women’s empowerment, climate action, and community resilience. Through IIX and the IIX Foundation, their work has mobilized over $250 million in private-sector investment and positively impacted more than 100 million people worldwide.

His team pioneered the Women’s Livelihood Bond (WLB) series, a first-of-its-kind financial product that channels investment into women-focused enterprises across emerging markets.

But they didn’t stop there. After proving the success of the Women’s Livelihood Bonds, they created Orange Bonds – an investment framework designed to standardize and scale gender-lens investing, just like Green Bonds did for climate finance.

In this episode, Robert takes us through the evolution of the WLB Series and the birth of Orange Bonds.

He also explains the mechanics of blended finance – where catalytic capital de-risks investments to attract large-scale institutional funding. We also talk about IIX’s Values Impact Measurement Tool, their Risk-Return-Impact philosophy, and their ambitious goal: creating one billion sustainable livelihoods by 2030.

Join us to discover why the future of impact investing isn’t just green – it’s turning orange.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
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Additional Resources:

Robert Kraybill LinkedIn
IIX LinkedIn
IIX Website
The Defiant Optimist: Daring to Fight Global Inequality, Reinvent Finance, and Invest in Women

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Today, I'm thrilled to welcome back Jed Emerson, our first-ever repeat guest on the show.

Jed is a true impact pioneer and has spent decades thinking about and exploring how to create impact and value that is in alignment with who you are – your values, your goals, and your purpose.

Jed's impact journey began in the gritty Tenderloin district of San Francisco, California, where he founded a homeless youth center at the height of the AIDS epidemic. This experience led to his dissatisfaction with the nonprofit sector, where funding was too often hinged on politics, persuasion, and perception rather than on real performance.

He wanted to rewrite that script.

By a stroke of serendipity, Jed crossed paths with George Roberts – the “R” in the renowned global investment firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR). Roberts was searching for a way to do good with his wealth that didn’t feel empty or disconnected from his business roots.

Together, they launched an experimental private equity fund where he learned firsthand that social progress and financial savvy don't have to sit at opposite ends of the table. They can be integrated into what Jed later called “blended value.”

Fast forward to the present, and Jed is now the Chief Impact Officer at AlTi Tiedemann Global, which is a global wealth management firm, guiding next-generation family members who are questioning the purpose of their inherited wealth.

But don’t be fooled into thinking this is a victory lap story. Jed remains as restless and inquisitive as ever, living by his five-year cycles of asking (and answering) life’s biggest questions about capital, community, and our collective future.

And if you need any proof that Jed is never short on surprises, his book, ‘The Purpose of Capital’ inspired a music video. Yes, you read that right: a music video about impact investing.

Jed discusses impact investing’s key challenge: ensuring tangible outcomes aren't lost to good intentions and slick marketing. He explains why every investment carries an undeniable social and environmental footprint.

If you're ready to rethink the purpose of wealth and capital, join us to hear Jed's mix of pragmatic investing and ethical commitment to improving our world.

His story will remind you that success isn’t just about returns. It’s about finding new questions worth asking time after time.

—
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—

Additional Resources:

AlTi website
AlTi LinkedIn

Connect with Jed:

Website
LinkedIn
BlueSky

Jed's books:

Impact Investing: Transforming How We Make Money While Making a Difference
The Purpose of Capital: Elements of Impact, Financial Flows, and Natural Being
'What If' music video
Toniic Institute
GIIN (Global Impact Investing Network)

Check out Jed Emerson's first appearance on the SRI360 podcast:

Listen here
Watch on YouTube

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Today, I'm talking with Cornelia Gomez, Global Head of Sustainability at General Atlantic. Cornelia is a leader who has uniquely merged corporate social responsibility with real-world business practices.

Born and raised in Paris, Cornelia's culturally vibrant yet traditional family shaped her strong sense of justice and commitment to ethical business practices.

Starting her corporate journey at Group Casino, in Hong Kong, Cornelia took the lead on improving supply chain sustainability across Asia. Her work involved conducting audits, implementing system changes, and ensuring compliance with labor and environmental standards. She pushed for stronger accountability and higher sustainability benchmarks, driving meaningful change in an industry resistant to transformation.

Now at General Atlantic, Cornelia oversees ESG integration across the firm’s portfolio, spanning over 330 companies across 20+ countries. Under Cornelia’s leadership, sustainability has become a core pillar of the firm’s investment approach.

GA doesn’t see ESG as a checkbox exercise. Instead, they have developed a unique "value creation" framework based on three key triggers: revenue growth, cost efficiency, and risk mitigation. This approach ensures that sustainability initiatives are directly linked to financial performance, helping businesses grow while making a positive impact.

In this interview, Cornelia talks about the evolution of ESG and sustainability in private equity investing – from compliance-driven checklists to deeply integrated strategies that influence corporate governance and competitive advantage.

Tune in to learn more about GA’s pragmatic, data-driven approach to sustainability and how they integrate ESG principles to drive real-world value while ensuring long-term business growth.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

—

Key Takeaways:

Intro (00:00)
Cornelia’s background and education (03:27)
Transition to business and sustainability (15:15)
Role at Group Casino and early challenges (17:21)
Move to France and role at PAI Partners (34:36)
Joining General Atlantic (38:32)
General Atlantic's theory of change (48:26)
ESG integration in the investment life cycle (50:43)
Three key value creation triggers (01:03:47)
Using data collection and analysis to drive decision-making (01:13:32)
Sustainability challenges and opportunities (01:25:28)
Rapid fire questions (01:31:46)
Contact info (01:35:17)

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Additional Resources:

General Atlantic Website
General Atlantic LinkedIn
Cornelia Gomez LinkedIn

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My guest today is Sir Ronald Cohen, often referred to as "the father of British venture capital" and "the father of impact investing."

As Co-founder and President of GSG Impact, Sir Ronald is leading a revolution to transform how the financial world measures and reports a company's value by including its net impact on people and our planet.

Early in his career, he co-founded Apax Partners, one of the oldest and largest international private equity firms. His ability to anticipate market shifts – a principle which he calls “the second bounce of the ball” – was key to his success.

However, he saw his financial success was also increasing inequality, prompting him to create new tools like the Social Impact Bond, which ties investor returns to measurable social benefits.

Through his latest initiative, the International Foundation for Valuing Impact (IFVI), Sir Ronald has established rules to standardize impact valuation in financial terms, akin to how GAAP standardizes financial disclosures for US publicly traded companies.

IFVI is working to establish a global framework that quantifies social and environmental impact in monetary terms. The foundation provides open-source data, methodologies, and valuation metrics to ensure transparency and consistency in impact measurement across industries.

IFVI is already gaining traction among major financial institutions, corporations, and regulators. By integrating impact into core business and investment strategies, IFVI aims to reshape markets – ensuring that companies reducing carbon emissions, improving labor conditions, and fostering social equity are rewarded not just ethically, but financially.

This marks a fundamental shift in capitalism, one that aligns profit with purpose and empowers investors to accelerate the transition toward a more sustainable and equitable global economy.

With over $40 trillion invested in ESG and impact funds today, he believes we are on the brink of a financial revolution – one where companies are no longer valued solely by net income as we do today but by the total financial value that their operations contribute to people and our planet.

Tune in and meet the true visionary of impact investing!

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Connect with SRI360°:
PODCAST
WEBSITE
X
FACEBOOK

Sign up for the free weekly email update

—

Key Takeaways:

Intro (00:00)
Sir Ronald's background (03:48)
Discovering venture capital at Harvard (13:17)
Founding Apax Partners and shaping the European VC landscape (19:28)
Co-founding IFVI (33:16)
The potential for impact accounting to drive innovation (45:41)
The “brown-to-green” transition and the role of impact measurement (54:09)
The challenges of aligning IFVI’s methodology globally (01:04:23)
Sir Ronald's advice for impact investors (01:09:05)
Rapid Fire Questions (01:17:19)
Contact info (01:20:22)

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Additional Resources:

Connect with Sir Ronald Cohen:
🔹Website

🔹X

🔹LinkedIn

GSG Impact website

GSG Impact LinkedIn

IFVI website

Book: "Impact: Reshaping Capitalism to Drive Real Change"

Yuka App

Adam Swersky on the SRI360 Podcast

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In this episode, I speak with Sandeep Farias, Founder and Managing Partner of Elevar Equity. If I wanted to describe Sandeep in one sentence, I'd probably say he’s a nomadic child of India’s landscapes who became an impact investing titan.

His early life was shaped by his father’s multiple assignments in the State Bank of India. From spending time in the mountains of Mount Abu to the chaos of Bangalore, he found a unique perspective on adaptability and resilience.

In our conversation, Sandeep openly talks about the beginnings of his career, where he went from fixing bicycles to working in a garment factory. These early hands-on experiences, together with his academic journey in law, uniquely prepared him for a not-so-conventional path.

Sandeep graduated from the prestigious National Law School of India University in Bangalore and started a legal career with stints at top Indian law firms. His rapid ascent in the legal world led him to Nishith Desai Associates, where he led the corporate law practice – a pretty meteoric rise for someone just four years out of law school. This position smoothly transitioned him into impact investing.

During the 2008 financial crisis, Sandeep took a monumental leap, leaving behind a promising legal career to start Elevar Equity with a clear-cut mission: to drive change and profits by investing in communities often ignored by traditional finance.

Unlike many in the space, Elevar focuses not on the bottom of the pyramid but on a segment that has progressed economically yet remains underserved. This strategic pivot places Elevar in a league distinct from microfinance entities like BlueOrchard and ResponsAbility (featured in previous episodes of the podcast). Elevar is not debt-focused. Instead, it opts to provide equity to these emerging communities.

Over the past 15 years, Elevar has expanded beyond microfinance into broader financial services, education, and healthcare, scaled over 50 companies, and supported more than 50 million 'entrepreneurial households'.

Tune in to hear how Elevar’s targeted focus on underbanked yet economically progressing communities has reshaped impact investing, distinguishing its approach from both mainstream venture capital and typical microfinance institutions.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

—

Key Takeaways:

Intro (00:00)
Sandeep’s nomadic upbringing (03:25)
Career path and transition to impact investing (14:44)
Founding of Elevar Equity (26:26)
The concept of entrepreneurial households (41:25)
The Elevar Method: Investment approach and process (45:02)
The importance of field immersion for investment strategy (51:42)
Driving customer-centric impact through innovation (01:01:34)
Challenges in measuring impact (01:10:49)
Scaling the Elevar Method (01:13:45)
Rapid fire questions (01:21:27)
Contact details (01:25:15)

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Additional Resources:

Sandeep Farias LinkedIn

Elevar Equity Website

Elevar Equity LinkedIn

BlueOrchard

responsAbility

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Impact investing in emerging markets has been viewed as a high-risk proposition fraught with challenges. But my guest today sees these challenges as opportunities for innovation, identifying and investing in solutions that address critical social and environmental needs while building a resilient portfolio with competitive returns.

Eliza Foo is a leader in sustainability and impact investing at Temasek, one of the world’s most respected global investment firms, with a portfolio value of USD $288 billion. Temasek operates across public and private markets, investing from its own balance sheet, which allows for great flexibility in pursuing opportunities across asset classes, geographies, and sectors.

Eliza’s journey to becoming a leader in impact investing is inspiring and unique. From a young age, she excelled in academics, earning scholarships that took her to the Australian National University. She graduated as a valedictorian with a Bachelor of Commerce and later pursued a Master’s in Applied Finance at the University of Melbourne.

Eliza has built an extraordinary career in finance, starting with prestigious roles at Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch. She later transitioned to impact investing - a field she has helped shape over the past decade.

Eliza leads the Impact Investing team at Temasek, which plays a key role in achieving Temasek’s mission of creating lasting value for this and future generations. Under her guidance, Temasek has spearheaded innovative investments in emerging markets, working to close gaps in financial inclusion, healthcare, agriculture, and climate.

Her vision for impact investing combines financial rigor with measurable societal and environmental outcomes. You’ll hear about her team’s focus on linking impact metrics to financial KPIs to ensure growth and positive benefits are intrinsically connected.

We also touch on Temasek’s partnerships with organizations like LeapFrog Investments and ABC Impact, which enable them to amplify their reach and scalability in creating innovative solutions across the globe.

Let’s dive in!

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About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
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—

Key Takeaways:

Intro (00:00)
Eliza foo’s background and early career path (02:55)
Temasek’s sustainability strategy (25:09)
Impact investing at Temasek (38:41)
Challenges and opportunities in emerging markets (53:51)
Temasek’s strategic partnerships (58:35)
Temasek’s exit strategy (01:11:38)
Rapid fire questions (01:14:52)
Contact info (01:18:54)

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Additional Resources:

Temasek's Website
Eliza Foo's LinkedIn
Temasek's LinkedIn

View Details

When you think about healthcare innovation, the image of cutting-edge technologies, AI-driven diagnostics, and robotic breakthroughs might come to mind. But is there a way to use these innovations to address the system's biggest challenges – cost, quality, access, and sustainability?

My guest today is Dr. Tara Bishop who is the founder and managing director of Black Opal Ventures, and she is uniquely positioned to answer this question.

As a fourth-generation physician turned venture capitalist, Tara teamed up with deep-tech veteran Eileen Tanghal to create a fund focused on bridging healthcare and technology. Together, they bring decades of expertise in medicine, policy, startups, and deep tech to build a brilliant tomorrow in healthcare.

Black Opal’s mission is to uncover and support the rarest gems in healthcare innovation – companies that redefine care delivery, improve access, and make a measurable impact while delivering competitive returns.

With $63M under management and a portfolio spanning robotic IVF, wearable AI diagnostics, and next-gen obesity care platforms, Black Opal proves that you don’t have to choose between impact and profitability.

In this interview, Tara talks about inefficiencies in the healthcare system and how they inspired her to dive into healthcare innovation. She also shares her investment strategy and explains how Black Opal balances impact and profitability.

Curious to learn more about how venture capital is turning the biggest healthcare challenges into opportunities to drive meaningful change and financial returns? Tune in to hear how this unique fund is bridging technology and medical expertise to deliver smarter, more accessible, and impactful solutions.

Let’s dive in!

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

—

Key Takeaways:

Intro (00:00)
Tara Bishop's background and early career path (02:50)
Transition to venture capital (20:40)
Co-founding Black Opal Ventures with Eileen Tanghal (35:00)
Black Opal’s mission and theory of change (42:37)
Investment strategy, process, and portfolio (01:02:18)
Portfolio highlights: Conceivable Life Sciences, Empatica, Violet (01:14:03)
Challenges of integrating technology into healthcare (01:22:34)
Impact measurement (01:27:10)
How diversity drives better and faster healthcare solutions (01:32:20)
The public sector's role in advancing health tech innovation (01:42:34)
Future of health tech and AI (01:45:30)
Rapid fire questions (01:48:14)
Contact info (01:54:08)

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Additional Resources:

Tara’s LinkedIn
Black Opal Ventures Website

View Details

In this 3-in-1 compilation episode, we're revisiting the world of the circular economy. As our planet faces escalating environmental challenges, these three pioneers are lighting the way for sustainable business practices that promote ecological resilience and economic prosperity. These are the innovators whose approaches are making a real difference:

Ron Gonen, Founder and CEO of Closed Loop Partners

Ron shares how his firm is making a real impact across sectors like consumer goods, food, and technology. By tackling supply chain bottlenecks, building recycling infrastructure, and leading projects like the $150 million bottle-to-bottle recycling facility in California, Closed Loop Partners is driving meaningful change. Their efforts have diverted 2.3 million tons of waste from landfills and prevented 5.3 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions. Ron’s work shows that aligning environmental goals with strong economic outcomes isn’t just achievable – it’s the way forward.

Full episode

Lucy Mortimer, Co-Founder of Archipelago Ventures

Lucy is intensely focused on advancing technologies that address material circularity, especially aimed at reducing plastic waste. Through Archipelago Ventures, Lucy is driving strategic investments into startups that are leading the way in recycling and reducing environmental footprints. This effort is fast-tracking our transition to a circular economy, showing that it's absolutely possible to combine strong environmental improvements with solid economic returns.

Full episode

Karla Mora, Founder and Managing Partner, Alante Capital

Karla is driving transformation in the apparel industry, a massive $3 trillion market primed for innovation. Through Alante Capital, she invests in startups that lead the way in circular and low-carbon solutions. Her strategic focus is reshaping how clothing is produced and consumed, offering a blueprint for sustainable practices in other consumer industries as well. Karla's journey into this space was driven by her ambition to effect systemic change within such a significant economic sector.

Full episode

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

—

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—

Key Takeaways:

Intro (00:00)
Ron Gonen - Closed Loop Partners overview (03:43)
Investment strategy, impact measurement & reporting (11:49)
Innovation center and industry challenges (23:32)
Lucy Mortimer - introduction to Archipelago (30:26)
Circular economy and plastics recycling (44:28)
AI’s impact on waste management (55:46)
Archipelago's theory of change and investment strategy (01:03:13)
Karla Mora - introduction to Alante Capital (01:09:57)
Circular economy in the apparel space (01:17:43)
Alante's theory of change (01:24:50)
3 key dimensions of impact and investment strategy (01:28:22)
Investment structure and returns (01:42:25)

View Details

In this episode, instead of bringing you a long-form interview with a world-class investor, I thought I’d do something different. This time, I’m revisiting the book that inspired this podcast: Sustainable and Responsible Investing 360: Lessons Learned from World-Class Investors.

As we step into a new year, it’s the perfect time to reflect on the choices we make and remind ourselves how sustainable and responsible investing became significant in the first place. We’ll explore why so many investors now see it as a future-proof investment trend and why more are considering the broader impact their portfolio returns have on others.

This episode is designed to do just that, featuring three chapters from the audiobook version of Sustainable and Responsible Investing 360: Lessons Learned from World-Class Investors. It’s an opportunity to revisit the foundational "why" behind sustainable investing – not as just a trend, but as a necessary shift in how we think about finance and its role in the world.

These chapters are narrated by the talented veteran actor Graham Rowat. The book is designed to be easy to navigate – you can read it from cover to cover or jump to specific topics that interest you.

The book begins with an overview of sustainable and responsible investing – its challenges, opportunities, and importance – before transitioning to interviews with 26 professional investors who have broken new ground in responsible investment

At the start of this new year, I wanted to share these three chapters as a chance to reflect on what truly matters. My hope is that they inspire you to think differently about your financial decisions and their potential to align with a more sustainable future.

If you are interested in checking out the rest of the audiobook, which is produced and copyrighted by Ascent Audio, you can find it on Audible, Apple, Google, Spotify, or wherever you find your favorite audiobooks.

Please enjoy… and thank you for listening.

