Dr Matthew Kiernan

Dr. Kiernan is Founder and Chief Executive of Innovest Strategic Value Advisors, Inc., an internationally recognised investment research and advisory firm. Innovest specialises in analysing companies’ performance on “non-traditional” risk factors, including environmental social, and strategic governance issues. The focus is on their impact on competitiveness, profitability, and share price performance.

Innovest’s clients include several of the leading institutional investors in North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific, and its largest outside investor is APG, the largest pension fund in Europe and second-largest in the world. Innovest has been rated the #1 firm in the world in its field in both 2006 and 2007 by the Thomson Extel survey of over 180 global institutional investors, with combined assets of over $2 trillion.

Prior to founding Innovest, Dr. Kiernan had served as Director of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development in Geneva. The Group served as Principal Business and Industry Advisor to the Secretary General of the U.N. Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, and Dr. Kiernan chaired the group’s capital markets task force.  Prior to that he had served as a senior partner in the strategy consultancy at KPMG, one of the world’s largest business advisory firms. Dr. Kiernan has also lectured on environmental finance in executive programs at the Wharton School, Columbia Business School, Stanford Business School, and Oxford University. 

Dr. Kiernan holds advanced degrees in political science and environmental studies, as well as a Ph.D. in strategic management from the University of London.  He has published over thirty articles and book chapters on the impact of environmental and other “non-traditional” factors on companies’ competitiveness and financial performance. His first book, The 11 Commandments of 21st Century Management, published by Prentice Hall, has been translated into eight languages. Dr. Kiernan is a frequent speaker at international investment conferences, and recently addressed the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. In 2007, he received a special executive award from the UN Environment Program’s Finance Initiative for innovation and leadership in the emerging field of carbon finance. His new book, Investing in a Sustainable World, was published in the fall of 2008.Dr. Kiernan is Founder and Chief Executive of Innovest Strategic Value Advisors, Inc., an internationally recognised investment research and advisory firm. Innovest specialises in analysing companies’ performance on “non-traditional” risk factors, including environmental social, and strategic governance issues. The focus is on their impact on competitiveness, profitability, and share price performance.