Bain & Company, Along With Private Equity Firm CVC, Finalize Terms Of Investment In EcoVadis To Deliver Cutting-Edge Environmental, Social, Governance Intelligence To Clients

New collaboration enables further integration of sustainability, fair labor practices and ethics into enterprise supply chains and business commerce

News provided by

Bain & Company

Feb 24, 2020, 10:00 ET

BOSTON, Feb. 24, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Bain & Company today announced it has made a minority investment in EcoVadis, the world's most trusted provider of business sustainability ratings for global supply chains. The collaboration will accelerate and deepen both companies' offerings for improving the environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance of their collective clients.

Focused on creating "the highest levels of value" for its clients, Bain & Company notes a comprehensive emphasis on economic, social and environmental value in its aims. This indicates a growing acknowledgement across the firm and the global industries it serves —including

private equity, consumer products, energy, finance, and technology—that the purpose of business must go beyond the singular focus of maximizing shareholder value.

Bain & Company will integrate EcoVadis' sustainability ratings into its approaches to corporate strategy, supply chain and procurement. They will also seek to develop a focused approach around specific offerings for financial investors across fund strategy, diligence and post-acquisition.

Bain & Company's investment, coupled with EcoVadis' recently secured c.$200m investment from CVC Growth Fund II, will enable EcoVadis to scale growth and maximize its impact on enterprise supply chains, embedding sustainability into business decision-making and corporate performance.

"Recognizing that social and environmental challenges are growing, timelines for addressing them are contracting, and companies are moving quickly to adapt, Bain & Company is committed to our mission of creating value – economic, social, and environmental – for our clients," said Jenny Davis-Peccoud, co-head of Bain & Company's global Sustainability & Corporate Responsibility Practice.

Practice co-leader Jean Charles Van den Branden, commented, "Joining forces with EcoVadis, which has a strong presence and reputation, as well as access in the ESG space, directly supports our strategy and enables us to create a highly differentiated offering across our various practice areas."

"Bain & Company's investment represents another substantial milestone for EcoVadis. The investment is a strong testament to the value and business-critical role that sustainability plays in today's market," said Pierre-Francois Thaler, co-CEO and co-founder of EcoVadis. "We continue to see executives from all over the world share bold plans for sustainability and ESG transformation. Collaborating with Bain & Company and CVC equips us to reach, enable and impact more organizations and communities globally."

"Environmental, social and governance issues are critical to business success, economic growth and societal improvement, and we are looking forward to working closely with two partners who rightly place these factors at the core of their business strategies," said Aaron Dupuis, partner, CVC Growth Partners. "This collaboration with Bain & Company coupled with our recent investment is a real game changer for EcoVadis, and we are excited to back this new partnership with the full weight of the CVC network."

Editor's Note:

For Bain & Company: Dan Pinkney at [email protected] or +1 646 562 8102

For EcoVadis: Tori Vichroski at [email protected] or +1 617-969-9192

For CVC Growth Partners: Carsten Huwendiek, Global Head of Communications and Marketing at [email protected] or +44 20 7420 4200

About EcoVadis

EcoVadis is the world's most trusted provider of business sustainability ratings, intelligence and collaborative performance improvement tools for global supply chains. Backed by a powerful technology platform and a global team of domain experts, EcoVadis' easy-to-use and actionable sustainability scorecards provide detailed insight into environmental, social and ethical risks across 198 purchasing categories and 155 countries. Industry leaders such as Johnson & Johnson, Verizon, L'Oréal, Subway, Nestlé, Salesforce, Michelin and BASF are among the more than 60,000 businesses on the EcoVadis network, all working with a single methodology to evaluate, collaborate and improve sustainability performance in order to protect their brands, foster transparency and innovation, and accelerate growth. Learn more on ecovadis.com, Twitter or LinkedIn

About Bain & Company
Bain & Company is a global consultancy that helps the world's most ambitious change makers define the future. Across 58 offices in 37 countries, we work alongside our clients as one team with a shared ambition to achieve extraordinary results, outperform the competition and redefine industries. We complement our tailored, integrated expertise with a vibrant ecosystem of digital innovators to deliver better, faster and more enduring outcomes. Since our founding in 1973, we have measured our success by the success of our clients. We proudly maintain the highest level of client advocacy in the industry, and our clients have outperformed the stock market 4-to-1. Learn more at www.bain.com and follow us on Twitter @BainAlerts.

About CVC Capital Partners
CVC is a leading private equity and investment advisory firm. Founded in 1981, CVC today has a network of 24 offices and over 550 employees throughout Europe, Asia and the US. To date, CVC has secured commitments of over US$134 billion from some of the world's leading institutional investors across its private equity and credit strategies. In total, CVC currently manages approximately US$80 billion of assets. Today, funds managed or advised by CVC are invested in 73 companies worldwide, employing over 300,000 people in numerous countries. Together, these companies have combined annual sales of approximately US$100 billion. For further information about CVC please visit: www.cvc.com.

About CVC Growth Partners
Launched in 2014, CVC Growth Partners is the growth-oriented middle-market technology investment arm of CVC Capital Partners. CVC Growth Partners primarily targets equity investments by the CVC Growth Funds between $50 million and $250 million in North America and Europe and manages over US$2.5 billion in assets across two dedicated funds. For further information about CVC Growth Partners please visit: www.cvc.com/growth.

Media Contacts:

Bain & Company
Dan Pinkney
[email protected]
+1 646 562 8102

EcoVadis
Tori Vichroski
[email protected]
+1 617-969-9192

CVC Growth Partners
Carsten Huwendiek
[email protected]
+44 20 7420 4200

SOURCE Bain & Company