—

The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

—

Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

—

Key Takeaways:

Intro (00:00)
CHAPTER 1 - Why Sustainable & Responsible Investing? (04:06)
Enter Sustainable and Responsible Investing (08:48)
Migrating Into the Mainstream (10:12)
Sustainable & Responsible Investing Acronyms and SRI (11:49)
‘I Don’t Have to Tell You Things Are Bad’ (15:07)
COVID-19 Pulled Back the Curtain (21:33)
‘I Have Not Yet Begun to Fight’ (24:43)
‘The Times They Are a-Changin’ (32:17)
Taming the 400-Pound Gorilla in the Room (34:18)
Gaining Traction and Altitude (36:30)
Wide Road Ahead (38:19)
CHAPTER 2 - Why SRI is a Future-Proof Trend (44:25)
Millennials Bank the Next Great Wealth Transfer (49:22)
CHAPTER 3 - Aligning Investment Portfolios with SRI Values (55:59)
Asset Classes (01:04:48)

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Additional Resources:

Order ‘Sustainable & Responsible Investing 360°: Lessons Learned from World Class Investors’ on Amazon

View Details

In this 4-in-1 compilation episode, I’ve brought together the compelling stories of four changemakers who are rethinking how we use capital to create measurable social and environmental impact. Each of these guests takes a unique approach to closing the gap between profit and purpose, showing how financial tools and innovative strategies are driving true systemic transformation.

Here are the featured guests:

Ed Marcum, Managing Partner, Working Capital Fund

Ed unpacks how his team is tackling systemic labor exploitation in global supply chains. By channeling investments into advanced tools like AI mapping and transparency technologies, he paints a picture of how these innovations are making accountability not just possible, but scalable – forcing companies to rethink their approach to labor conditions.

Full episode

Andrew Behar, CEO of As You Sow

Andrew is a leader in shareholder advocacy. He emphasizes a collaborative approach – engaging with companies to reduce material risks in areas like climate change, diversity, and equity – rather than resorting to hostile tactics. This approach not only strengthens financial performance but also cuts systemic risks – creating wins for stakeholders at every level.

Full episode

Adam Swersky, CEO of Social Finance

Adam breaks down how social impact bonds are redefining solutions for some of society's toughest challenges. He shares how these unique financial tools bring together governments, investors, and social organizations to tackle pressing issues like homelessness and criminal justice reform. By tying financial returns to measurable outcomes, they ensure accountability and create a ripple effect of lasting impact.

Full episode

Paul Miller, Managing Partner and CEO at Bethnal Green Ventures

Paul focuses on identifying founders who combine tech innovation with a mission to create real impact. He’s laser-focused on backing startups that merge sustainability with scalable business models. By investing in these early-stage companies, he’s helping to drive solutions that tackle global environmental and social challenges head-on while paving the way for high-growth opportunities that have the potential to reshape entire industries.

Full episode

—

The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

—

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—

Key Takeaways:

Introduction (00:00)
Ed Marcum - Mission to combat labor exploitation (03:35)
AI and tech transforming supply chains (14:53)
Investment process and impact measuring (19:50)
Andrew Behar’s journey to shareholder advocacy (34:01)
Challenges and opportunities in shareholder advocacy (47:16)
From greenwashing to greenhushing: Corporate response trends (58:23)
Adam Swersky - the social impact bond model (01:03:13)
The success story of Peterborough prison (01:18:34)
Mental health and employment partnership initiatives (01:28:24)
Paul Miller - origins of Bethnal Green Ventures (01:33:33)
Definition of 'Tech for Good' (01:44:32)
VC’s impact potential (01:49:51)
Diversity, growth tensions, and impact-washing (01:55:26)

View Details

Last week, my guest, Ben Dear, the founder and CEO of Osmosis Investment Management, started sharing his extraordinary journey – a 17-year journey of career pivots that ultimately led him to create one of the most innovative sustainable investment funds. We paused at the pivotal moment when he founded Osmosis, which now manages over $17 billion in assets.

Today, we’re continuing the Osmosis story and diving into the groundbreaking strategies behind its success.

Ben explains how his team developed a systematic, data-driven approach to investing, using their resource efficiency factor to measure carbon, water, and waste management as predictors of company returns. This method allows Osmosis to build portfolios that consistently outperform benchmarks while significantly reducing environmental footprints.

We also talk about ESG data – what’s broken, why it matters, and how Osmosis collects, cleans, and standardizes its own data to ensure accountability. Ben unpacks the nuances of portfolio construction, balancing risk and reward, and shares how they’ve managed to cater to global institutional clients while staying laser-focused on their mission: delivering returns that are both financial and environmental.

If you still doubt that sustainability can drive profitability – or that a boutique firm can achieve explosive growth while redefining public equity investing – this episode is a must-listen.

Let’s pick up where we left off!

–

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

–

Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

–

Key Takeaways:

Intro (00:00)
The meaning behind “Osmosis” & core investment philosophy (03:26)
Emerging markets fund launch (14:55)
Osmosis’ theory of change (22:20)
Data collection and fundraising journey (33:13)
Osmosis’ investment process (49:28)
Key Metrics: carbon, water, and waste (56:18)
Engaging companies to disclose environmental data (01:11:27)
Rapid fire questions (01:26:14)
Contact info (01:32:37)

—

Additional Resources:
Osmosis website

Ben Dear LinkedIn

View Details

Today, I’m joined by Ben Dear, founder and CEO of Osmosis Investment Management, and this is the first part of a story that is anything but ordinary.

It's a true odyssey that began in a small town in England, passed through many entrepreneurial experiments, and ultimately led him to found Osmosis – a $17 billion sustainable investment fund.

But Ben’s journey was far from an overnight success. He faced academic struggles, tried his hand at various careers – including managing a Jamaican restaurant and building a software testing company he later sold for millions – and learned important lessons about taking risks and building trust in business.

A pivotal moment in Ben’s life came when he watched ‘An Inconvenient Truth,’ which inspired him to align his career with sustainability and create Osmosis based on values and integrity. It combines investment strategies with a focus on environmental impact, using a rare systematic approach that has driven remarkable growth and success with solutions like green indices and ETFs.

In this first part of the interview, Ben openly talks about the highs and lows of his journey, how he overcame early obstacles, and what it took to convince initial investors to believe in his vision.

Tune in for this inspiring conversation about what it really takes to build something impactful from scratch.

P.S. Don't forget to join us next week as we dive into the second chapter of this story. We'll talk about how Osmosis is revolutionizing sustainable investing, share the strategies driving its success, and explore why it's become a leader in aligning finance with environmental values.

–

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

–

Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

–

Key Takeaways:Intro (00:00)
Ben’s background, early life, and education (03:55)
Learning from entrepreneurial ventures (23:27)
Building, scaling, and selling a software testing business (41:24)
'An Inconvenient Truth' epiphany and transition to sustainable investing (50:34)
Various investment strategies employed by original Osmosis (01:08:14)
Raising capital activities (01:14:38)
Stop selling, start listening to investors (01:20:30)

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Additional Resources:
Osmosis website

Ben Dear LinkedIn

View Details

Biodiversity loss isn’t just an environmental issue – it’s a financial opportunity hiding in plain sight. But here’s the thing: while it’s just as important as tackling carbon emissions, natural capital is still flying under the radar for most businesses and investors.

That’s where today’s guest, Helen Avery, comes in. Helen is the Director of Nature Programs at the Green Finance Institute (GFI), and she’s on a mission to flip the script. Working at the crossroads of finance and nature, she is helping break down the barriers that are keeping private investment from flowing into biodiversity and sustainable landscapes.

Helen makes a compelling case: ignoring natural capital isn’t just bad for the planet – it’s bad business. She’s helping companies rethink the way they operate, from creating financial tools like carbon credits to embedding biodiversity right into their business models.

In this interview, Helen explains why biodiversity has been overlooked in the climate conversation and how the GFI is driving innovation to get private money moving into nature-positive projects.

We also talk about the big challenges – like scaling investments in natural capital – and why we need more leadership and collaboration to make restoring nature an economic no-brainer.

Tune in as we talk about how the finance world can drive meaningful change for our planet – and why it’s time to make that happen.

Don’t miss it!

–

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

–

Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

–

Key Takeaways:Introduction (00:00)
Helen Avery’s background, education & early career (03:40)
Joining Green Finance Institute (GFI) in 2020 (15:47)
GFI overview, mission, and theory of change (21:13)
The value of natural capital in driving investment returns (31:18)
GFI’s Nature Programs and its key focus areas (42:06)
Catalyzing private investment with structured approaches (46:39)
Reporting standards for nature-related risks (57:14)
Rapid fire questions (01:05:27)
Contact info (01:09:53)

—

Additional Resources:
Helen Avery LinkedIn

GFI website

GFI Hive website

View Details

When you think of venture capital, you might picture fast-paced deals, tech unicorns, and ambitious growth strategies. But what if it could also drive real, measurable change for the planet?

That’s exactly the vision behind Serena, whose co-founder Xavier Lorphelin joins me today. Xavier is here to explain, among other things, why the firm integrates impact considerations into every decision, moving beyond the traditional investment approach.

Serena isn’t a typical VC firm. Founded by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs, it blends financial ambition with a mission to support innovative startups that serve a better world. With €1 billion in assets under management, Serena invests in transformative sectors like climate tech, AI, and sustainability – all while delivering impressive double-digit financial returns.

Xavier’s journey to this mission-driven approach is deeply rooted in his time in Silicon Valley. After earning his master’s degree at Stanford during the rise of the internet boom, he gained a front-row seat to the power of innovation and entrepreneurship to drive societal change.

Today, Xavier is with us to explain how Serena is aligning financial success with sustainability by introducing groundbreaking concepts like climate dividends and embracing cutting-edge technologies such as AI to address biodiversity challenges. In this conversation, Xavier dives into Serena’s investment process, the evolution of impact investing, and the powerful business case for sustainability.

Tune in to learn how venture capital is being transformed into a force for good – and why it might just be the key to tackling our planet’s biggest challenges.

Don’t miss it!

–

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

–

Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

–

Key Takeaways:Intro (00:00)
Xavier Lorphelin’s background and education (02:52)
Silicon Valley experience (12:24)
Transition back to France and career development (19:02)
Founding Serena (25:48)
Serena’s mission, investment focus & theory of change (33:11)
Serena’s investment process (42:34)
Conducting pre- and post-investment ESG assessments (59:11)
Serena Squad and operating framework (01:15:38)
Opportunities in Measure, Report, Verification (MRV) solutions (01:20:32)
Rapid fire questions (01:28:14)
Contact info (01:32:52)

—

Additional Resources:
Xavier Lorphelin LinkedIn
Xavier Lorphelin's e-mail: xavier@serena.vc

Serena Website
Serena LinkedIn

VC Funding Trends in Nature Tech
Terrahui Foundation
Climate Fresk

View Details

Last month I had insightful conversations with two leaders in impact investing and sustainability. The first was with Rochus Mommartz, who is the CEO of responsAbility, and the other was with Jonathan Maxwell, who is the founding partner and CEO of Sustainable Development Capital.

This episode is a special one which serves as a recap of the episodes from last month. It features a couple of key clips from each conversation in one place so you can jump around and get a feel for both the episode and the guest.

Here’s the full list of the guests featured today and the links to their full episode:

Rochus Mommartz, the CEO of responsAbility

Rochus Mommartz is a pioneer in impact investing who has spent decades creating opportunities for people in emerging markets. He played a key role in developing regulatory frameworks and microfinance models that enable financial inclusion and long-term growth for communities across Latin America, Africa, and Asia.

My interview with Rochus was so long and so compelling that I ended up splitting it into two episodes. We talked about the evolution of microfinance because Rochus was in the field and literally had a front-row seat to the evolution of this market in its earliest days. We also discussed responsAbility's strategy for managing $5 billion in investments across 70+ countries, balancing social impact with strong financial returns.

Full Interview:
Part 1
Part 2

Jonathan Maxwell, founding partner and CEO of Sustainable Development Capital LLP (SDCL)

In this conversation Jonathan Maxwell presented a bold approach to climate challenges by focusing on reducing waste and maximizing efficiency. His EDGE model (Efficient and Decentralized Generation of Energy) drives resource savings across 50,000 properties worldwide. These projects support sustainability and also bring double-digit returns while cutting energy waste, showing how responsible and profitable investing can go hand in hand.

Full Episode

—

The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

—

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

—

Key Takeaways:
Intro (00:00)
The early days of microfinance (03:10)
Founding responsAbility and rising to CEO (17:02)
Impact investing philosophy (25:05)
ResponsAbility – overview and mission (30:24)
15+ thematic funds impacting 70+ countries (36:44)
Investment process, criteria, and impact measurement (43:08)
Jonathan Maxwell on sustainability (01:15:01)
SDCL's mission, activities, and investment focus (01:21:21)
SDCL's theory of change (01:40:39)
Project portfolio & impact measurement (01:52:58)

—

Additional Resources:

ResponsAbility Website
ResponsAbility LinkedIn
Rochus Mommartz LinkedIn

—

SDCL website
SDCL LinkedIn
Jonathan Maxwell LinkedIn

Buy The Edge by Jonathan Maxwell

View Details

When we think of impactful investments, public fixed income probably isn’t the first thing that comes to mind.

Yet, it’s driving far more capital into climate finance than we see in private equity, venture capital, and public equities combined. It’s not just statistics – it’s proof of the powerful impact fixed income can achieve.

To learn more about the role of fixed income in sustainable impact investing, I’m speaking with Steve Liberatore, Head of ESG and Impact for Global Fixed Income, at Nuveen, one of the world’s largest asset managers. A true pioneer, Steve has spent nearly two decades defining what sustainable bonds can achieve, crafting innovative green, blue, and nature bond frameworks that have become blueprints for the industry.

Under his leadership, Nuveen’s impact fixed income strategy is tackling some of today’s most urgent challenges through a carefully structured approach that prioritizes positive social and environmental outcomes without compromising returns.

Steve’s strategy centers on “ring-fencing” proceeds to fund projects in four critical areas: affordable housing, renewable energy and climate, community and economic development, and natural resources. His approach drives large-scale impact by lowering the cost of capital for issuers, making it more affordable to finance sustainable projects that deliver long-term value.

In this interview, Steve breaks down how Nuveen’s global ESG strategy leverages public fixed income to drive measurable impact.

Tune in for a fresh perspective on how responsible fixed income’s unmatched scale is redefining impact investing and driving real, measurable change.

–

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

–

Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

–

Key Takeaways:Introduction (00:00)
Steve Liberatore's background and education (03:15)
Early work experience (17:38)
Joining Nuveen and expanding its ESG & impact portfolio (31:23)
Overview of green, blue, social, and orange bonds (46:36)
Benefits of sustainable bonds for issuers (50:56)
Theory of change for impact investing in fixed income (57:30)
Performance of ESG-integrated bond funds (01:04:53)
Investing in bonds: Avoiding losers over picking winners (01:11:24)
Nuveen’s four thematic areas (01:22:33)
Nuveen’s impact measurement process (01:26:09)
Future of ESG and impact investing in fixed income (01:32:25)
Rapid fire questions (01:41:34)
Contact information (01:47:19)

—

Additional Resources:- Stephen M. Liberatore LinkedIn
- Nuveen Website

View Details

Here's something I learned in this interview: We're wasting three-quarters of the world’s energy, half of its food, and a third of its water. That’s a crazy amount of lost resources! But what if, instead of just seeing this as an environmental problem, we saw it as a huge economic opportunity?

The truth is, we don’t need to wait for new technology, or find new resources, or produce more – we just need to use what we already have more efficiently. After all, if massive investments in renewable energy haven’t significantly reduced global emissions, and fossil fuels still dominate, maybe the real issue is how we're using our resources in the first place.

That’s the perspective my guest this week is sharing.

I’m sitting down with Jonathan Maxwell, founding partner and CEO of Sustainable Development Capital LLP (SDCL). Over the past 17 years, Jonathan has built SDCL into a leader in sustainable investing, driving projects across 50,000 properties worldwide to cut energy waste and boost efficiency.

His approach is all about EDGE investing – efficient and decentralized generation of energy – which focuses on producing energy closer to where it’s needed (since the majority of energy is lost before it even reaches consumers). This strategy not only makes energy consumption more sustainable, but it also helps clients cut costs and delivers double-digit returns for SDCL.

At SDCL, it’s not just about benefiting the environment and society – the projects have to be financially viable, too. Jonathan argues that degrowth isn’t a responsible investment strategy, insisting, “If it’s not commercial, it’s not sustainable.”

Join us as we talk about Jonathan’s journey, his investment philosophy, and how SDCL’s innovative strategies are transforming energy use, tackling climate change, and driving sustainable growth.

Tune in now!

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

—

Key Takeaways:Intro (00:00)
Jonathan Maxwell's background, education, and early career (03:25)
Joining HSBC and gaining international experience in investment banking (15:32)
Sustainability epiphany in China and founding SDCL (21:45)
SDCL's mission, activities, and investment focus (40:16)
SDCL's theory of change (01:05:44)
Jonathan’s book – 'The Edge' (01:18:05)
Project portfolio, impact measurement, and reporting (01:21:51)
Future of energy efficiency investments (01:32:18)
The role of nuclear power in future energy solutions (01:39:40)
Rapid fire questions (01:44:35)
Connect with Jonathan (01:51:09)

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Additional Resources:

SDCL website
SDCL LinkedIn
SEEIT website
SEEIT LinkedIn
Jonathan Maxwell Substack
Jonathan Maxwell LinkedIn
Buy The Edge by Jonathan Maxwell

View Details

In honor of COP16, the biodiversity 'Conference of the Parties', which begins next week in Cali, Colombia, I’ve put together a special compilation episode featuring four insightful conversations on nature-focused investment strategies. Each segment explores different approaches to nature-based investing, highlighting the diverse asset classes and strategies designed to protect and enhance natural capital. Here are the featured guests:

1. Alina Donets, Lead Portfolio Manager at Lombard Odier Investment Managers
Alina Donets manages the LO Funds-Natural Capital portfolio, which invests in publicly traded companies focused on biodiversity and the circular economy. The fund addresses issues like resource overuse and pollution while aiming for strong financial returns. In this segment, Alina discusses the importance of investing in natural capital, noting that over half of the global GDP depends on it.

Full Episode

2. Tammy Newmark, CEO and Managing Partner of EcoEnterprises Fund
Tammy Newmark has been a leader in impact investing for over 30 years, particularly through EcoEnterprises Fund. It is a Venture Capital fund that invests in small businesses in Latin America that preserve natural capital. In this episode, Tammy explains how EcoEnterprises integrates local communities into their investments to ensure long-term sustainability and success.

Full Episode

3. Charlotte Kaiser, Head of Impact Finance at BTG Pactual's Timberland Investment Group (TIG)
Charlotte Kaiser brings a wealth of experience from her leadership roles in conservation finance. At BTG Pactual's TIG, she oversees $6 billion in assets, creating real asset impact investing strategies that support biodiversity, water conservation, and climate action through timberland investments. Charlotte highlights how her team is transforming traditional timberland investing into a tool for both profit and global sustainability.

Full Episode

4. Martin Berg, CEO of Climate Asset Management
Climate Asset Management is dedicated to scaling real asset natural capital investments and recognizing biodiversity as a financial asset. Drawing on his experience at the European Investment Bank and the UN Climate Change Conference, Martin Berg highlights the urgent need for large-scale capital to support nature-based solutions to tackle the urgent climate and biodiversity crises.

