Impact Strategy

CS Capital was founded on the belief that capital should be an enabler of impact. We consider impact investing as the activity of generating both competitive risk-adjusted returns and positive societal outcomes. In our view, both should be present for an investment to be a success, and these are the opportunities we invest in.

Investment Approach

High-impact sectors: We focus on sectors critical to a more sustainable society, including renewable energy and energy efficiency, resource optimisation, and societal health. Within these sectors, we engage with companies which require capital and support to scale their impact.

Flexible Capital: We direct our capital and capabilities to where we believe they can create impact while ensuring competitive returns, regardless of asset class: equity, credit, or both. This allows us to offer solutions that can support the varying needs of our portfolio companies.

Nordic global outlook: We are based on values of promoting active ownership, collaboration, and innovation, which have also helped cement the Nordic region as a powerhouse for the green transition, exporting solutions globally. To reflect these values in our first fund, we have focused on companies and projects based in the Nordics.

Active Ownership: We engage closely with our portfolio companies, providing strategic guidance and operational support to enhance their impact potential. In addition to traditional active ownership activities, such as monitoring and reporting, we leverage our team and trusted advisors’ expertise in business development and impact management to help companies improve financial performance, implement best practices, and achieve their impact goals.

Risk Management: Identifying and mitigating potential risks is a central aspect of our investment approach. We have implemented a risk management system with governance outlining processes, roles and responsibilities. This system ensures that sustainability risks are assessed and monitored throughout the entire investment process in order to protect the Fund’s returns.

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Impact Management Approach

As a fund manager, we seek to create impact through the investments we make. We approach this through our impact management framework, which covers four phases of workflows across an entire investment lifecycle.

Phase 1. Deal Sourcing
When identifying relevant investment opportunities, our investment team engages with companies and projects which align with our investment strategy and impact themes. In this phase, we place a detailed focus on impact considerations and assess the ESG profile of prospective companies with a particular focus on evaluating both the positive and negative impacts of their activities.

Phase 2: Investment Decision
Ahead of an actual investment decision, CS Capital works to design and actualise a value creation plan to assure active ownership in the holding period. These considerations are embedded in our transaction terms, to ensure that impact management becomes a contractual element of our portfolio company relationship. This includes initiatives for impact creation and mitigating actions to reduce negative impacts. As part of this process, we invest time in strategic conversations with management teams to confirm that the envisioned journey is feasible and can create value for the company.

Phase 3: Active Ownership
During the ownership period, CS Capital deploys resources into the portfolio to provide strategic and operational support. This includes establishing appropriate targets, defining effective governance and program structures, strengthening organisational capabilities, resolving execution bottlenecks, and continuously monitoring and reporting on progress.

Phase 4: Exit
In the final stages of an investment, CS Capital will document the achieved impact during ownership and include considerations for continuous impact improvements after exit.

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