Companies and investors are faced with continued ESG and sustainability challenges as reporting and compliance becomes more complex, new standards for public and private companies arise across jurisdictions, and the need for execution expertise becomes more critical and high stakes. Fortunately a thriving start-up sector of SaaS platforms and tools is providing enterprises with cutting … Read more
Read More Global Zero – ToolsEmerging and frontier markets have an urgent need for sustainable and impact investments to tackle economic, climate and societal challenges. As investors and advisors in these markets, we have long relied on numerous on-ground resources as well as “other people’s data” relating to sustainability issues around the world. Below are a just a few of … Read more
Read More Global Zero – Data and ResourcesGlobal investors are facing a widely varied post-Covid recovery with the IMF forecasting per capita income losses in emerging markets (ex-China) of -6.1% between 2000-2024, and potentially greater “scarring” over the medium term. There are a range of fiscal, humanitarian and social issues to consider and debate. I’ll pick one: the impact of an estimated … Read more
Read More Global Scarring: Investment RoundUpChina may have created the most impressive advance of educational attainment in history but it also suffers from a growing skills gap. In fact, China has one of the least educated workforces in the world as measured by the proportion of its labor force with a high school and college degree. The evidence piles up in … Read more
Read More China’s massive skills gapPublicly-listed education companies often sit uncomfortably between the demands of financial stakeholders on one side and commercial challenges of working with school systems, parents, government regulators and students on the other. Perhaps this is why education investment bankers are paid to be optimistic. Consider the recent flurry of announcements for the creation of education SPACs–or … Read more
Read More Taking SPACs to SchoolPeople hate job interviews, and for good reason: they can be a huge waste of time. According to a number of studies, there is no reason to think that an interview leads to better-decision making, a less biased process (starting with problems with the interviewer) or that the sequential “death by interview” method has any … Read more
Read More Open innovation is the new job interviewIn education, as in all economic life, there is no such a thing as a free lunch. Or is there? The international debate on higher education access and affordability creates a long wish list of what can or should be done, largely depending on a specific country’s development stage. In the wake of the Covid-19 … Read more
Read More Fintech, Student Debt and a Free LunchCross-border M&A activity is accelerating across a range of workforce and education segments, from education and training to career navigation, job search, workforce alignment, AI matching and productivity. This will not be a shock to many observers, although simply transacting across borders can require quarantine for 14 days or conducting endless due diligence meetings via … Read more
Read More M&A: Coronavirus and Cross-Border InvestmentThere is a cold logic to globalization—especially when it appears to be dying. Can growth be maintained in the world’s leading economies without expanding internationally? Can education start-ups and new ventures rely solely on their local markets? How long will new markets and new consumers in emerging and frontier markets—the world’s engine for future growth—be … Read more
Read More GES 20: Putting the X in Globalization?The world after Covid-19 will never be the same. What might it look like for the future of learning and work? It is impossible to assess the precise fallout at this point but a few scenarios would be helpful in structuring potential outcomes. Businesses, employers, investors and universities and their stakeholders would be well advised … Read more
Read More Human Capital in the Age of Pandemics