Full Episode

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The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

—

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
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—

Key Takeaways:
Intro (00:00)
Alina Donets on natural capital (03:50)
The LO Funds-Natural Capital’s investment strategy and portfolio (13:21)
Tammy Newmark on EcoEnterprises Fund’s type of investments (28:35)
Downsides of nature-focused investment strategies (46:26)
The impact washing issue (50:23)
Charlotte Kaiser’s experience at The Nature Conservancy/NatureVest (51:57)
Transition to BTG Pactual’s Timberland Investment Group (59:51)
Sustainable forestry’s role in climate change & biodiversity (01:04:35)
Martin Berg on Climate Asset Management’s mission and key strategies (01:16:16)
Key risks to consider with natural capital investments (01:43:11)

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Welcome back to the second part of the interview with Rochus Mommartz, the visionary CEO of responsAbility and a true impact warrior.

With his specialized impact asset management house, Rochus is on a mission to create accessible opportunities for all, focusing on sectors that touch on the core needs of underserved populations – sustainable agriculture, climate finance, and financial inclusion.

Today, responsAbility manages $5 billion in assets, directing its investments into the private markets of emerging economies where traditional financial services are either nonexistent or insufficient. Its portfolio covers more than 70 countries in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and Eastern Europe.

In this episode, we dive deeper into responsAbility's investment strategy, which channels over 95% of its assets into private debt and private equity.

In its mission, responsAbility prioritizes impactful outcomes. But achieving attractive financial returns remains equally important. With this dual focus, they meet investor expectations and continue to generate growth and positive impacts in the sectors they serve.

Join us as Rochus explains responsAbility's investment process, the impact measurement techniques they employ, and the operational challenges they face in diverse and complex markets.

Tune in to learn more about how strategic private market investments can drive significant social and economic progress worldwide, while also delivering strong financial returns.

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About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

—

Key Takeaways:ResponsAbility – overview and mission (00:00)
Private market focus (debt and equity) (06:02)
15+ thematic funds impacting 70+ countries (11:47)
M&G acquisition (18:12)
Investment process and criteria (22:22)
Three-layer approach: ESG assessment, impact assessment, technical assistance (34:46)
Tracking impact post-investment (49:13)
Decreasing impact as a success factor (54:16)
Managing risk when companies don't achieve expected impact (57:28)
Correlation between impact and financial returns (58:34)
The risks in financial sector development (01:05:00)
Rapid fire questions (01:14:01)
How to connect with Rochus (01:25:02)

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Additional Resources:

ResponsAbility Website

ResponsAbility LinkedIn

Rochus Mommartz LinkedIn

View Details

Rochus Mommartz has spent decades creating opportunities for people in emerging markets. ⁤⁤Today, he's with us to share his insights and his experiences from that incredible journey.⁤

Rochus is the CEO of responsAbility, a pioneer in impact investing that has evolved from a leader in microfinance to a prominent force in impact investing across Latin America, Africa, and Asia. It is known for its investment approach, using sustainability-based assessments that have been proven and refined over many years.⁤

ResponsAbility has played a crucial role in building financial inclusion frameworks, helping microfinance institutions evolve into sustainable, profitable businesses that serve the underbanked. ⁤

As part of the founding team and later as CEO in 2016, Rochus has been instrumental in shaping responsAbility's success.

Few people were involved in microfinance before it even became an industry, but Rochus was pivotal in working with governments to create the frameworks that turned it into a profitable business that was financially sustainable in emerging markets. He had a front-row seat, witnessing firsthand how microfinance evolved from a charitable initiative into a sustainable, for-profit sector empowering the underbanked.

With such a wealth of experience, our conversation ended up being so packed with insights that we’ve split it into two episodes.

In this first part, we talk about Rochus' journey in impact investing, in microfinance, and the development of microfinance regulatory frameworks in emerging markets. He explains how creating opportunities for underserved populations through responsible investments can drive sustainable change.

In the next episode, we'll dive even deeper into responsAbility's expansion beyond financial inclusion, and how the firm has managed billions in assets to drive lasting impact in sustainable agriculture and climate finance.

Tune in today, and don’t miss the next episode – I promise it’ll be worth it!

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About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

—

Key Takeaways:Rochus Mommartz's background (00:00)
Education – “Rochus wins the lottery!” (06:12)
The early days of microfinance and the challenge of sustainability (12:07)
Importance of regulatory frameworks for microfinance institutions (17:48)
Founding responsAbility and rising to CEO (28:18)
Impact investing philosophy (41:42)
Response + Ability = responsAbility (46:44)
ResponsAbility’s theory of change and the problems it solves (48:14)
Three key impact investment themes (51:25)
Addressing the ESG backlash and its difference from impact investing (53:44)
The themes driving future impact (59:02)

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Additional Resources:

ResponsAbility Website

ResponsAbility LinkedIn

View Details

Today, I'm speaking with Nimrod Gerber, Managing Partner of Vital Capital, a private equity firm that is redefining impact investing in emerging markets, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Vital Capital focuses on providing essential services such as healthcare, food production, water, and sustainable infrastructure, often through "overlooked opportunities" – greenfield projects that carry higher risks but also promise financial returns and deliver meaningful societal impact.

With over $400 million assets under management, Vital Capital has made a significant impact, improving the lives of more than 22 million people by providing first-time access to critical resources like clean water and healthcare. Their investments have also created nearly 65,000 jobs and supported over 50,000 smallholder farmers.

In addition to Africa, Vital Capital has extended its reach to other emerging markets, including India, where they’ve focused on rural water access projects serving millions, and Latin America, bringing their expertise to diverse regions with complex challenges.

Nimrod’s journey from managing agricultural projects in Israel to becoming a leader in global impact investing spans two decades and over 28 countries. His hands-on experience enables him to navigate challenging greenfield investments that many others might pass up.

Join me as we discuss how Nimrod and his team are using their operational expertise to identify high-impact investments that are transforming lives in Africa, India, and beyond.

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About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

—

Key Takeaways:Nimrod Gerber's background (00:00)
Early career and transition to impact investing (19:17)
Joining Vital Capital (29:50)
Vital Capital's mission and theory of change (35:19)
Investment process and impact assessment (47:44)
Examples of Vital’s end-to-end investment process and results (01:14:52)
Post-investment impact assessment and key KPIs tracked (01:28:48)
Correlation between impact and financial returns (01:32:00)
Vital Capital's unique approach to risk (01:34:21)
What sets Vital Capital apart and its key success (01:43:12)
Rapid fire questions (01:48:32)
Connect with Nimrod Gerber (01:58:22)

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Additional Resources:

Nimrod Gerber LinkedIn

Vital Capital LinkedIn

Vital Capital Website

View Details

My guest today is Nancy Pfund, the visionary founder and managing partner of DBL Partners. She invested in Tesla when others ridiculed the idea of electric cars transforming the auto industry.

DBL was among the first to see Tesla's potential, driven by a commitment to decarbonize transportation and create jobs in an industry most believed would never succeed. Today, they’re not just an investor but a pioneer in the field of impact investing, proving that financial success and social impact can indeed go hand in hand.

Nancy's journey into impact investing began with a strong foundation in anthropology and a unique career path that led her through policy advocacy and tech innovation. Before founding DBL, Nancy was a managing director of venture capital at JPMorgan. Previously, Nancy worked at Intel Corporation, the State of California, Stanford University, and the Sierra Club.

This experience paved the way for her pioneering work at DBL, where she has managed over a billion and a half dollars in assets, backing transformative companies like SolarCity, The RealReal, and, of course, Tesla.

DBL Partners invests across diverse fields such as cleantech, sustainable products, and information technology, all while maintaining a strong focus on climate impact and economic inclusivity. DBL’s approach is centered on their “trifecta” strategy:

eliminating excess carbon in industries
achieving substantial impact
investing in sectors that have historically been carbon-intensive

Join me today as we explore Nancy's career, the evolution of impact investing, and how DBL Partners is reshaping industries with a focus on innovation and sustainability.

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About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

—

Key Takeaways:Nancy Pfund’s background (00:00)
Education and early career (09:10)
Transition to venture capital (23:40)
Early success in solar energy and initial investment in Tesla (32:54)
Establishing DBL Partners (38:12)
DBL's mission, approach, and theory of change (43:10)
Aligning impact results with financial returns and impact assessment (01:00:42)
Policy engagement’s influence on DBL’s portfolios (01:17:38)
Advice for impact investors (01:22:48)
Rapid fire questions (01:30:40)
Contact info (01:34:55)

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Additional Resources:

DBL Partners website

Connect with Nancy:

LinkedIn
X
Email: nancy@dbl.vc

View Details

Today, I'm speaking with Monica Brand Engel, a Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Quona Capital, an impact pioneer focusing on financial inclusion in emerging and frontier markets.

Quona’s mission is to generate impact and returns by investing in micro, small, and medium-sized businesses across South and Southeast Asia, Latin America, and Africa.

The company is dedicated to transforming lives in underserved and underbanked communities through fintech solutions that bridge the gap between emerging markets and advanced financial infrastructures. It offers a range of financial products that meet the unique needs of consumers in these markets, including digital payments, lending platforms, accessible insurance products, and comprehensive neo-banking services.

Monica’s journey into impact investing is deeply influenced by her multicultural upbringing and experience in both the private and nonprofit sectors. She began her career in financial services, driven by a deep commitment to economic empowerment and financial inclusion, which eventually led her to co-found Quona Capital.

Before founding Quona, Monica was a Vice President at ACCION International, a leading global microfinance organization promoting commercial approaches to alleviate poverty.

Quona Capital is strategically focused on understanding the nuances of investing in emerging markets so that it can support entrepreneurs with both local insight and global expertise.

However, it has not only made a significant impact on financial inclusion but has also proven that these ventures can generate strong financial returns. Under Monica’s leadership, Quona has grown to manage $760 million in assets, with a team that speaks 21 languages and operates across major hubs like Mexico City, Bengaluru, Jakarta, and Cape Town.

Join me today as I speak with Monica about her remarkable background and how Quona Capital creates opportunities for millions of people in regions often overlooked by traditional financial service providers.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

—

Key Takeaways:Monica’s background and early career (00:00)
The calling to work internationally (19:23)
Career in ACCION International and shifting focus to fintech (27:39)
The birth of Quona Capital (38:19)
Quona’s mission and key strategies (52:54)
The meaning of financial inclusion (59:26)
What makes a company investable for Quona (01:03:41)
3 key measures of impact (01:11:37)
Aligning impact and financial returns (01:20:58)
Evaluating and managing risks in emerging markets (01:36:05)
Key lessons for impact investing success (01:44:35)
Contact information (01:56:48)

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Additional Resources:Visit Quona's website

Follow Quona:
- LinkedIn
- X
- Medium

Connect with Monica:
- LinkedIn
- X

Connect with Michael Chu on LinkedIn
‘The Innovator's Dilemma’ by Clayton M. Christensen

The Innovator's Dilemma: The Revolutionary Book That Will Change the Way You Do Business

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This episode is a two-for-one, and that’s because the podcast recently hit its second year anniversary. To celebrate, I’ve been curating special compilation episodes, featuring some of the best segments over the past two years of SRI360.

Today, I’m revisiting two extraordinary guests who have harnessed the power of impact investing to create a better, more sustainable world. What ties these two pioneers together is their commitment to setting the stage for a future where investment is not just about profit, but about purpose.

Here are the featured guests:

Basil Demeroutis, Managing Partner of FORE Partnership

FORE Partnership is a purpose-driven real estate investment firm active in the UK and Western Europe. Out of a passion for sustainability, Basil founded FORE Partnership believing in a low carbon future in which property can be a force for social good, aligning with both his and the company’s investors’ core values.

In his segment, we discuss how Basil puts the “E” and the “S” into their real estate projects. We hear about some of FORE’s projects and examples of the real social impact they have made, how FORE became one of the first real estate investors to become a certified B Corporation, and much more.

Full episode here.

Jean-Philippe de Schrevel, Founder and Former Managing Partner at Bamboo Capital PartnersSince our last conversation in 2022, Jean-Philippe founded a company called Oxygen Holding and became a partner in Oryx Impact in early 2024. His former venture which we explored back in 2022 is Bamboo Capital Partners, and it’s an impact investing platform providing innovative financing solutions to businesses in emerging markets.

Jean-Philippe is widely considered to be a global pioneer in the field of impact investing, having founded Blue Orchard in 2001 and later on Bamboo Capital Partners in 2007. He’s launched eight investment funds and raised over $1 billion across a variety of asset classes and sectors.

Jean-Philippe has made it his life’s mission to help develop solutions to some of the most critical problems on our planet today. In his segment, he shared Bamboo Capital Partners’ investment strategies and their five main Funds. We also talk about Bamboo’s partnerships with various UN agencies and International NGO’s, the SDG500 Impact Investment platform, and much more.

Full episode here.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—

Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update.

Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.

Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.

Follow SRI360° on X.

Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

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Key Takeaways:Introduction (00:00)
Basil Demeroutis & what FORE Partnership does (03:12)
FORE’s building forward strategy & investment selections (19:07)
Investment examples & greener building materials (26:09)
Jean-Philippe de Schrevel’s start in microfinance & founding

View Details

In celebration of the SRI360 podcast's second anniversary, I’ve prepared a special four-in-one episode featuring curated segments from four extraordinary leaders in impact investing and social change. These stories highlight their unwavering commitment to using finance as a tool for positive change, showcasing how these pioneers are leading the way in sustainable and responsible investing. Here are the featured guests:

1. Jenn Pryce, President and CEO of Calvert Impact Capital.
Under her leadership, Calvert Impact Capital has raised nearly $3.5 billion, investing in communities and businesses overlooked by traditional finance in over 100 countries. Jenn’s story highlights the importance of making impact investing accessible to both institutional and retail investors.

Full episode here.

2. Sharon Vosmek, CEO of Astia and Managing Partner of the Astia Fund.
Sharon is a venture capitalist who directly invests in and syndicates investors into high-growth start-ups founded and led by women. She talks about the under-investment by venture capital firms in women-led companies, citing interesting statistics on how much money seems to be left on the table by doing so.

Full episode here.

3. Ben Rick, is the Co-Founder of Social and Sustainable Capital.
Ben transitioned from a successful career in investment banking to co-founding a firm that provides flexible capital to social sector organizations in the UK. His passion for making a difference has driven him to support initiatives tackling society's most pressing challenges and improving the lives of disadvantaged people.

Full episode here.

4. Stewart Langdon, Partner and Co-Head of South Asian Investments at LeapFrog Investments.
Stewart's expertise in financial and healthcare services investments across emerging markets has made a significant impact on low-income populations. With a focus on both financial returns and social impact, Stewart discusses LeapFrog’s rigorous investment decision-making process and the transformative power of technology in providing essential services.

Full episode here.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

—

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—

Key Takeaways:

Introduction (00:00)
Sharon Vosmek explains Astia’s mission & theory of change (03:53)
Key statistics about women’s inclusion in venture capital investing (10:59)
Ben Rick tells us about Social and Sustainable Capital’s Social Housing Fund (18:44)
How Ben Rick makes investing decisions (25:39)
Jenn Pryce talks about community investing with Calvert Impact Capital (37:47)
An example of an investment with positive financial and impact results (46:25)
How the community investment note works, strategies & due diligence (52:25)
Stewart Langdon shares an overview of LeapFrog (01:01:29)
How LeapFrog was founded, how they deploy capital & investment examples (01:09:28)

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In a society pushing most planetary boundaries, how can venture capital step in and scale the technologies we need to change the world?

That’s the power behind Planet A Ventures, led by environmental advocate and policymaker Lena Thiede.

Lena is a co-founding partner of Planet A — a cutting-edge green tech venture capital fund that only invests in European startups with a proven and significant positive impact on the environment. They’ve already hit an important milestone, raising an impressive €160 million in 2023 that has been put into action for backing and scaling startups with groundbreaking green technologies in development.

What’s truly unique about Planet A Ventures is that they’re the only early-stage VC with an in-house science team dedicated to conducting rigorous lifecycle assessments before investing, which Lena leads. This means they place the highest value on impact as the primary screening metric, guaranteeing significant positive outcomes for climate, biodiversity, and beyond.

Lena is a prominent figure in environmental research and policy, thanks to her substantial background in climate science and over 11 years of experience as a senior government official at the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development.

She knew early on in her childhood that she wanted to be involved in political science and environmental protection, a desire that landed her in government programs in Tanzania and East Africa, focusing on biodiversity and water resource monitoring and evaluation. Lena has also done environmental research for the German Advisory Council on Global Change, OECD, GIZ, and the Ecologic Institute. She also advises the EXIST Program of the German Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action, promoting more science-based startups.

Tune in to hear all the fascinating examples of science-based impact investing that Lena shares, along with how Planet A is transforming the landscape of sustainable venture capital.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—

Key Takeaways
Meet Lena Thiede & her formative years (00:00)
Lena’s time at the Ecological Institute in Berlin & 3plusx (08:23)
Moving to Tanzania & Managing the Serengeti & Selous game reserves (13:48)
Relocating to Cape Town, founding Planet A, and Lena’s other ventures (19:16)
A high level overview of Planet A ventures (25:55)
The relationship between impact and financial returns (33:48)
Planet A’s investment universe & how they measure impact (34:51)
Conducting lifecycle assessment analysis (48:42)
Positive impact beyond Planet A & the biodiversity lifecycle analysis (54:51)
An end-to-end look into a Planet A investment (59:55)
Rapid fire questions (01:08:53)

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Additional Resources
Planet A's Website & Medium page.
Follow Planet A

View Details

What happens when Bono meets impact investors? They create The Rise Fund!
In this episode, I’m speaking with Maya Chorengel, the co-managing partner of The Rise Fund — the world’s largest global impact platform committed to achieving measurable, positive social and environmental outcomes while securing financial returns for its investors.

Founded by TPG, a private equity firm with $224 billion in AUM, The Rise Fund was launched in partnership with U2’s Bono and Jeff Skoll, and now boasts $9 billion in AUM. The fund invests in growth-stage, high-potential, mission-driven companies that have the power to change the world.

Maya is a long-time impact, private equity and venture capital investor, leading climate, education, financial inclusion, and healthcare investing, among others, for Rise worldwide. She was also the key architect in developing the fund’s impact methodology and assessment process.

She began her investing career at Warburg Pincus and eventually gravitated toward impact investing in 2007, when the concept was still very much in its infancy. Prior to TPG, she was the Managing Director of the Dignity Fund and co-founder of Elevar Equity, where she leveraged venture capital and microfinance to drive impact across emerging markets.

Recognized as Barron’s 100 Most Influential Women in US Finance, among several other awards and titles, Maya has played a substantial role in elevating the concept of impact investing to what it is today, particularly within TPG.

Tune in to hear all about how The Rise Fund leverages TPG’s vast resources, business-building skills, and global network to help portfolio companies accelerate growth, change, and impact.

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—

Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—

Key Takeaways
Introducing Maya Chorengel: her upbringing, education, & early career (00:00)
Maya’s work at Warburg Pincus and The Dignity Fund (18:56)
Founding Elevar Equity & its theory of change (31:38)
Maya’s move to TPG & an overview of the company (46:06)
The Rise Fund’s theory of change & investment universe (01:06:25)
Measuring impact & Maya’s article in the Harvard Business Review (01:13:56)
Examples of companies that Maya invests in with The Rise Fund (01:16:10)
The investment lifecycle, stewardship, and active engagement (01:26:46)
Explaining TPG’s proprietary tool IMM: impact multiple of money (01:31:31)
Maya’s take on the future of impact investing (01:37:15)

—

Additional Resources
Read Maya’s Harvard Business Review article “Calculating the Value of Impact Investing”.

