Sustainability as a value creation driver: Ardian’s Co-Investment activity in action

This approach guides our investment process, from due diligence to monitoring and engagement, ensuring that sustainability is embedded in our operations while delivering tangible outcomes for investors and stakeholders.

To achieve that, we have built a dedicated Sustainability x Co-Investment taskforce, bringing together members of both teams, with different seniority levels and from different geographies. Through this taskforce, we address ongoing projects (due diligences, portfolio monitoring and engagement, client requests, etc.) as well as new developments and innovations. 

This cross-pollination between teams and regions, including Europe and North America, is key to our success.

A unique approach to ESG analysis 

ESG analyses are collaboratively conducted by Ardian’s Sustainability and Co-Investment teams, at both the sponsor level and the portfolio company level.

At the sponsor level, we leverage our long-standing and ambitious Sustainability approach for Secondaries. Indeed, 90% of Co-Investment lead sponsors are scored as part of Ardian’s Secondaries Sustainability campaign. Through the annual sponsor scoring assessment, we have a thorough understanding of GPs’ ESG policies, practices and overall maturity. At the portfolio company level, we aim to identify key ESG subjects, assess the main ESG risks and value creation levers. This dual approach allows us to ensure that the sponsor has a robust process and adequate resources to support the portfolio company in its sustainability roadmap. 
 

We don’t expect every company to have a fully developed ESG strategy at the outset, but we prioritize investments where the sponsor and management team acknowledge ESG’s importance and have a clear, actionable plan for improvement.

Our most recent Co-Investment fund generation operates under the SFDR Article 8 regime. By focusing on four high-impact levers, we’re actively promoting environmental and social progress and building better companies:

A data driven engagement strategy 

Our engagement strategy is powered by data. Each year, Ardian conducts an ESG data collection campaign, gathering sustainability metrics at the portfolio company level from both portfolio companies and sponsors.

 
These metrics provide detailed insights into portfolio company performance in key areas such as job creation, governance, diversity, and environmental impact as well as sponsor ESG performance which are key to developing an effective engagement strategy and enhance the ESG performance of the portfolio. 
 

As part of this engagement, we organize Ardian Circle sessions – collective intelligence workshops around Sustainability topics – for portfolio companies as well as for sponsors. Through these events, Ardian shares market trends, best practices and concrete recommendations on key ESG issues. 

Overall, we prioritize our actions to maintain a constructive dialogue with sponsors and management teams and ensure Sustainability initiatives align with business ambitions.

We have been shareholder of Palacios, a Spanish food producer, over 2019-2025. As a board member, we have actively supported the company in improving its ESG positioning. 

Finally, we also frequently negotiate ESG clauses in the shareholder agreements to make sure we have access to the right level of information and can support our portfolio companies appropriately.

Sustainability value creation – Selected Co-Investment portfolio example 

Driving tangible value through sustainability is our priority. One such example is Alvest, a provider of airport ground support vehicles. Its investment in electric vehicles not only slashed CO2e emissions by 272,000 tons in 2023 but also strengthened its competitive position in a future-focused market.

What’s next? At Ardian, we believe that responsible investing isn’t just about ticking boxes—it’s about building resilient companies that will succeed in the long term. With our structured approach, combining clear metrics, rigorous evaluations, and hands-on engagement, we will continue in the next Co-Investment fund generations combining financial performance and sustainability efforts across the private equity industry.