Background

Astarte Capital Partners platforms members are thematic investors, whose investment activities were already strongly aligned with a sustainable future through their intrinsic link with environmental or social themes. MJ Hudson’s role was to put in place best-in-class ESG and Sustainability policies and reporting frameworks that help to clearly communicate their sustainability credentials to investors.
  
Our approach

As part of a multi-year engagement, MJ Hudson have worked closely and collaboratively with Astarte Capital Partners, allowing MJ Hudson to develop deep insight into its ambitious ESG and sustainability goals and ensuring that commensurate standards are maintained across the entire Astarte platform. Each platform member project has begun with a deep dive into the nuances of each business model and further exploring how its investment activities are contributing to sustainability outcomes, followed by a 2-hour workshop. Led by MJ Hudson, the 2-hour workshops facilitated dialogue that helped to hone in on each platform member’s in-house views and ambitions on certain ESG and sustainability areas. Following this, material was drafted and finalised through an iterative feedback loop.

One of the most exciting aspects of this project’s journey has been developing a truly deep partnership with the client, who has demonstrated their commitment to industry-leading practice by engaging in a multi-year project that encompasses each of their platform fund managers. Not only does this highlight just how important ESG & Sustainability has become within the private equity industry, but hints at a growing trend: one in which institutional investors look for evidence of continuous improvement and targeted progress versus policies that simply indicate a level of ESG integration at a static moment in time.

Through working with MJ Hudson, Astarte and its platform members have benefitted from the ESG & Sustainability team’s cross-industry expertise, resulting in policies and reporting frameworks that showcase best practice position each manager as a leader in their respective fields. The resulting reports set specific sustainability KPIs to measure current and target performance against that reflect the nuances of each platform member’s sustainability investment activities and the opportunities they present, providing a compelling sustainability narrative to investors.