Learn more about The Rise Fund and TPG.

Connect with Maya on LinkedIn.

View Details

Today’s episode is a follow-up to our first “best of” compilation in celebration of our 2-year anniversary as the SRI360 podcast.

I’m highlighting some of my favorite and most interesting responses from one of the most popular questions in my interviews.

Tune in to hear what these world-class investors in sustainable and responsible investing had to say.

This episode features:

François Bourdon: ESG Investing (02:18)Managing Partner, Nordis Capital. Full episode.
Michael O'Leary: Impact Investing & Activism (03:41)Partner and Co-Head of L Catterton Impact Fund. Full episode.

Asha Mehta: Quant Investing (04:58)Managing Partner & CIO at Global Delta Capital. Full episode.

Jennifer Pryce: Community Investing (06:30)President and CEO of Calvert Impact Capital. Full episode.

Liesel Pritzker-Simmons: Family Office Investing (08:44)Co-Founder & Principal, Blue Haven Initiative. Full episode.

Mark Dowding: Fixed Income & Sovereign Bonds Investing (10:51)Chief Investment Officer at BlueBay Asset Management. Full episode.

Martin Berg: Natural Capital Investing (12:03)CEO of Climate Asset Management. Full episode.

Matt Patsky: Public Equities Investing (13:23)CEO & Lead Portfolio Manager of the Trillium ESG Global Equity Strategy. Full episode.

Chris Ailman: Sustainable Institutional Investing (14:48)Founder and CEO, Ailman Advisers. Former CIO of CalSTRS. Full episode.

Patrick Drum: Faith-Based Investing (16:48)
Portfolio Manager of the Sustainable Fixed Income Fund & Amana Participation Fund for Saturna Capital. Full episode.

Radha Kuppalli: Real Asset Investing (18:39)Former Managing Director of Impact and Advocacy at New Forests. Full episode.

Sharon Vosmek: Venture Capital Investing (19:56)CEO of Astia, Managing Partner of the Astia Fund. Full episode.

Charlotte Kaiser: Impact-Driven Forestry Investing (22:27)Head of Impact Finance, BTG Pactual Timberland Investment Group. Full episode.

Adam Swersky: Social Impact Investing (24:11)CEO of Social Finance. Full episode.

Marisa Drew: Millennial Investing (25:18)Chief Sustainability Officer of the Standard Chartered Bank in London. Full episode.

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About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.
—
Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
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Biodiversity is essential for the survival of humankind, yet we threaten it every day as a society.

But what’s most concerning is how it’s vastly overlooked by companies in the investment space, not realizing how their future returns depend on having healthy ecosystems.

To help shift this narrative is my guest Ingrid Kukuljan, Head of Impact and Sustainable Investing at Federated Hermes. Ingrid’s journey begins in Croatia, where her childhood experiences with nature laid the foundation for her future career. She started as an equity research analyst at Lazard, where she quickly made her mark and earned a spot in Citywire’s first-ever global compilation of the 1,000 top fund managers in the world.

With a career trajectory that spans several significant roles, she’s now at Federated Hermes, a multi-strategy US/UK-based asset manager with $770 billion in AUM and $1.8 trillion under stewardship advisory.

There, Ingrid is responsible for developing and leading their impact and sustainable investing franchise, overseeing products, strategies, and thought leadership primarily within the public markets.

She explains how Federated Hermes integrates impact across all investment portfolios using proprietary data tools, ensuring sustainability is embedded in every aspect of their operations across multiple asset classes. We also talk about their biodiversity champions, transition investments, their proprietary data tools, stewardship and engagement work, and their Biodiversity Equity Fund.

Join this conversation to learn about how Federated Hermes is leading the charge in biodiversity investing and beyond.

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Show notes: {link}

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—

Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—

Key Takeaways
Introducing Ingrid Kukuljan and her early connection to nature (00:00)
Ingrid’s start at Lazard & other career moves (11:42)
Involvement in the Natural Capital Investment Alliance and Biodiversity Credits Panel (24:11)
Ingrid delivers an overview on Federated Hermes.(27:03)
The theory of change at Federated Hermes & investing on the secondary market (39:51)
Ingrid’s take on integrating sustainability and impact in investment analysis (44:04)
Investment process, KPIs, and generating impact across various asset classes (53:12)
A peek into Federated Hermes’ proprietary data tools (01:05:58)
The role of stewardship for achieved targeted outcomes & divestment (01:12:40)
The Biodiversity Equity Fund at Federated Hermes & biodiversity credits (01:19:54)
Rapid fire questions (01:31:31)

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Additional Resources
Learn more about Federated Hermes.
Connect on LinkedIn or X.
Connect with Ingrid on Lin

View Details

To celebrate the SRI360 podcast's 2nd anniversary, I've created a “best of” episode with some of my favorite responses from one of the most popular questions in my interviews: the lessons learned from investments that didn’t turn out as expected.

This episode features:

1. Bram Bos: Green Bonds Investing (02:12)

Managing Director, Goldman Sachs Asset Management. Former Lead Portfolio Manager of Green, Social, and Impact Bonds at NN Investment Partners.
Listen to his full episode.

2. Jennifer Pryce: Community Investing (03:45)

President and CEO of Calvert Impact Capital
Listen to her full episode.

3. Marisa Drew: Millennial Investing (05:00)

Chief Sustainability Officer of the Standard Chartered Bank in London
Listen to her full episode.

4. Mark Dowding: Fixed Income & Sovereign Bonds Investing (07:00)

Chief Investment Officer at BlueBay Asset Management
Listen to his full episode.

5. Matt Patsky: Public Equities Investing (08:49)

CEO & Lead Portfolio Manager of the Trillium ESG Global Equity Strategy
Listen to his full episode.

6. Patrick Drum: Faith-Based Investing (09:57)

Portfolio Manager of the Sustainable Fixed Income Fund
Listen to his full episode.

7. Radha Kuppalli: Real Asset Investing (11:28)

Former Managing Director of Impact and Advocacy at New Forests
Listen to her full episode.

8. Tammy Newmark: Biodiversity Impact Investing (13:53)

CEO and Managing Partner of EcoEnterprises Fund
Listen to her full episode.

9. Chris Ailman: Sustainable Institutional Investing (15:44)

Founder and CEO, Ailman Advisers. Former CIO of CalSTRS
Listen to his full episode.

10. Martin Berg: Natural Capital Investing (16:49)

CEO of Climate Asset Management
Listen to his full episode.

11. Amy Novogratz: Sustainable Aquaculture Investing (18:52)

Co-Founder of AquaSpark
Listen to her full episode.

12. Ed Marcum: Supply Chain Impact Investing (21:12)

Managing Director of Working Capital Fund
Full episode here.

13. Karla Mora: Sustainable Fashion Investing (22:29)

Founder and Managing Partner of Alante Capital
Full episode here.

14. Sharon Vosmek: Venture Capital Investing (24:22)

CEO of Astia, Managing Partner of the Astia Fund
Full episode here.

15. Charlotte Kaiser: Impact-Driven Forestry Investing (26:27)

Head of Impact Finance, BTG Pactual Timberland Investment Group
Full episode here.

—

Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
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Have you ever thought about what happens with the clothes you toss out, or all the unsold items in malls?

The apparel industry is a $3 trillion market that mass-produces tons of garments. Yet, a large portion of these items end up as waste without ever being sold.

For many brands, it’s more cost-effective to write off unsold items as waste rather than consolidating and reselling them — a practice that leads to huge amounts of perfectly good merchandise being thrown away, along with the packaging waste that comes with it.

So, how do we create more sustainability in the fashion industry? Today’s guest, Karla Mora, has the strategies for making this change happen.

Karla is the visionary founder and managing partner of Alante Capital. With her extensive global experiences, including work on supply chain reform in Afghanistan and a dip into the coffee sector with the United Nations Sustainable Commodity Initiative, Karla has made a unique path in impact venture capital investing.

Karla’s mission with Alante Capital is to drive real change within the fashion industry by investing in early-stage technology startup companies that champion circular, sustainable practices.

In this episode, Karla breaks down the concept of the circular economy and how her firm invests in both material science and software solutions for a more efficient value chain. We also discuss the challenges of integrating sustainability into the apparel industry, the role of consumer consciousness, and the vast opportunities for innovation within the industry.

Tune in now to learn more about impact investing strategies that are set to redefine the future of fashion.

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Show notes: {link}

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—

Key Takeaways:
An introduction to Karla Mora and her extensive global experience (09:07)
Karla’s transformative work experience in Afghanistan (27:52)
Transition to Helios Investment Management and impact investing (37:26)
The inspiration behind launching a circular-focused VC firm in the apparel industry (49:27)
Founding Alante Capital and focusing on circularity (53:47)
The three dimensions of impact and KPIs for measuring success (1:06:57)
Alante Capital’s investment selection, decision process, and exit strategies (1:16:08)
How to ensure investment in businesses maintains lasting impact post-exit (1:40:39)
Investing in diverse founders and balancing sustainability and pricing (1:42:20)
Rapid fire questions (1:56:11)

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Additional Resources
Connect with Karla on LinkedIn.
Visit Alante Capital's website.

View Details

Have you ever stopped to think how we’re treating biodiversity like it’s free to use? Our planet’s biodiversity does a great service for all humankind, and it's time we give it the financial value it deserves.

This is the core of natural capital investing, and today’s guest, Martin Berg, is here to share its inner workings.

He is the CEO of Climate Asset Management, and he made his way into climate finance at the UN’s first Climate Change Conference following the Kyoto Protocol. Martin's commitment to climate and nature-based solutions has led him through several leadership and strategy positions over the past two decades, integrating natural capital investing and carbon finance across both private and public sectors at organizations like the European Investment Bank, Merrill Lynch, RNK Capital, and the OECD.

Martin shares how Climate Asset Management started off as a joint venture between HSBC and Pollination. With $650 million of AUM raised after just 18 months, the company has become a global asset management leader in the field of natural capital investing, carbon offsets, and innovative financial vehicles that bridge the two.

The company is now investing across all asset classes, themes, and geographies, and even managing capital on behalf of high profile corporates such as Apple, among other large institutional investors.

In this episode, Martin shares his thoughts on how natural capital investing not only addresses climate change but also offers significant, long-term financial returns. He emphasizes the importance of moving large amounts of capital to this space for our planet’s future, and delivers a comprehensive view of the challenges and opportunities in natural capital and carbon finance.

Tune in to learn how nature’s value can turn into real financial gains that drive positive environmental impact.

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Show notes: {link}

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights into how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

—

Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—

Key Takeaways
Meet Martin Berg & his early experiences at the UN & OECD (00:00)
Becoming a Carbon Finance Specialist at RNK Capital in New York (13:15)
Martin’s time at Merrill Lynch, the European Investment Bank, & Pollination (21:26)
An overview of Climate Asset Management (42:19)
Martin defines what natural capital investment is (48:50)
Climate Asset Management's theory of change & investment examples (53:35)
What makes a strong nature-based investment? (01:02:45)
The investment process at Climate Asset Management (01:10:00)
Apple’s Restore Fund & The Future of Natural Capital Investing (01:23:53)
Rapid fire questions (01:32:14)

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Additional Resources
Listen to the episode about Tammy Newmark & her Eco Enterprises Fund.
Learn more about Climate Asset Management.
Connect with Climate Asset Manageme

View Details

Research shows that 81% of adults would like their investments to do some good as well as provide a financial return. However, the skepticism surrounding impact investing and limited awareness of the tools, standards, and regulations that support it holds many investors back in their impact journey.

What the world needs now is greater advocacy for integrating social good into mainstream investment practices, which is precisely what we're going to explore with today’s guest, Kieron Boyle.

Kieron Boyle is a visionary leader working on shaping policy around impact investing for social good. Currently, he’s the Chief Executive of the Impact Investing Institute in London, an independent, non-profit organization with the goal of making capital markets fairer and better aligned with the UK’s and the world’s current social and environmental needs.

Prior to the Impact Investing Institute, Kieron served as the Chief Executive of Guy's and St. Thomas' Foundation for seven years, managing their £1 billion foundation investment arm. His highly distinguished career spans several influential roles, including a senior advisor role at No. 10 Downing Street, which led to this Cabinet Office role as Head of Impact Investment and as a non-executive director at the world's first social investment bank — Better Society Capital.

With this breadth of experience, Kieron has consistently driven real-world change through innovative financial strategies focused on urban health and social good.

Our conversation delivers insights into Kieron’s goal of shaping investment frameworks that not only yield financial returns but also address crucial global challenges surrounding health and climate change. We discuss his achievements in his most prominent roles and also his efforts in establishing major initiatives like the Long-term Investors in People's Health (LIPH), a $7 trillion global alliance of institutional investors working to improve people's health.

Tune in to learn more about how you can contribute to societal change while also achieving financial growth.

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Show notes: {link}

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

—

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—

Key TakeawaysMeet Kieron Boyle, his early life, & formative experiences (00:00)
Kieron’s beginnings in strategy consulting (23:45)
The world's first social investment bank, Big Society Capital (45:43)
Kieron’s time at Guy’s and St. Thomas' Foundation (59:18)
Transition to the Impact Investing Institute & their theory of change (01:35:03)
Kieron’s plans for the Impact Investing Institute (01:45:16)
Rapid fire questions (01:54:17)

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Additional Resources
Learn more about Kieron here or connect with him on LinkedIn and X.
Visit the Impact Investing Institute website here.
Visit Big Society Capital here.

View Details

Portfolios looking to make a real-world impact are increasingly considering real assets as part of their investment strategies.

With a trillion-dollar investment gap in our global infrastructure, this seems like a smart move. Real asset investing is not only driving progress worldwide, it’s also a smart long-term investment to secure our planet’s future.

But some may ask… what is the real extent of impact that real assets can generate? In this episode, we’re going to find out.

My guest is Anish Majmudar, the Head of Real Assets for Impact & Private Equity at M&G plc. He studied economics at University College London and entered the world of finance and asset management in 2012 thanks to the graduate program at M&G, which at the time was Prudential Portfolio Management Group.

Anish is here to share his remarkable insights on overseeing a vast portfolio that amounts to nearly $400 billion in assets across public and private markets.

His curiosity for alternative assets ultimately led to a crucial role in establishing M&G’s private markets division, including an impact-focused subdivision dedicated to real assets, private equity, and growth equity.

In this episode, Anish and I lay out all the opportunities and challenges within the real asset impact investing space. He details how M&G's real asset impact fund — an open-ended fund with about $750 million committed to over 100 portfolio companies — is designed to provide substantial, sustainable returns by investing in projects that not only yield financial returns but also foster environmental and social advancements.

These investments aim to bridge the massive infrastructure spending gap with sustainable solutions, focusing on energy transition, responsible consumption and production, and social and economic inclusion.

We also discuss how this strategic approach is about much more than just capital investment for returns; it's about using private capital and M&G’s expertise to create clean energy, improve biodiversity, and open doors for underserved communities, thereby driving decarbonization and advancing global sustainability.

Tune in to gain a better understanding of the deep impact that strategic investments in real assets can bring to our world.

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Show notes: {link}

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

—

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
Follow SRI360° on X: https://twitter.com/SRI360Growth/
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/SRI360Growth/

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Key Takeaways
Meet Anish Majmudar & his start in asset management (02:58)
An overview of M&G plc & Anish’s focus on real asset impact investing (16:45)
Zoning in on M&G’s real asset impact fund (21:53)
M&G’s focus on energy transition, responsible consumption, & social inclusion projects (30:35)
How M&G identifies investment targets, impact washing, & investment exits (46:04)
Measuring impact & examples of M&G’s investment methodology (56:10)
Carbon and biodiversity credits & their competitive edge in real asset investing (01:06:35)
Rapid fire questions (01:11:50)

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Additional Resources

Connect with Anish on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anish-majmudar-cfa-8192933b/

Learn more about M&G plc here:
Main Website: https://www.mandg.com/
M&G Investments: https://www.mandg.com/investments/institutional/en-gb/about-us
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/m&g/

View Details

When you think of the circular economy, it’s inevitable to also bring up the significant challenges in the transition to this model, such as high transition costs, logistical complexities, inconsistent regulatory support, and low business and consumer participation. Regardless of its complexities, there’s hope in impact venture capital.

To share how venture capital investing is playing a huge role in overcoming these barriers is today’s guest, Lucy Mortimer, a founding partner of Archipelago Eco Investors and Archipelago Ventures. She’s a visionary force who is paving the way towards a circular economy through funding innovative solutions and technologies that drive systemic change in the way we manage and use materials.

With a career spanning over two decades, Lucy has cultivated a rich expertise in climate finance, renewable energy, and ESG. Her early days as an emissions broker at CantorCO2e and her experience in founding Galápagos Environmental Consulting exposed her to plastic waste innovations, inspiring the birth of Archipelago Eco Investors in 2020.

Archipelago’s mission is to tackle the challenges in waste management at material recovery facilities (MRFs), particularly plastics and microplastics — a sector full of inefficiencies and a disappointingly low rate of material reuse. They do it by supporting tech startups focused on plastic waste, from seed to Series B, aiming to increase the amount of material that remains within the circular economy while reducing carbon emissions and environmental impact.

In this episode, Lucy shares real examples of how Archipelago is revolutionizing the circular economy, digging into exciting projects and ideas in enzymatic recycling, pre-fill products, and bio-based materials. She also highlights the firm’s three-way investment strategy: the Future of Plastics Fund, the Circular Plastics Accelerator, and the Oceans Plastic and Microplastic Accelerator.

Join the conversation to learn how visionary investors like Lucy are not just betting on technology but are actively funding the transition towards a circular economy.

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Show notes: {link}

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

—

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—

Key Takeaways
Intro (00:00)
Meet Lucy Mortimer & her path into finance & sustainability (03:13)
An overview of Archipelago Eco Investors & Archipelago Ventures (30:25)
What the circular economy is and the economics of plastic recycling (43:47)
Lucy’s focus on AI-enabled separation technologies (55:06)
Archipelago Eco Investors’ theory of change (01:02:33)
Examples of Archipelago’s investment strategy & expected market returns (01:09:29)
How Archipelago invests and measures impact outcomes (01:21:01)
Impact washing & improving recycling’s profitability (01:32:30)
Rapid fire questions (01:50:14)

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Additional Resources
Learn more about Archipelago Ventures here.

Connect with Lucy Mortimer on LinkedIn.

Learn more about Grey Parrot & The Global Plastics Treat

View Details

Traditional timberland investing has historically attracted those with long investment horizons, drawn by its reputation as a solid inflation hedge and ability to deliver cash yields competitive with public equities over the long term.

But imagine investing in forests not just for profit, but as a powerful agent of global sustainability and conservation. It’s a powerful win-win!

This episode is all about impact-driven timberland investments and my guest is Charlotte Kaiser, a visionary leading the charge at BTG Pactual’s Timberland Investment Group (TIG) as the Head of Impact Finance.

After her first job in community development banking in Borneo with a USAID project for the Biodiversity Conservation Network, she moved to The Nature Conservancy, becoming Deputy Managing Director in the creation of NatureVest. Charlotte scaled their impact investment portfolio to over $2.5 billion, focusing on conservation-driven strategies that benefit both people and the planet.

Charlotte now oversees TIG’s $6 billion portfolio, creating impact strategies to hit production objectives, create financial returns, and support water, biodiversity, and climate conservation at scale through their core timberland assets.

We also touch on how Charlotte generates impactful results for ecosystems and communities through key alliances with organizations such as The Nature Conservancy and Conservation International, all through real asset impact investing, as well as her thoughts on carbon offsets, reforestation, and biodiversity protection initiatives across the continent.

Tune in to learn how Charlotte and TIG are redefining sustainable forestry with impact-driven strategies.

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Show Notes
—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

—

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—

Key TakeawaysIntro (00:00)
Meet Charlotte Kaiser and early interest in conservation (01:02)
Charlotte’s 13-years at The Nature Conservancy/NatureVest (17:29)
Carbon offsets explained & their effectiveness in reducing emissions (23:51)
Strategic partnerships with corporate giants. Is it greenwashing? (33:03)
Charlotte’s transition to BTG Pactual’s Timberland Investment Group (35:45)
The role of traditional forestry in investor portfolios (40:30)
TIG’S impact investing strategy, measuring impact & main risks (45:44)
Sustainable forestry’s role in climate change & biodiversity (56:34)
The competitive advantage of sustainable forestry & tech innovation (01:01:27)
Rapid fire questions (01:03:47)

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Additional Resources

Learn more about Charlotte Kaiser & Timberland Investment Group:

Charlotte’s Bio
TIG’s Website
TIG’s LinkedIn

Learn more about NatureVest here.
Connect with Charlotte Kaiser on LinkedIn.
Find the book mentioned "Nature's Keepers" here.

View Details

The world of finance has proven that it has the power to drive the global decarbonization effort and advance interest in ESG investments. ⁤⁤Learn how this is happening with one of the architects of the Green Bond Principles.

⁤Today's guest is Marilyn Ceci, a titan in the world of sustainable finance. ⁤She started in interest rate sales at JP Morgan, making her way to Head of ESG Debt Capital Market, and is now the Managing Director and Senior Advisor to the Center for Carbon Transition. ⁤

⁤With over three decades of experience, Marilyn spearheaded ESG debt capital market growth and co-authored the Green Bond Principles, a cornerstone in the development of the green bond market worldwide. She also steered JP Morgan to become the #1 Global Sustainable Bond Underwriter multiple years in a row.

⁤Marilyn is a major force in driving the global sustainability agenda forward, earning her several awards and recognitions such as Wall Street's Green Bond Warrior by Reuters and GlobalCapital's Top Most Impressive Green/SRI Investment Banker. ⁤

In this episode, I dig into the origins of the Green Bond Principles and their evolution. ⁤⁤Marilyn also shares how green bonds differ from traditional bonds, the role of bonds and fixed income in driving long-term ESG impact, and more. ⁤

⁤Join me in this powerful discussion on the transformative power of green bonds and how Marilyn’s work is sustainably financing the carbon transition.

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Show notes

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

—

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—
Key Takeaways:
Intro (00:00)
Meet Marilyn Ceci (02:31)
An overview of JP Morgan and their ESG debt strategy (07:48)
From interest rate sales to kickstarting the green bond market (12:07)
Incentives for issuing a green bond vs. a traditional bond & examples (23:36)
Insights on co-authoring the green bond principles & their evolution (29:50)
The role of bonds and fixed income in driving long-term ESG impact (39:25)
Supporting biodiversity, stakeholder engagement, & greenwashing (45:18)
Marilyn’s take on the new European green bond regulation (51:27)
Marilyn’s role at JP Morgan's Center for Carbon Transition (55:14)
The future of fossil fuel-related projects at JP Morgan (01:03:24)
Experience with teaching at Duke University (01:04:58)
Rapid fire questions (01:06:48)

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Additional Resources:JP Morgan's Center for Carbon Transition
JP Morgan's Carbon Compass Overview
JP Morgan's Carbon Compass Methodology
JP Morgan’s 2023 Climate Report
Planet Tracker Green Washing Report

Connect with Marilyn Ceci on

View Details

Emerging and frontier markets are full of opportunities often overlooked by the mainstream investment community.

Today’s guest will help us understand these markets and prove how systematic investing in publicly listed equities can unlock their potential for alpha and impact generation.

Meet Asha Mehta, the managing partner & CIO at Global Delta Capital, a US-based equity long-only investment manager focused on harnessing the power of capital to fuel social and economic development in international, emerging, and frontier markets.

With a background that begins with medical and anthropological studies at Stanford and a well-traveled upbringing, Asha developed an interest in microfinance lending in India after witnessing its extreme poverty in the late 90s. This experience led her to pioneering roles in sustainable and quant investing, making a mark on the international investment scene.

Recognized as one of the Top 10 Women in Asset Management and dubbed a "Brilliant Quant" by Forbes, Asha’s career highlights include leading emerging market strategies at Acadian Asset Management, where she launched the first quantitative/systematic frontier fund.

At the core of this episode is Global Delta Capital’s combination of systematic stock selection and a fundamental thematic overlay on the opportunities present in emerging and frontier markets. Asha and her team are not just seeking high returns; they're using their combined expertise to leverage ESG data and make a tangible impact on the world’s financial, environmental, and social landscape.

We also discuss a range of topics, including the importance of financial literacy, quantitative investing, examples of emerging markets that Global Delta Capital has invested in, and Asha’s take on the future of investment in developing economies.

If you’re intrigued by the power of capital to drive global change and want to learn from one of the leading voices in the field, this is an episode you cannot miss.

Tune in and be inspired by this adventure capitalist.

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Show notes: {link}

—

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

—

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

—

Key TakeawaysIntro (00:00)
Asha Mehta’s background and transition into finance (02:47)
Founding Global Delta Capital (24:43)
Overview of Global Delta Capital's strategy and focus areas (35:06)
Asha explains quantitative investing & strategies for sourcing reliable data (41:07)
The investment process at Global Delta Capital (55:16)
Discovering opportunities in the emerging markets: Saudi Arabia’s case (01:03:52)
Shareholder engagement, risk management, & examples of impact (01:11:39)
Asha’s book “Power of Capital” & emerging market predictions (01:21:03)
Rapid fire questions (01:32:45)

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Additional ResourcesFind Asha’s book “Power of Capital” here.

Learn more about Global Delta Capital here:
Website
LinkedIn

Connect with Asha Mehta on LinkedIn.

The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are that of Asha Mehta’s only,

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Millennials care much more about how their investments affect the world around them. Since they’re set to inherit the largest wealth transfer in history, we’re seeing a shift toward impact investing.

Today’s episode is proof.

My guest is Liesel Pritzker Simmons, a millennial who’s rewriting the rules of wealth management with her single-family office, Blue Haven Initiative. It’s one of the world’s first family offices to go all-in with impact investing across all asset classes, transforming their wealth into catalysts for social and environmental impact through strategic investments.

We begin the conversation with her transition from Hollywood's silver screens to the forefront of private wealth investing. Born into a lineage renowned for its philanthropic and entrepreneurial ventures, Liesel's journey is not just one of inheriting wealth but of redefining its purpose.

Through her acting work and her time at Columbia University, Liesel developed a diverse background that laid the groundwork for co-founding the Blue Haven Initiative with her husband in 2012.

At BHI, Liesel oversees a diverse portfolio that spans several asset classes, including traditional equities, private equity, and philanthropic programs, all structured to generate financial returns while addressing social and environmental challenges.

Liesel also works closely with organizations that support and advance the field of impact investing, co-founding The ImPact, a network of families committed to the conscientious stewardship of wealth, and serving as a board member of Activate, the IDP Foundation, and ImpactAssets.

Blue Haven Initiative demonstrates that a single-family office can do more than just manage wealth; it can wield it as a force for good through strategic placements in sustainable ventures and innovative startups.

Our conversation also explores topics of social responsibility, investing in fintech in Sub-Saharan Africa, the power of civic engagement, and catalytic and philanthropic capital.

Ready to learn how you can also transform your wealth into a force for positive change? Listen in.

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Show notes here.

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About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

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Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update.
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST.
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE.
Follow SRI360° on X.
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK.

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Key TakeawaysIntro (00:00)
Liesel’s transition from child actor to impact investor (02:37)
A Millennial’s POV on investing (22:11)
What the Blue Haven Initiative is & their investment approach (25:48)
Blue Haven’s impact goals and strategies (40:30)
A few examples of Blue Haven’s investments (56:17)
Investing in the youth vote (01:04:28)
Thoughts on impact washing, catalytic capital, and philanthropic capital (01:10:39)
Rapid fire questions (01:23:14)

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Additional ResourcesLearn more about Liesel’s foundation.
Learn more about the five dimensions of impact here.
Learn more about the Blue Haven Initiative.

Connect with Liesel Pritzker Simmons:LinkedIn

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In the pursuit of social change, every bit of investment can make a difference. Learn how Social Finance is leading the charge through social impact bonds.

Today, I’m interviewing Adam Swersky, CEO of Social Finance (UK), the non-profit enterprise responsible for creating the world’s first social impact bond. He’s here to talk all about social impact bonds and has been at the forefront of designing solutions that bring together finance with social impact since he joined the organization in 2014.

After studying economics at Cambridge, Adam became a project leader at the Boston Consulting Group, where he advised private, public, and not-for-profit organizations on strategy and transformation. There, he was seconded to the Clinton Health Access Initiative in West Africa to support Niger in accessing a subsidy for malaria medication.

Now as CEO of Social Finance, Adam shares how this organization, which predates the term "impact investing," leads the effort of designing solutions to solve social challenges beyond mere investment. He also details how they have broadened beyond investment to involve data collection and analysis, philanthropy, building new ventures, government advisory, and beyond.

From the mechanics of how social impact bonds function to several real-life examples of social bonds at work, this episode delivers a deep look into social impact financing.

We also touch on the capabilities and limitations of private capital in addressing social challenges, and Adam’s insights on leading an impact-focused business.

This conversation is a deeper exploration of how social impact bonds serve as a partnership between social investors, governments, and providers to design solutions to social challenges.

Feeling intrigued? Listen now to learn how Adam and Social Finance are pioneering the path for impactful investing.

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Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/https-sri360-com-podcast-adam-swersky/

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About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

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Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/

Visit the SRI360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/

Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/

Follow SRI360° on X: https://twitter.com/SRI360Growth/

Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/SRI360Growth/

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Key Takeaways

Intro (00:00)
Adam Swersky’s background and start at Boston Consulting Group (03:03)
An overview of Social Finance: How they began & what they do (18:07)
How Social Finance produces transformative social impact (30:11)
A look into the world’s first social impact bond for Peterborough inmates (35:59)
The Mental Health and Employment Partnership Program (45:51)
A detailed look into the workings of social bonds (50:39)
Measuring outcomes and managing risks for social impact bonds (57:58)
The evolution of social impact bonds (01:07:57)
Adam’s thoughts on leadership & rapid fire questions (01:19:54)

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Additional Resources

Learn more about Social Finance here.

Connect with Adam Swersky:

X/Twitter

Medium

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What if your investments could be a force for global change? At BlackRock, the world’s largest asset management company, they’re steering capital towards a sustainable future with green bonds and ESG fixed-income investing.

In this episode, I’m speaking with Ashley Schulten, the Head of ESG Investment for Global Fixed Income at BlackRock. After graduating from Vanderbilt University, Ashley entered the world of finance as a bond trader at First Union. From there, she evolved in the financial world at institutions like BNP Paribas, J.P. Morgan, and Goldman Sachs, before landing at BlackRock.

At BlackRock, where over 600 people manage more than $700 billion invested in sustainable strategies, Ashley oversees ESG investing and integration in the active fixed-income asset class.

Besides driving the change toward a sustainable future within finance, her leadership extends beyond BlackRock to influential roles in the TCFD and the Executive Committee of the ICMA Green and Social Bond Principles.

Ashley is also an Aspen Institute First Movers Fellow and sits on the board of the Mianus River Gorge, the first land conservancy project for the Nature Conservancy, which showcases her commitment to sustainability.

This episode highlights the power of integrating ESG data into investment analysis and decision-making. Ashley also shares how she saw the birth and development of the green bonds market, explaining how they work, and how BlackRock was an early adopter of this transformative financial instrument.

By leveraging green bonds, impact investing, and ESG data, BlackRock not only achieves its desired risk profiles and outcomes for investors but also drives meaningful change in the real economy.

Ashley and I also discuss BlackRock’s PEXT/NEXT ESG framework that her team uses to evaluate, tag, and categorize investments based on their positive and negative externalities.

Ready to learn the ins and outs of green bonds and ESG fixed-income investing? Tune in.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/ashley-schulten/

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

Connect with SRI360°:

Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X/Twitter
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

Key Takeaways:

Intro (00:00)
Meet Ashley Schulten and learn about her background (03:00)
Ashley’s evolution from options trader to Head of ESG of Global Fixed Income at BlackRock(13:22)
An overview of BlackRock & its sustainable strategies (21:09)
Green bonds & the role of publicly traded bonds in sustainability (25:50)
ESG criteria in investment analysis & an explanation of PEXT/NEXT (34:31)
ESG-integrated vs. ESG-tilted portfolios & examples of ESG fixed-income funds (46:58)
The evolution of green bonds into a trillion-dollar market & their role in sustainable finance (57:32)
Measuring impact on fixed-income portfolios & issuer engagement (01:05:22)
Final thoughts & rapid fire questions (01:13:50)

Additional Resources:

Connect with Ashley:
LinkedIn

Connect with BlackRock:
Twitter
Website

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Imagine your portfolio as a catalyst for change, where each investment contributes to solving the world's most pressing social and environmental challenges. That's the promise of impact investing.

Today, we're discussing everything you need to know about impact venture capital investing with a guest whose career trajectory embodies this ethos like no other—Gordon Eichhorst, a trailblazer in impact venture capital.

Gordon's journey into investing begins unconventionally.While he studied both engineering and economics at UCLA, he started his professional life by designing and launching spacecraft as an aerospace engineer and member of the NASA Advisory Council.

With the dip in aerospace developments in the '90s, Gordon found a renewed interest in economics, particularly in analytic finance, leading him to pursue an MBA from the University of Chicago. It was on this path that he positioned himself in leading roles as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs and later on, at Morgan Stanley, where he led the European technology banking team during the first internet bubble.

After his time at HSBC as Global Head of the Industrial and Technology sectors, he settled down in London and set up an investment banking advisory boutique, which ultimately seeded the ideas for making a bigger impact on the world.

As the founder of Impact Central, and a General Partner at Opto Impact Ventures, Gordon has been at the forefront of supporting purpose-driven entrepreneurs and startups on their path to growth. Impact Central has nurtured over 50 startups through ten cohorts, proving that solving social and environmental problems can go hand-in-hand with generating profit.

Today's episode explores Gordon's multifaceted career, from his early days as an engineer to his crucial role in shaping the arena of impact venture capital.

If you’ve been meaning to invest in or start a business with a greater purpose, listen in and learn all about how Gordon’s VC fund and accelerator programs bring profit and sustainability together.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/gordon-eichhorst/

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X/Twitter
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

Key Takeaways

Intro (00:00)

Gordon Eichhorst’s trajectory from engineer to investment banker (02:34)
Founding Opto Impact, Impact Central, and Chorus Network (11:10)
Gordon’s approach to impact investing (23:46)
Chorus Network, Opto Impact, and startup investing (36:02)
Opportunities in consumer goods, public service providers, & Tech for Good (45:45)
Gordon’s criteria for making an impact investment in an early-stage startup (51:11)
A real-life example of a successful impact investment (01:04:36)
Measuring impact and looking out for impact-washing (01:19:40)
Impact investing vs. other forms of impact investment (01:24:20)
The types of investors at Opto Impact (01:27:44)
Gordon’s thoughts on AI and final questions (01:33:35)

Additional Resources
Connect with Gordon Eichhorst

Impact Central Website

Opto Impact Website

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Does your pension fund contribute to a more sustainable world? CalSTRS does and has been since the 1970s/80s.

To lead this conversation is the very first pension fund guest for SRI 360°, Chris Ailman, one of the world’s most recognized and respected Chief Investment Officers.

Multiple award winner, Chris currently acts as CIO of CalSTRS, managing its $311.5 billion portfolio, making it the second-largest pension fund in the United States and the largest educational pension fund in the world.

With over 39 years of expertise in institutional investment, Chris has become a thought leader in incorporating ESG criteria into his long-term, “patient” capital investing approach.

His journey began with an early fascination with the stock market, leading him from the role of registered rep at Dean Witter to becoming a certified financial planner from USC. His interest in institutional investment carried him through pivotal roles, from Sacramento's county retirement system to the Washington State Investment Board, before landing at CalSTRS in 2000.

Chris has not only placed CalSTRS as a beacon of sustainable investing but has also been recognized globally for his innovative investment approach. He’s also the mind behind the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board, the chair of the 300 Club, and co-chair of the Milken Global Capital Markets Committee.

In this episode, Chris and I reflect on the evolution of ESG investing and its critical role in shaping our planet’s future. His narrative is not just about investment; it's a testament to his belief in the power of long-term investing and the need for a sustainable approach to wealth management.

We also explore the challenges of integrating ESG into traditional investment frameworks, the importance of shareholder engagement and corporate governance, and the future of sustainable investing.

Tune in to this conversation to gain valuable insights from one of the world’s most influential figures in pension fund management and sustainable investing.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/chris-ailman/

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X/Twitter
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

Key TakeawaysAn overview of the CalSTRS portfolio (17:14)
Chris’ theory of change on long-term capital investing (24:09)
The ins and outs of ESG investing strategy (25:40)
Sustainable investing, shareholder engagement, and corporate governance (40:26)
The CalSTRS net-zero emissions pledge (49:13)
Chris’ thoughts on nuclear power (55:00)
Differences between how Europe & USA view ESG (59:26)
Sectors making progress towards global sustainability (01:06:01)
Sustainability initiatives that Chris is involved in (01:12:13)
Final questions for Chris (01:15:42)

Additional Resources
Connect with Chris Ailman on LinkedIn CalSTRS WebsiteCalSTRS Sustainable Investing CalSTRS Path to Net Zero CalSTRS LinkedI

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The transition from traditional investment in energy production to renewable energy represents a significant shift in addressing climate change challenges.

To help us understand the intricacies of investing in renewables and utility-scale battery energy storage systems, I am joined by Ben Guest, the Managing Director of Gresham House New Energy Division.

Ben has over 29 years of investment experience that spans the investment spectrum across infrastructure, technology, public equities, and venture capital asset classes.

He has been a pioneer investor in battery energy storage systems since the early development days of the sector.

Ben's upbringing was truly global, with parents from Argentina and Africa, leading to diverse educational experiences in France, Japan, Sweden, and the UK. He holds a BEng in Mechanical Engineering from Imperial College.

Beginning his fund management career in 1994 at Lazard Asset Management, Ben later founded Hazel Capital in 2007. The acquisition of Hazel Capital in 2017 transformed it into Gresham House New Energy Division, where Ben manages substantial assets, including the Gresham House Energy Storage Fund Plc.

The conversation delves into Ben's expertise—in the renewable energy sector, particularly battery energy storage systems. He discusses the challenges of real-time supply and demand balancing, highlighting the vital role batteries can play in not only stabilizing the grid but also providing the key to transitioning the electrical grid to predominately renewable energy.

Ben breaks down the complexities of battery energy storage systems revenue models, addressing challenges posed by supply and demand fluctuations. He also shares his thoughts on the future of renewable energy infrastructure, emphasizing sustainability, carbon emissions reduction through battery energy storage systems, and the evolving landscape of the energy transition.

I hope you enjoy my conversation with Ben as much as I did!

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/ben-guest/

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X/Twitter
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK Key TakeawaysIntro (00:00)
Ben Guest's background and career path (02:24)
The shift from traditional to sustainable energy investments (15:24)
The role of battery storage in renewable energy (38:32)
Energy trading and battery management (47:22)
Assembling project rights for energy storage infrastructure (52:23)
Renewable energy investments and impact metrics (59:55)
Primary investors at Gresham House (01:05:58)
Risks facing battery energy storage systems investments (01:10:18)
Challenges around battery production and usage (01:15:10) Additional ResourcesBen Guest’s LinkedInGresham HouseGresham House New EnergyLazard Asset ManagementHazel Capital InvestmentCantillon Capital Management LLP

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In this episode, I speak with Paul Miller, Managing Partner and CEO at Bethnal Green Ventures, which has invested in over 150 startups that aim to create a more sustainable planet, an inclusive society, and healthy lives.

Paul is a trailblazer who spearheaded early-stage impact venture capital investing in the early 2010s at a time when this was highly unusual for VCs to do.

He was awarded an Officer of the British Empire award for services to startup investment in 2020.

Miller's early exposure to social and environmental issues, thanks to his parents' activism, laid the foundation for a unique perspective later in his career.

His stint as a policy advisor at Forum for the Future marked a pivotal period, working on sustainability with tech giants like Amazon and Vodafone.

This experience fueled a desire for a more direct impact, leading Miller to venture into the startup scene. In 2006, the School of Everything was born – a groundbreaking attempt to revolutionize adult education.

Around 2012, as the School of Everything continued to pioneer adult education, Miller's focus expanded to co-founding Bethnal Green Ventures. Securing an initial investment of approximately £150,000 from Nesta, a UK foundation, Bethnal Green Ventures took flight.

Google provided office space, and the venture attracted mentors and contacts to nurture the startups. Paul’s venture into impact venture capital with Bethnal Green Ventures was a pioneering move, especially considering the prevailing industry norms around 2012.

At a time when impact investing was in its nascent stages, Paul brought a level of authenticity and maturity to the venture capital landscape.

Today, he'll be taking us through his 'Tech for Good’ approach, investing in early-stage companies aiming for both high growth and positive social or environmental impact.

I hope you enjoy my conversation with Paul as much as I did!Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/paul-miller/

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X/Twitter
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

Key Takeaways

Intro (00:00)

Paul Miller’s academic and professional background (04:29)

How Bethnal Green Ventures came about (20:18)

Bring a level of authenticity and maturity to venture capital (23:36)

An overview of Bethnal Green Ventures (29:33)

Tech for Good Concept (32:22)

Theory of Change at Bethnal (35:00)

Impact VC Vs. other impact investing (37:59)

Examples of impact investments by Bethnal (50:09)

Measuring impact at early-stage businesses (58:38)

Role of AI in Tech for Good paradigm (1:08:41) Additional ResourcesBethnal Green Ventures

Bethnal Green Ventures on LinkedIn

Bethnal Green Ventures on Twitter

Paul Miller’s LinkedIn

School of Everything

Forum for the Future

Demos

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In the fast-evolving world of impact investing, few individuals stand out as prominently as Michael O'Leary. Recently appointed as a Partner and Co-Head of L Catterton Impact Fund, Michael has a wealth of experience and a compelling vision for responsible capitalism.

Formerly a Managing Director at Engine No. 1, Michael made headlines globally by orchestrating one of the most successful impact-focused activism campaigns in history.

Despite holding a mere 0.02% of share capital, Engine No. 1 successfully replaced three members of Exxon's board, underscoring the potency of impact activism.

He was also on the founding team of Bain Capital's impact fund and invested in consumer, industrial, and technology companies through Bain Capital's private equity fund.

Now, at L Catterton, one of the world's foremost private equity funds specializing in consumer brands, Michael leads the charge in integrating sustainability and impact considerations into the firm's investments.

Michael's co-authorship of 'Accountable: The Rise of Citizen Capitalism' further illustrates his commitment to shaping the future of capitalism. The book delves into the promises and challenges of the sustainable investing movement.

With a solid educational background, including a BA in Philosophy from Harvard University and an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business, Michael combines academic rigor with real-world impact.

In this episode, he shared a lot of insights into

Shareholder activism for sustainability and development
Citizen capitalism
Impact investing in the public markets
Impact investing in the consumer sector
And much more.

I really learned a lot from my discussion with Michael, and I hope you will too!

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/michael-oleary/About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X/Twitter
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

Key Takeaways

Intro (00:00)

Michael O'Leary’s background (01:43)

Impact investment thesis (11:44)

Citizen Capitalism (14:14)

Exxon shareholder activism campaign (30:36)

Using shareholder activism for long-term sustainable development (47:33)

Does impact investing have any impact on public markets (50:43)

Impact investing in the consumer sector (57:22)

The biggest challenge to impact investing (01:16:45)

Additional Resources

Michael O'Leary’s LinkedIn

L Catterton Website

Accountable: The Rise of Citizen Capitalism Book and Featured Publications Other Links Mentioned

Bain Capital

Engine No. 1

Deval Patrick

Warren Valdmanis

Exxon

An ESG Reckoning Is Coming

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In this episode, I am joined by Harald Walkate. Harald isn't just another voice in the sustainability space. He's a seasoned navigator, guiding us across the complex landscape of ESG and impact investing.

With 25 years of experience, he's seen both sides of the table, working with major asset managers and corporations. This unique perspective fuels his passion for bridging the gap between good intentions and real-world impact. He's a champion of blended finance, a powerful tool that blends public and private resources to tackle urgent challenges like climate change and poverty.

Born in Leiden, Netherlands, Harald Walkate studied law at Leiden University, later venturing into corporate law at Allen & Overy. After obtaining an MBA from the University of Chicago, Harald moved into business development at Bally Total Fitness, then shifted to Aegon, focusing on mergers and acquisitions.

At Aegon, he became the Global Head of Responsible Investment, leading to a move to Natixis in 2019 as the Head of ESG. In 2022, he founded Finding Ways Ahead, and in 2023, he initiated Route 17, an SDG funding & blended finance advisory firm.

In this enlightening conversation, we explore Harald's insights on ESG, impact investing, and the often misunderstood realm of blended finance.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/harald-walkate/About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X/Twitter
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

Key TakeawaysIntro (00:00)
Harald Walkate’s career journey (02:17)
How impact investing can make a difference (14:54)
Appreciation of the global financial markets (21:43)
Topics most misunderstood in ESG and impact investing (26:27)
ESG investing in the US (30:24)
The best evidence that the EGS toolkit enhances return (34:35)
Measuring the real-world impact of ESG investing (40:14)
Sustainable finance vs financing sustainability (43:38)
Blended finance for sustainable investing (01:04:51)

Additional ResourcesHarald Walkate’s LinkedIn
Route17 Website
Finding Ways Ahead

Other Links MentionedAllen and Overy
Bally Total Fitness
Aegon Asset Management
Natixis
Center for Sustainable Finance and Private Wealth
University of Chicago Booth School of Business
Financial Conduct Authority
Marc Andreessen
Robert W. van Zwieten
Jean Raby
10 things every investor should know about Net Zero

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In the world of hedge funds, where the focus on environmental, social, and governance (ESG) factors is often considered secondary, Nordis Capital stands out as a pioneer.

Born in a small farming town near Montreal, François Bourdon's journey into sustainable investment is as unique as the hedge fund he co-founded. From working in agriculture to earning the moniker "Mr. Risk Manager" on the trading floor, Francois's diverse experiences shaped his path.

After pursuing actuarial mathematics at Concordia University, François joined MetLife and later transitioned to risk management. Subsequently, he held diverse roles at Fiera Capital, ultimately becoming Chief Investment Officer.

He later joined Sustainable Market Strategies (SMS) with the goal of creating Nordis, a hedge fund built from the ground up around responsible investing.

Nordis Capital's mission is to contribute to the fight against climate change and social inequality through sustainable market strategies. What sets them apart is their commitment to long positions aligned with ESG megatrends and their unique approach of taking short positions against companies that fall short on sustainability metrics.

Nordis Capital identifies five ESG megatrends that will transform economies and societies, forming the basis of their investment approach.

Tune in to this episode to learn more about François Bourdon's journey and how Nordis Capital is pioneering responsible investing in the hedge fund landscape.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/francois-bourdon/About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

Connect with SRI360°:Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X/Twitter
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK Key TakeawaysIntro (00:00)
Bourdon's journey into SRI (02:30)
Nordis Capital's mission and strategies (18:31)
Who are the investors of Nordis (21:29)
5 ESG megatrends (26:14)
Nordis investment process (36:27)
Double materiality analysis (47:08)
Why are other players not pricing ESG (50:30)
How sustainable investing impacts corporate behavior (53:40)
The future of sustainable investing (01:00:27)

Additional ResourcesFrançois Bourdon’s Facebook
François Bourdon’s LinkedIn
François Bourdon’s Email: fbourdon@nordiscapital.com
Nordis Capital's Website Other Links mentioned in this episode:Fiera Capital
MetLife
Sustainable Market Strategies
Atlantis Capital Group
François Boutin-Dufresne
Felix-A.Boudreault
The Fourth Turning by Neil Howe
VIX futures

The Fourth Turning: An American Prophecy

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In this episode, we explore Ed Marcum's unique journey from Santa Cruz to leading the charge against labor exploitation as the Managing Director of Working Capital Fund.

Marcum's career choices were heavily influenced by his parents' commitment to social activism. After studying political science at UC Berkeley, Marcum had a brief but impactful tennis career, instilling in him lessons of resilience and hard work.

Following his tennis stint, Marcum recognized the need to integrate business skills into mission-driven work. Pursuing an MBA at Wharton broadened his skill set, opening the door to impact investing. This transition began at the Omidyar Network, working for Pierre & Pam Omidyar and focusing on human rights issues.

Within Humanity United, Marcum spearheaded efforts against labor exploitation in multinational companies' supply chains. Identifying technological innovations to tackle supply chain issues, Marcum laid the groundwork for the Working Capital Fund. Initially incubated within Humanity United, the fund became an independent entity in 2020, marking a pivotal moment in its evolution.

They invest in startups offering scalable solutions to enhance supply chain accountability, promoting a more equitable and sustainable global supply chain ecosystem.

Marcum highlights a significant change in recent years – the global push for supply chain transparency. Companies must now take responsibility for knowing who is in their supply chain and ensuring responsible practices. This shift creates a vast and growing market for investments aimed at improving transparency and accountability.

I enjoyed my discussion with Ed and learned a lot about the dark side of global supply chains.

Please enjoy!

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/ed-marcum/

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes.

Connect with SRI360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update
Visit the SRI360° PODCAST
Visit the SRI360° WEBSITE
Follow SRI360° on X/Twitter
Follow SRI360° on FACEBOOK

Key TakeawaysIntro (00:00)
Ed Marcum's career journey (02:43)
Working Capital Fund (09:39)
Who is in the global supply chains? (16:30)
The scale of the labor exploitation problem (21:27)
What constitutes labor exploitation (24:34)
Working Capital Fund's theory of change (28:20)
How Working Capital Fund deploys capital (39:49)
Investment selection process for the fund (41:33)
Red flags to look out for in supply chains (55:03)
Outro (01:06:29)

Additional ResourcesEd Marcum’s LinkedIn
Working Capital Fund Twitter/X
Company Website

Other links mentioned in this episodeGlobal Education Partnership
Humanity First Initiative
Omidyar Network
Pierre Omidyar
Pam Omidyar
Humanity United
Save Darfur Advocacy Movement

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Andrew Behar, the CEO of As You Sow, is a well-known advocate for shareholder advocacy. With a rich background in documentary filmmaking, entrepreneurship, and technological innovation, he brings a unique perspective to shareholder advocacy.

Behar's journey as a shareholder advocate was influenced by his personal experiences. Growing up near Long Island Sound in Connecticut, he witnessed the environmental impact of industry on his surroundings. These early observations of environmental degradation left a lasting impression on him.

Before dedicating himself to shareholder advocacy, Behar explored entrepreneurial endeavors, including a medical device company that earned him five patents and demonstrated his commitment to using technology for positive change.

Behar then transitioned to As You Sow in 2010. As CEO of a nonprofit organization, he began advocating for values-aligned investing and using shareholder influence to drive corporate responsibility.

Behar emphasizes that As You Sow practices shareholder advocacy, which focuses on engaging with companies to improve their practices. Shareholder activism, on the other hand, often involves taking over boards or liquidating companies, a different approach that doesn't align with As You Sow's goals.

The core philosophy of As You Sow is to compel companies to reduce material risks on various issues, including climate change, diversity, equity, inclusion, and more. Under Behar's leadership, As You Sow has developed valuable tools to empower shareholders, including the Investor Value Tool and As You Vote Tool.

The goal is to create a win-win situation where companies make responsible decisions that benefit all stakeholders.

In this episode, we'll explore Behar's journey and the core principles of shareholder engagement, shedding light on how it works, where it falls short, and how it can be improved.

I really learned a lot from my discussion with Andrew, and I hope you will too! Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/andrew-beharAbout the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, I interview a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

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Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/

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Key Takeaways

Intro (00:00)

Andrew's journey into shareholder advocacy (06:55)

Our rights as shareholders (15:31)

The concept of materiality in advocacy (22:18)

Investor Values and As You Vote Tools (25:23)

Shareholder activism vs shareholder advocacy (38:48)

Successful engagement campaigns (45:38)

As You Sow escalation process (50:31)

Driving change amidst culture wars (01:03:44)

Is Shareholder Advocacy always a win-win (01:04:38)

What asset managers need to do differently (01:08:54)

Disclosure issues with private equity (01:20:17)

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In this episode, I am speaking with Tammy Newmark, CEO and Managing Partner of EcoEnterprises Fund. Billed as ‘An Investment Fund for Nature’, EcoEnterprises Fund has pioneered investing in small businesses in Latin America that preserve the integrity of natural capital while contributing to local economies and biodiversity.

Originally an “East Coast Girl”, Tammy completed her undergraduate studies at Smith College in Massachusetts in the US. Following her studies, a desire to move to New York and her mother’s serendipitous cocktail party meet led to Tammy working at JP Morgan Chase, which was her first step into the world of finance. Tammy then went on to study for an MBA at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, before moving to Washington DC, where she worked for the International Finance Corporation.

Tammy has been a pioneer and a leader in the impact investing space for over thirty years, and in this episode we join her impact journey, starting at the IFC, moving on to a start-up venture fund, the Environmental Enterprises Assistance Fund, then to Technoserve and finally The Nature Conservancy, where the EcoEnterprises Fund was first launched by Tammy in 1998, before spinning off as an independent women-run investment manager in 2010.

In this episode, we discover more about EcoEnterprises Fund, their mission and why they focus solely on Latin America. We hear about their typical investor profile and what attracts them to natural capital. We discuss EcoEnterprises Fund’s investment process and the screens and due-diligence used when verifying investments and why they only invest in companies that have working partnerships with local communities, to ensure a vested interest among all stakeholders for the long-term sustainability of natural resources.

Tammy provides some real-life examples of companies that the EcoEnterprises Fund have invested in and how they have made an impact. We talk about potential problems with transparency in supply chain, impact washing, and of course, no episode would be complete without my rapid-fire questions.

I really enjoyed this insightful discussion with Tammy, and I hope you enjoy it too!

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
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In this episode, I am chatting with Micah Schulz, Head of Office at Lendlease Australia.

Micah grew up on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland, in a farming area, and living on what he describes as a ‘hobby farm’, with horses, cows, and chickens. He studied Business Management, majoring in Real Estate & Development at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, a decision which could perhaps be attributed to serendipity, rather than a lifelong desire to work in this field. Having thought about a career in Physiotherapy, he was advised against this by a Physiotherapist, who told him the latter was boring and would destroy his hands! At the time, his now brother-in-law was working as a real estate valuer, and the idea of travelling around (and the idea of working in an office on the beach like his brother-in-law!) led Micah to the idea of a career in this field.

Following a season on the slopes of Whistler, B.C., Micah began his career at Colliers International, working as Sales Assistant to the sales team. Micah recounts how his then-boss planted the idea to work as a fund manager and eventually, he moved to Sydney as Assistant Fund Manager at Investa Property Group. He later landed in his first Fund Manager role at Centuria Capital, but returned to Investa when he was offered the opportunity to work on Investa’s flagship wholesale office fund, attracted by the idea of working with a broader portfolio of large, prominent assets around the country.

Micah shares how he finally landed at Lendlease in 2016, motivated by the scale of their organisation and its global presence, as well as key elements of the strategy of the APPF Commercial fund on which he worked, first as Deputy Fund Manager, and later as Fund Manager.

In this episode, we hear more about Micah’s transition into the sustainable real estate investment space. Micah gives us an overview of Lendlease and how creating powerful outcomes for the end customer is a key part of their strategy. We hear how sustainability is part of Lendlease’s DNA, and this becomes clear as Micah discusses some of the real-life developments that Lendlease have driven, such as the Barangaroo Precinct in Sydney’s central business district.

We discuss the journey to net carbon zero within the real estate space, and Micah shares his optimism on the impact that technological innovation will have on this journey. We talk about Lendlease’s typical investors, their screening and due-diligence process, and much more.

Micah’s passion in his field is clear and I thoroughly enjoyed our conversation. I hope you will too!

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
Follow SRI 360° on TWITTER: https://twitter.com/SRI360Growth/
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In this episode, I sit down with Stefano Bacci, Partner and ESG Manager at Ambienta, a private equity asset manager that was purpose-built to pursue environmental sustainability investing in resource efficiency and pollution control. Ambienta is the largest private equity fund manager in Europe dedicated to investing entirely in environmental sustainability.

Stefano grew up in Milan, (despite maintaining that he is culturally from Tuscany!). When choosing his career path, he was advised by his parents – both chemists – not to follow in their footsteps if he ever wanted to make any money (!) which led him to study Chemical Engineering at the Politecnico di Milano. He then went on to complete a PhD in Physical Chemistry at the Technische Universität Darmstadt in Germany.

Stefano’s early career took him to Switzerland where he worked for Ciba-Geigy (later acquired by BASF) in numeric modelling. Five years later, a chance conversation with a fellow graduate from his Ciba-Geigy induction period led him to study for an MBA, starting in Helsinki, then transferring to MIT in Boston.

Following his MBA, Stefano spent ten years working in consultancy at the Boston Consultancy Group, which brought him back home to Milan for a year, then on to Stockholm, then to Helsinki where he set up the BCG office and finally to Germany where he spent several years working in the run-up to the ‘dotcom bubble’. It was at this juncture in his life that he decided to switch to investment management and began working at Palamon Capital Partners, where he spent several years, before returning to Italy to work with Ambienta.

In this episode, Stefano takes us on a journey from his studies in chemical engineering right through to the point when Ambienta co-founders Nino Tronchetti Provera and Rolando Polli convinced him that sustainability was the way forward. We learn more about these two people who inspired him in his early days at Ambienta and how his passion for sustainability has grown over the years.

We discuss how Ambienta considers sustainability and ESG as two very different things, and how they invest in businesses where resources are used more efficiently in order to reduce pollution, waste in landfills and improve air and water quality. We discuss how Ambienta measures the impact of their investments, their typical investors, why sustainability is primary in their investment selection, and much more.

I really learned a lot chatting with Stefano, whose passion for environmental sustainability is clear. I hope you enjoy listening to our conversation!

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
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Mark Dowding is Chief Investment Officer at BlueBay Asset Management. Mark is a macro fixed income specialist who meets regularly in that context with global policymakers and has been actively involved in sovereign ESG engagement. He began his career in 1993 as a fixed income portfolio manager, after earning his economics degree at the University of Warwick.

In today’s episode, Mark speaks about his early career, how he came to be the Head of Global Fixed Income at Invesco at only 28 years of age, his move to Frankfurt to work with Deutsche Asset Management and why he chose to move with his family back to the UK, where he joined BlueBay Asset Management in 2010.

We discuss his time at the University of Warwick and whether Warwick lives up to its title of the happiest place to live in Britain! Mark tells us about his love of football and his support of Chelsea F.C. and then we move onto the more serious stuff, with an overview of BlueBay and Mark’s role as Chief Investment Officer.

We hear how BlueBay incorporates ESG criteria into all of their investment decisions, and how they have incorporated ESG analysis into their investment teams rather than structuring it as a separate research function. Mark shares real life examples of their engagement activities with sovereign issuers, how they have shorted bonds of issuers who they perceive as performing poorly from an ESG perspective and how their investing strategies in sovereign bonds have impacted government policy and behavior.

No fixed income ESG discussion would be complete without talking about greenwashing, and we discuss to what extent this practice exists at the sovereign level. We speak about BlueBay’s Impact Aligned Bond Fund and finally, I quiz Mark with some rapid fire questions such as the single most important challenge in the fixed income space, and his advice on how to get into the sustainable fixed income space.

I thoroughly enjoyed this insightful discussion with Mark and I hope you will too!

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
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Mitch Reznick is the Head of Sustainable Fixed Income at Federated Hermes and the Co-Portfolio Manager of the company’s SDG Engagement High Yield Credit Fund. With over 23 years experience in the corporate credit industry, he was previously the Co-Head of Credit Research for the global credit team at Fortis Investments, and prior to that was an associate analyst in the leveraged finance group at Moodys Investors Service in New York.

Mitch has a Master’s in International Affairs from Columbia University, a Bachelor’s in history from Pitzer College and is a CFA charterholder. He is Co-Chair of the Federated Hermes Sustainability Investment Centre and holds several advocacy roles, including founding board member of the European Leveraged Finance Association (ELFA); Co-Chair of the Credit Risk and Ratings Advisory Committee at the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) and workstream member CFO Coalition for the SDGs of the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC).

Formerly, Mitch was Co-Chair of the Capital Markets Advisory Committee of the IFRS Foundation; member of the Sovereign Working Group (PRI); workstream member of the UK-China Green Finance Task Force; and served on the Green Finance Advisory of the City of London.

In today’s episode, Mitch recounts that it was early in his career while working in the leveraged finance team at Moody’s that he fell in love with finance in general and specifically with the high yield corporate credit world. He later moved to London as a high yield fund manager for Fortis Investments and then left in 2008 for Federated Hermes as part of a team hired to rebuild the credit business in the wake of the global financial crisis.

Mitch discusses how early on he observed that Federated Hermes was well-placed to bring sustainable fixed income solutions to the market and since then he has been focused on ESG integration and building investment solutions that deliver financial returns while delivering positive change for society and the environment with engagement being the catalyst. Mitch describes in detail the Federated Hermes SDG Engagement High Yield Credit Fund which he is Co-Manager. He discuss at length the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and what they mean in the fixed income space.

We talk about greenwashing, ‘greeniums’, ‘step-ups’, transition bonds and much more.

Mitch is active on a number of technical working groups and work streams that are currently developing the connection between sustainability and fixed income investments. As a representative of a large investor in the fixed income space, he is very much in the flow of this evolution and represents the current thinking on the subject.

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
Follow SRI 360° on TWITTER: https://twitter.com/SRI360Growth/
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Daniel Klier is CEO at ESG Book, part of the Arabesque Group, a global group of financial technology companies offering sustainable investment, advisory and data services through their advanced ESG and AI capabilities. Prior to joining Arabesque, Daniel was Global Head of Sustainable Finance for HSBC, where he developed the global climate strategy for the bank and led the development of the sustainable finance business across the corporate bank, retail bank, and asset management business. He joined HSBC in 2013 as Group Head of Strategy in London, following nine years as a Partner at McKinsey & Company.

Daniel is a member of the Board of Sustainable Energy for All and has also chaired the Bank of England Climate Risk Working Group and the Sustainable Finance Working Group at the Institute of International Finance.

At the time of our discussion, Daniel was CEO of Arabesque S-Ray, the predecessor to ESG Book, so when we refer to Arabesque S-Ray in our discussion, we’re essentially talking about what is now ESG Book. In this episode, we talk about how Daniel came into the world of sustainable finance from a more traditional private equity and financial services background. We hear an overview of Arabesque and their mission to mainstream sustainable finance and we discuss what quantitative investing actually means.

Daniel explains more about what was, at the time of our discussion, the Arabesque S-Ray artificial intelligence platform and how it allows companies to customize their investment strategies. We look at greenwashing in the public equities landscape and how Arabesque protect against this in the algorithms used in their AI technology. We discuss how Arabesque S-Ray differs from competing ESG data providers, and Daniel introduces us to the ESG Book initiative, which at that time had not yet been launched.

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
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Dave Chen is CEO at Equilibrium, a sustainability driven, real asset investor in the agriculture and food, and carbon transition infrastructure. He is responsible for strategy, executive leadership, and developing the firm’s investment products and asset strategies. Dave is a preeminent thought leader in sustainable real asset investing, particularly in the realm of agriculture and food investments that achieve measurable impact investment results while realizing financial returns attractive to institutional investors.

Prior to joining Equilibrium, Dave was General Partner at OVP Venture Partners, CEO/Co-Founder of GeoTrust (acquired by VeriSign in 2006); Founder of The Ascent Group; and served on the San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank Board.

Dave is an Adjunct Professor of Finance at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University and taught sustainable finance and impact investing at Stanford Graduate School of Business from 2011 to 2013.

In today’s episode, Dave gives an overview of Equilibrium, provides insight into the genesis of Equilibrium’s founding, discusses how value chain analysis is in their DNA and how he philosophically considers sustainability and sustainable investing as a competitive advantage. He speaks about how Equilibrium was focused on institutional investors from the beginning and how today they make up 90% of their clients. Dave describes Equilibrium’s four main funds, including their Controlled Environment Foods Fund, and he speaks about what he calls ‘Distributed Abundance’ where hi-tech, controlled environment agriculture disconnects climate from geography enabling the ultimate ‘Do-It-Yourself’ and ‘Bring-Your-Own’ climate anywhere on earth.

We delve deeper into this concept of ‘Distributed Abundance’ and the countries at the center of controlled environment technology, the potential for this technology to develop and move into other food categories in the future, and how we will see a complete ‘rethinking of agriculture’ in the years to come.

I really enjoyed this insightful discussion with Dave, and I hope you will too!

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/dave-chen

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
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Philipp Mueller is Chief Executive Officer of BlueOrchard, a leading global impact investment manager and member of the Schroders Group, that connects millions of entrepreneurs in emerging and frontier markets with investors. Philipp joined BlueOrchard in 2018 from Partners Group, where he served in a number of capacities in Switzerland and in the UK, most recently as Senior Vice President of Investment Solutions. Phillipp holds an MBA from ETH Zurich and a master’s degree in Law from the University of Zurich.

During today’s discussion, we discuss Philipp’s time as an Officer in the Mountain Infantry during his time in compulsory military service in Switzerland. Philipp shares how after completing his Masters degree in law he decided to pursue a career in finance instead and he discusses the reasons behind his eventual transition from traditional finance to impact investing, shedding light on his motivations and choices.

We discuss Philipp’s role as CEO at BlueOrchard, the company mission and how they prioritize making a positive environmental and/or social impact, while still achieving market rate financial returns. Philipp explains what microfinance means, its potential to advance financial inclusion, and shares some real life examples of microfinance impact. We speak together about blended finance and how this can change the risk return profile of certain investments in order to attract more private investors, and we look at the broad range of BlueOrchard’s investor profiles and the potential benefits of investing in microfinance as an asset class. Philipp shares his views on the role of advancing technology in impact and microfinance and much more.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/philipp-mueller

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
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Amy Novogratz is Co-Founder of AquaSpark, a global investment fund based in Utrecht, the Netherlands. AquaSpark is a holding company of innovative, novel solutions to some of aquaculture’s biggest challenges, investing in companies developing a sustainable, optimal food system all along the aquaculture value chain.

Amy’s career as a change agent has focused on building collaborative solutions to some of the world’s most pressing challenges. Her early career highlights include helping set up SPAN, the Social Policy Action Network; developing and producing ‘Chat the Planet’, a web and television entity that bridged young people globally; later she served as Director of the TED Conference’s annual TED Prize for almost a decade, leading more than 20 global collaborations across a broad spectrum of sectors, including healthcare, education, science, technology, conservation, art, and activism.

Notable projects during Amy’s time at TED include: Jamie Oliver’s Food revolution, JR’s Inside Out Project, Bono’s One.org and Sylvia Earle’s Mission Blue. It was on an expedition with marine biologist Sylvia Earle to the Galapagos Islands that Amy met Mike Velings, with whom she developed a shared vision to transform the aquaculture fish farming sector into a more sustainable industry, leading to the launch of AquaSpark – the first global investment fund dedicated to sustainable aquaculture – in 2013.

Amy serves on the boards of eFishery, Energaia, and Xpert Sea.

In today’s episode, we discuss the aquaculture industry and the need for its transition into a more sustainable food supply. A natural-born change agent, Amy recounts her odyssey journey starting out early in her career in activist theater which she soon felt was too indulgent. She then did an about-face and worked at a series of jobs, first with a think tank, and moving later to co-found the Social Policy Action Network with the objective of impacting culture. This ultimately led to a number of television-related media projects and eventually landing at the TED conferences.

Amy explains the challenges that the sustainable aquaculture sector faces and the increasing role of technology in finding sustainable aquaculture solutions. We discuss Aqua-Spark’s theory of change and the eight components they use to measure their sustainability. She speaks about AquaSpark’s ecosystem approach to portfolio management, how they select their investments, their due diligence process, examples of investments they’ve made and much more.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/amy-novogratz

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
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Stewart Langdon is Partner and Co-Head of South Asian Investments at LeapFrog Investments, a private equity impact investment firm that invests in financial and healthcare services businesses providing essential services to low-income populations in emerging markets. Stewart leads financial services investments, primarily in India, and digital financial services across Asia and Africa, with a focus on deal sourcing and execution.

Prior to joining LeapFrog, Stewart’s career encompasses corporate finance, investment banking, and capital markets advisory as a vice president at Rothschild & Co. He specialized in the insurance, banking, and telecom sectors across Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.

A member of the Emerging Markets Private Equity Association, Stewart is also a trustee of the Asia Scotland Institute and chairs its business advisory council. He sits on the boards of a number of portfolio companies including WorldRemit, BIMA and Cignifi. He holds a Bachelor of Laws degree from the University of Aberdeen and is a chartered accountant.

In today’s episode we discuss Stewart’s early career and how he made the switch from investment banking to impact investing, joining LeapFrog Investments in 2010. We learn about LeapFrog’s investment decision-making process with both financial return and impact metrics being equally weighted and the financial and non-financial screens they use. Stewart speaks about how LeapFrog verifies and measures the impact of their investments using the company’s FIIRM framework.

Stewart gives insights into LeapFrog’s key areas of competence, how they avoid greenwashing and “impact washing” and he describes the impact of technology on the ability to provide large numbers of people with financial and healthcare services. From the transformative power of technology to their evolving investor profile, he provides valuable insights into the intersection of financial returns, sustainable investing strategies, and measurable positive impact outcomes. During this episode, we look at LeapFrog’s typical investor profile and how this has changed over time, and we hear some real-life examples of investments that LeapFrog has made.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/stewart-langdon

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
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Patrick Drum leads the Environmental, Social & Governance investment research at Saturna Capital, a private investment management firm with $5.5 billion in assets under management. He is the portfolio manager for Saturna’s Sustainable Global Fixed Income Fund; the Amana Participation Fund (the oldest and largest family of funds in the United States following principles of Islamic finance), and the firm’s institutional subsidiary, Saturna Sdn. Berhad in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Drum holds a BA in economics from Western Washington University and an MBA from Seattle University Albers School of Business and is a CFA® Charterholder and Certified Financial Planner®.

Previously, Drum was Chairman of the United Nation’s Principles for Investment (UNPRI) Fixed Income Outreach Subcommittee and an adjunct professor of finance for the Sustainable MBA Program at Pinchot’s Bainbridge Graduate Institute.

In our discussion, we hear about Patrick’s early career and how he came to be involved in sustainability back in 2008. We learn that about 50 percent of investors in Saturna’s Sharia compliant funds are not of the Muslim faith and discuss why a non-Muslim investor might be attracted to investing in their funds. Patrick describes the basic tenets of Sharia compliance, he speaks about the debt-like instrument that is called a ‘Sukuk’ and explains how they differ from traditional bonds. We hear about the screens Saturna uses and how each investment goes through a ‘Fatwa’ by a recognised Sharia body, and much more.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/patrick-drum

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
Follow SRI 360° on TWITTER: https://twitter.com/SRI360Growth/
Follow SRI 360° on FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/SRI360Growth/

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Radha Kuppalli is Managing Director of Impact and Advocacy at New Forests, a leading asset manager in institutional funds management business, providing forestry and land-based investment solutions through sustainable forestry investments. Her 20-year career has been focused on driving capital markets toward investing in climate change solutions and sustainable development.

Radha is a director of the Board of New Forests Pty Ltd, member of the company’s Executive Committee, and a member of all Investment Committees. She is also a Non-Executive Director for Timberlink Australia and Greening Australia and chairs Greening Australia’s investment committee. She earned an MBA and a Masters in Environmental Management from Yale, serves on the university’s Advisory Board at the Center for Business and Environment, and is an associate of the Yale World Fellows Program.

In this episode, we discuss Radha’s studies, her early career, the ‘sliding doors’ moments that led to her working at Natsource and joining New Forests back in 2006, and how Radha’s care for the environment has shaped her career. We learn how New Forests select their investments, who their typical investors are and the attractions of investing in forestry as an asset class. We discuss New Forests’ three main regions and the different approaches used in each. And we talk about the California Cap and Trade Scheme emissions trading system, conservation easements, repatriating land back to the Yurok tribe and much more.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/radha-kuppalli

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
Follow SRI 360° on TWITTER: https://twitter.com/SRI360Growth/
Follow SRI 360° on FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/SRI360Growth/

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Simon Bond is Executive Director of Responsible Investment Portfolio Management and until recently, was the portfolio manager of the Threadneedle UK Social Bond Fund and the Threadneedle (Lux) European Social Fund at Columbia Threadneedle Investments, the asset management arm of Ameriprise Financial, which has total assets under management of $593 billion (as of 30 June 2021). With over three and a half decades of experience in the fund management industry, Simon is a recognized specialist in corporate credit.

In this episode, we discuss Simon’s early career, starting as a desk assistant in the investment management department of Hambros Bank under Peter Hill-Wood, and how his enthusiasm and tendency to ask lots of questions led him to work in bonds. We hear how Simon discovered what he calls the soft side of finance, where investing could produce benefits for society. We learn how he conceived and launched the Threadneedle UK Social Bond Fund and the Threadneedle (Lux) European Social Fund, both of which invest in diversified portfolios of fixed income securities, with social impact criteria. Simon explains how his approach to portfolio management includes positive inclusion, evidence-based decision making, and engagement with management. We also talk about how he integrates social impact into everything he does (including his support of premiership football club Tottenham Hotspur!)

Simon is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute for Securities and Investment and holds the Investment Management Certificate and the General Registered Representatives Certificate.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/simon-bond

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
Follow SRI 360° on TWITTER: https://twitter.com/SRI360Growth/
Follow SRI 360° on FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/SRI360Growth/

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Peter Arensman is an experienced entrepreneur and investor in sustainable agriculture and food chains. He is a Founding Partner of the investment company People, Planet, Profit, and the venture capital investment firm, Future Food Fund.

Growing up on a farm in the Netherlands, Peter went on to study for a Masters in Business & Economics at the University of Rotterdam. Following his graduation, he took a job with he American global food firm, Cargill, but soon realized that working for a large corporation wasn’t for him, recognizing he was an entrepreneurial at heart. This led him to first found the IT company, Attecc BV, and then acquire the company, Signal. After eight years, he decided to sell both companies and ‘started again’ at the age of thirty-five, founding the financial professional subcontracting company BAS Consultancy.

In this episode, we discuss how, after reaching a certain level of financial success, Peter realized he gained no satisfaction from earning more and more money and instead found satisfaction in gaining more knowledge. Hence his return to University to study for his third Degree in Agricultural Engineering.

Peter then founded People, Planet, Profit, which was his first venture into responsible investment, and then later he went on to found the VC investment firm, Future Food Fund. In this episode, I discuss with Peter Future Food Fund’s portfolio approach, how they select their investments and you will hear some real-life examples of investments they have made.

A strong business development professional, Peter sits on the boards of several companies, is a Guest Lecturer at Wageningen University, and holds Masters Degrees in Business Economics, Financial Law, and Agricultural Engineering.

I really enjoyed this far-reaching discussion with Peter and hope you will too!

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/peter-arensman

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
Follow SRI 360° on TWITTER: https://twitter.com/SRI360Growth/
Follow SRI 360° on FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/SRI360Growth/

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Ron Gonen is the Founder and CEO of Closed Loop Partners, a New York-based investment firm comprised of venture capital, growth equity, private equity, project-based finance, and an innovation center that’s focused on building the circular economy.

Ron spent his early childhood years in Israel, moving to Philadelphia around the age of five. He studied History and Economics at the University of Massachusetts and after graduating, joined Andersen Consulting as a trainee, then moved on to Deloitte Consulting. In 2004 he co-founded RecycleBank while studying for his MBA and then he went on to become New York City’s Deputy Commissioner of Sanitation, Recycling, and Sustainability, during the Bloomberg administration.

In 2013, Ron was named the city’s ‘Public Official of the Year’ by the Natural Resources Defense Council and Earth Day New York. Throughout his career, he has earned numerous business and environmental awards, including recognition as ‘Champion of the Earth’ by the United Nations Environment Program and receiving a Medal of Excellence from Columbia University, where he earned his MBA and later served as an Adjunct Professor in its business School from 2010– 2018. In 2021, he received the Social Enterprise Center Award for Excellence in Teaching. A former member of the Council on Foreign Relations and Henry Catto Fellow at the Aspen Institute, he holds multiple recycling industry technology and business method patents.

In this episode, we learn more about the circular economy and why it has a clear competitive financial advantage. We hear about Closed Loop Partners’ investment strategy, as well as some real-life examples of circular economy investments they have made. Ron shares how he verifies impact and measures outcome, and we learn how Closed Loop Partners’ Innovation Center came about.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/ron-gonen

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
Follow SRI 360° on TWITTER: https://twitter.com/SRI360Growth/
Follow SRI 360° on FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/SRI360Growth/

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Basil Demeroutis (@Basil_FORE) is the Managing Partner of FORE Partnership, a purpose-driven real estate investment firm active in the UK and Western Europe. Basil founded FORE Partnership believing in a low carbon future in which property can be a force for social good and his mission has been to prove that driving environmental sustainability and positive social outcomes is good for investors’ financial returns. Basil is passionate about sustainable property and has aligned FORE Partnership’s investment strategy with his, and the company’s investors’ core values.

Born in Toronto, Basil studied Aerospace Engineering at Cornell University thinking that he would work for NASA or at the Jet Propulsion Lab building rovers and spacecraft. In the end, after he graduated, he changed his mind and began his career in finance at the Bankers Trust analyst training program in the United States, after feeling that engineering was too slow moving for him in terms of making an impact. After five years there, he moved to Bear Stearns and eventually moved to London.

After spending a total of eleven years in asset finance, where he was financing everything from ships and aircraft to satellites and real estate, Basil made the move from advising people on real estate investing, to actually becoming an investor in real estate and joined Jargonnant Partners in Germany, as Managing Partner. In 2008, he became a Partner at Capricorn Investment Group, the family office of Jeff Skoll, before founding FORE Partnership in 2012.

In this episode, we discuss the integration of social and environmental impact in the built environment, how Basil puts the “E” and the “S” into their real estate projects. We hear about some of FORE’s projects and examples of the real social impact they have made, and we get a true definition of social impact and what it really means. We discuss how social impact can be measured in the real estate arena and the future of biodiversity within real estate investment. Basil also discusses why he decided to forgo a typical private equity structure that pits GPs against LPs when he set up FORE’s unique ‘club’ structure, how FORE became one of the first real estate investors to become a certified B Corporation, and a whole lot more.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/basil-demeroutis

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
Follow SRI 360° on TWITTER: https://twitter.com/SRI360Growth/
Follow SRI 360° on FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/SRI360Growth/

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Jean-Philippe de Schrevel is the Founder and Managing Partner at Bamboo Capital Partners, an impact investing platform which provides innovative financing solutions to businesses in emerging markets. He has dedicated most of his career to the development of the impact investing field, during which time he has launched eight investment funds and raised over $1 billion across a variety of asset classes and sectors.

Jean-Philippe spent the early years of his life in Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of Congo, moving with his parents to Belgium at the age of seven and then going on to study Development Economics at the University of Namur. His early career began as a Junior Economist in Bucharest in the period just after the fall of Ceaușescu, after which he went on to McKinsey Brussels, which took him on engagements around various parts of the world. He became the CEO of a Microfinance foundation in Argentina for a year and then returned to Europe, where he continued to work in microfinance and came to work at Dexia Asset Management. Jean-Philippe co-founded BlueOrchard in 2001 and then went on to found Bamboo Capital Partners in 2007. He holds an MBA from the Wharton School of Business and is fluent in French, English, and Spanish.

Widely considered to be a global pioneer in the field of impact investing, Jean-Philippe has made it his life’s mission to help develop solutions to some of the most critical problems on our planet today. In this episode, Jean-Philippe shares how a trip to India as a 3rd year student in his twenties and witnessing some of the problems and suffering there shaped his future. He also discusses his Faith and how this has also played a crucial role in his mission.

In our discussion, Jean-Philippe tells us about Bamboo Capital Partners’ investment strategies and their five main Funds. We talk about Bamboo’s partnerships with various UN agencies and International NGO’s and the SDG500 Impact Investment platform. We hear Jean-Philippe’s true definition of impact investing and we discuss the role of technology in impact investing now and in the future.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/jean-philippe-de-schrevel

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
Follow SRI 360° on TWITTER: https://twitter.com/SRI360Growth/
Follow SRI 360° on FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/SRI360Growth/

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Eric Rice is Head of Impact Investing at BlackRock and the portfolio manager and the architect of the world’s first diversified public markets impact investing strategy, Global Impact. Global Impact is an alpha-oriented strategy that invests in companies whose goods and services help address the world’s great problems, as defined by the UN Sustainable Development Goals. He also collaborates with other investors at BlackRock to help germinate additional impact and sustainable investment strategies.

Blackrock is the world's largest asset manager, which has reported more than US $10 trillion in AUM as of January 2022. Eric grew up in Berkeley, California, and studied close to home at the University of California Berkeley, where he was awarded an AB degree in economics. He began his career as a Diplomat in Rwanda with the U.S Department of State. It was during this posting that Eric quickly became aware that he wanted to do development work and projects that would make a difference.

Following his posting in Rwanda, Eric went on to earn a PhD in Economics at Harvard University. He then spent several years as a country economist at the World Bank, then moved on to Wellington Management, where he transitioned into portfolio management and eventually got permission to launch an impact fund strategy that he proposed after explaining what exactly sustainable investing was. Eventually, he and his Sustainability team at Wellington Management landed at Blackrock in 2019, where he designed and launched the world's first diversified public market impact investing strategy.

In this episode, Eric discusses Impact Investing in the context of a public equity fund and how, with the Global Impact Fund, he has worked to take the very best characteristics of impact investing that have been developed over the years in the private market and adapted them to public equity investing, to create an authentic impact strategy.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/eric-rice

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
Follow SRI 360° on TWITTER: https://twitter.com/SRI360Growth/
Follow SRI 360° on FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/SRI360Growth/

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Ben Rick is the Co-Founder and CEO of Social and Sustainable Capital, a company that provides flexible capital to enable social sector organizations to grow their social impact, tackle society’s most pressing challenges, and improve the lives of disadvantaged people across the United Kingdom.

After graduating from the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (now part of Manchester University) in 1993 with a degree in Management Science, Ben’s plans to train as an accountant changed rapidly when by chance, he attended a Goldman Sachs recruitment event and was offered a Management Trainee position there. He describes his transition from the back office at Goldman Sachs to the Trading Floor at Lehman Brothers, where he worked as a Euro Bond Trader, followed by a move to UBS where he jointly ran the corporate bond trading department. He later became Managing Director of the EMEA Global Proprietary Trading Group for Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

In our conversation, Ben explains how after his years in the City he began to find the environment, the attitudes, and focus on personal wealth distasteful and how it was his desire to make a difference that led to him founding Social and Sustainable Capital.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/ben-rick

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

SELECTED LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

Connect with Ben Rick:
Goldman Sachs
Lehman Brothers
UBS
Merrill Lynch
BTG Pactual
Social and Sustainable Capital
Hull Women’s Network

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Sharon Vosmek is the CEO of Astia & Managing Partner of the Astia Fund ($100M) and a founding member of Astia Angels. Astia is the pre-eminent organization working to ensure the success of high-growth start-ups founded and led by women. Ms. Vosmek is well regarded around the globe for her opinions, research, and commentary on the importance of women leaders as integral to innovation and high-performing entrepreneurial companies.

Her work began in the political sector, where she worked for the US Senate, Senator Dennis DeConcini. She became very interested in global economies and women's economic participation, in particular, the policies and roadmaps that were available to ensure that women successfully participated in the economy. A chance meeting of the founder of Astia, Catherine Muther, at a dinner party paved the way for things to come and Sharon was appointed CEO of Astia in 2007. Under her leadership, Astia has grown from 20 individuals in Silicon Valley to a global community of more than 5,000 investors, entrepreneurs, and industry leaders that make up its investment ecosystem today.

In this episode, Sharon goes in depth to describe the extent of this under-investment in women-led companies and cites a number of studies and some very interesting statistics on how much money seems to be left on the table. We discuss at length what she considers to be the shortcomings of the typical VC investment approach as well as race and gender bias in the VC investment community.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/sharon-vosmek

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

SELECTED LINKS:

Connect with Sharon Vosmek: LinkedIN
Astia
The Body Shop
Food First
Global Exchange
Cisco
Documentary ‘Something Ventured’
Babson College research
Portola Creek
Toniic

PEOPLE MENTIONED:

Jennifer Mcfarlane
Catherine Muther
Professor Thomas Malone
Anita Roddick
Senator Dennis DeConcini
Sandy Lerner
Jim Clark
John Doerr
Jim O’Neill
Walt Macnee

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Bram Bos is Lead Portfolio Manager of Green, Social and Impact Bonds at NN Investment Partners. He has over 20 years of portfolio management experience, including previous roles at Unilever, APG Asset Management, Nomura, and Fullerton Fund Management.

Bram’s early career began in his native Holland, took him to Singapore for several years and then back to Holland, where he went on to build the green bond franchise at NNIP following its inception in 2015, back before interest in green bonds really exploded. The flagship NN (L) Green Bond Fund focuses exclusively on green bonds and combines a clear green profile with an above market performance since its inception. The fund is currently the world’s largest open-ended green bond fund in the market, with over €3.8 billion total assets under management.

Bram was awarded a Masters of Science and Financial Economics at Erasmus University in Rotterdam, and previously sat on the Fixed Income Advisory Committee for the United Nations-backed Principles for Responsible Investment.

In this episode, we discuss what makes a green bond “green”, the criteria he uses at NNIP to ensure green bonds meet international standards, what makes green bonds attractive to investors and of course, the concept of ‘greenwashing’.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/bram-bos

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

SELECTED LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

Connect with Bram Bos: LinkedIN
NN Investment Partners
APG Asset Management
Fullerton Fund Management
Temasek Holdings
Unilever Sustainable Living Plan
Principles for Responsible Investment
ABN AMRO
Climate Bonds Initiative Taxonomy
European Green Bond Standard
Sustainalytics
ISS
MSCI

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Marisa Drew is the Chief Sustainability Officer for the Standard Chartered Bank in London as of July 2022. However, this discussion will not be about Standard Charter Bank because my interview with Marissa took place some months back when I was finishing my book, Sustainable and Responsible Investing 360º. At that time, she was the Chief Sustainability Officer for Credit Suisse, where she had worked for nearly 19 years. Today's discussion will concern Marissa's experience at the Credit Suisse sustainability program.

Marisa’s investment banking career spans over thirty years. During an eleven-year stint at Merrill Lynch, she was instrumental in the formation of their European Leveraged Finance Group, which saw her relocate to London back in 1999. In 2003 she joined Credit Suisse to establish the Leveraged Finance Origination Group. She moved over into the Sustainability area in 2017, when she established the Impact Advisory and Finance Department after which she took on the additional role of Chief Sustainability Officer which we discuss today.

Marisa attributes her successful transition into the Sustainability area to her traditional capital markets background and being able to “speak the language of the institutional investment community” to mobilize capital at scale in the private sector in order to help solve some of the world’s biggest environmental and social challenges.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/marisa-drew

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.
SELECTED LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

Connect with Marisa Drew: LinkedIN
Credit Suisse
The Trump Group
Merrill Lynch
Standard Chartered Bank
Global Women’s Financial Forum
Funding Circle
Impact Advisory and Finance (IAF) Department
Sustainability Strategy, Advisory, and Finance (SSAF)
Next Generation Education Program
Young Investors Program
JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM)
Climate Bonds Initiative
BlackRock

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Matt Patsky is the CEO and Lead Portfolio Manager of the Trillium ESG Global Equity Srategy and Portfolio Manager of the Trillium Sustainable Opportunities Strategy. Matt began his career at Lehman Brothers in 1984 and has over three decades of experience in investment research and investment management. In 1994 he became the first sell-side analyst in the United States to publish on the topic of socially responsible investing.

In this episode, we discuss how early in his career, Matt wrote a sustainability business plan in his first job out of school at Lehman Brothers and how his boss told him he would ruin his career if he didn’t stop this sort of thing. We spoke about how he stumbled into the Social Venture Network and ‘found his tribe’ after meeting a lot of the early SRI pioneers like Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfeld of Ben and Jerry’s, Howard Schultz of Starbucks Coffee, Anita Roddick of The Body Shop, and a bunch of others who encouraged him to follow his passion for responsible investing, and how he ended up being recruited to replace Trillium’s well-known founder, Joan Bavaria.

Matt speaks at length about his views on value creation and his belief that a manager’s fiduciary responsibility requires incorporating ESG principles into portfolio management. We also discuss greenwashing in the industry and the failures of investment funds to hold themselves accountable to the same standards that they impose on the management of their portfolio companies.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/matt-patsky

About the SRI 360° Podcast: The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In my interviews, I cover everything from their early personal journeys - and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI - to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

SELECTED LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

Connect with Matt Patsky: Twitter | LinkedIN
Pax World Fund
Social Venture Network
Blue Haven Initiative
BlackRock
Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero
Lehman Brothers
KLD Research & Analytics
Eaton Vance
Adams Harkness & Hill
State Street Global Advisors
SSGA Gender Diversity Index Exchange Traded Fund (ETF)
Winslow Management
Matt, Mark Zuckerberg and The Onion

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Jed Emerson (@BlendedValue) is an internationally recognized thought leader in impact investing, social entrepreneurship and strategic philanthropy and the Managing Director and Global Lead Impact Investing with Tiedemann Advisors.

He has extensive experience leading, staffing, and advising funds, firms, social ventures, and foundations in pursuance of financial performance alongside social/environmental impact. Jed has authored numerous articles and papers on the subject, including the first book on impact investing (Impact Investing: Transforming How We Make Money While Making a Difference). In 2018 he released his eighth book, The Purpose of Capital: Elements of Impact, Financial Flows and Natural Being.

Originator of the Blended Value concept, Emerson is a Senior Fellow with the Center for Social Investment at Heidelberg University and has held faculty appointments at Oxford, Harvard, Stanford, and Kellogg business schools.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/jed-emerson/

About the SRI 360° Podcast:
The SRI 360° Podcast is focused exclusively on sustainable & responsible investing. In each episode, Scott Arnell interviews a world-class investor who is an accomplished practitioner from all asset classes. In each interview, he covers everything from their early personal journeys—and what motivated and attracted them to commit their life energy to SRI—to insights on how they developed and executed their investment strategies and what challenges they face today. Each episode is a chance to go way below the surface with these impressive people and gain additional insights and useful lessons from professional investors.

Connect with SRI 360°:
Sign up for the free weekly email update: https://sri360.com/newsletter/
Visit the SRI 360° PODCAST: https://sri360.com/podcast/
Visit the SRI 360° WEBSITE: https://sri360.com/
Follow SRI 360° on TWITTER: https://twitter.com/sri360degrees/
Follow SRI 360° on FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/SRI360Growth/

SELECTED LINKS:

KKR and Co. Inc.
Roberts Enterprise Development Fund (REDF)
RS Group Asia
Gates Foundation
Larkin Street Youth Services
Blue Haven Initiative
Acumen Fund
Outcome Funding (Book)
Impact Investing: Transforming How We Make Money While Making a Difference (Book)
The Purpose of Capital: Elements of Impact, Financial Flows and Natural Being (Book)

PEOPLE MENTIONED:

George R. Roberts
Annie Chen
Patty Stonsifer
Liesel Pritzker
Jacqueline Novogratz
Edward Abbey (Author)
Walter Brueggeman

Impact Investing: Transforming How We Make Money While Making a Difference

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Alina Donets is the lead portfolio manager of LO Funds-Natural Capital at Lombard Odier Investment Managers and has been managing sustainability portfolios for nearly nine years. She is a globally recognized specialist in water and sustainable investment, and during her career has developed several new strategies with proprietary impact, thematic, and ESG-centered processes. In this episode we will be doing a deep dive on biodiversity and investing in natural capital.

The LO Funds-Natural Capital invests in publicly traded companies that contribute to the preservation of natural capital or create solutions for the circular biodiversity economy. Alina launched the fund in 2020 and the fund has over 900 million dollars in assets under management.

Alina cut her teeth in sustainable investing at Pictet Asset Management where she was an investment manager on the Pictet Water fund and was a supporting investment manager on the Pictet Global Environmental Opportunities fund. Following that she co-managed the Allianz Global Water strategy at Allianz Global Investors where she developed the proprietary SDG-alignment tool that became the foundation for their sustainable SDG-aligned investment fund range.

Alina holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Studies from the Bayes Business School at City, University of London (formerly the Cass Business School) and a Master of International Business degree from the HEC Paris. Alina is a CFA® charterholder and has achieved the CFA Institute Certificate in ESG Investing.

Show notes: https://sri360.com/podcast/alina-donets/

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Jenn Pryce (@JennPryce) is President and CEO of Calvert Impact Capital, a global investment firm investing in communities, people, and businesses that are overlooked by traditional finance in the United States and in over 100 other countries. Essentially, they’re putting their money where banks won’t.

Jenn learned the power of community at the start of her career working in the Peace Corps in Africa teaching math in Gabon. She then worked as an equity research analyst for Neuberger Berman before making her way to the investment banking team at Morgan Stanley’s London office and then went on to help raise financial support for The Public Theater in New York City. Facing several challenges in this endeavor, she stumbled upon a Community Development Financial Institution where she began to understand the importance of community investing.

During a stint at the Nonprofit Finance Fund in Washington D.C., she learned about the value of driving financial support to community businesses after which she landed at Calvert Impact Capital where she later became the CEO. During Jenn’s tenure at Calvert, she has expanded the sectors they work in and developed new products and services to ensure that impact investing is accessible from institutional to small retail investors. Since Calvert Impact Capital’s founding, the company has worked with nearly 20,000 individuals, institutions, and advisors to raise nearly $3.5 billion.

Jenn studied engineering at Union College and holds an MBA from Columbia University. She serves as a Forbes contributor, a lecturer at Oxford Saïd School of Business, a board member of UNICEF USA Impact Fund for Children, the Advisory Board Chair of Quantified Ventures, and as a member of the Advisory Board of Ecofin and Operating Principles for Impact Management.

SELECTED LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

Connect with Jenn Pryce: Twitter | LinkedIN
Calvert Impact Capital
Calvert Community Impact Investment Note
Community Development Financial Institutions
Incapital/InspereX
Jonathan Rose Funds
Neuberger Berman
Non-Profit Finance Fund (NFF)
Seychelles Blue Bond
SunFunder
The Public Theater

PEOPLE :

Harold Newman, Financial Advisor
John G. Guffey, Jr., Director Emeritus and Founder of Calvert
Joseph Papp, NYC Theatrical Producer & Director
Wayne Silby, Director Emeritus and Founder of Calvert

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Welcome to the SRI 360º Podcast where I interview world-class Sustainable & Responsible investors and bring you the lessons that they’ve learned so you can find out what they are doing and how they are doing it.

SRI 360º Podcast: Recent Episodes

Scott Arnell