Effective long-term capital allocation drives innovation and value creation, with R&D playing a central role.
Long-horizon R&D projects face unique pressures, often making them the first to be cut when financial constraints arise. Factors such as managerial risk aversion, uncertainty in forecasting long-term returns, shorter executive tenures, and incentive structures that overlook innovation all contribute to this imbalance.
As a result, companies increasingly favor short-term projects with predictable but lower returns, while neglecting high-impact, long-term innovations that could generate transformational value. To reverse this trend, companies must adopt long-horizon R&D investments.
Case Study
February 28, 2024
While private capital is beginning to mobilize and help emerging markets make progress on decarbonization goals, the public and private sectors must continue to work...
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Case Study
February 28, 2024
Today’s business environment is characterized by greater uncertainty and volatility, stressed supply chains, and higher interest rates – and we’re experiencing one of the most...
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Case Study
February 28, 2024
Women entrepreneurs face unique barriers to success, from challenges in obtaining funding to inadequate access to basic financial services and tools, but a world that...
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Case Study
February 28, 2024
At Barclays, we continue to explore opportunities for collaboration to unlock more capital for climate tech companies. We are clear that to build a better...
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Case Study
February 28, 2024
Investors are looking out for any changes that might affect how their capital is steered in the balance between sustainable-investment objectives and imperatives for a...
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Case Study
February 28, 2024
Votorantim is in many ways proof that hard-to-abate operations can transform themselves. Simply divesting from these assets altogether squanders the opportunity to utilize companies’ pre-existing...
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Case Study
February 28, 2024
Pursuing the energy transition requires managing the intersecting forces of energy availability, energy security and energy access – while simultaneously looking to decarbonize our energy...
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Case Study
February 28, 2024
Nasdaq’s role as an exchange operator, public company, and provider of ESG-focused marketplace solutions gives us a unique perspective on the challenges corporates face in...
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Case Study
February 28, 2024
The heart of BlackRock’s business model is helping clients invest for the long-term, through strategies ranging from retirement target date funds to growth equity and...
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Case Study
February 28, 2024
In 2020, APG Asset Management, together with AustralianSuper, British Columbia Investment Management Corporation (BCI), and PGGM jointly established the Sustainable Development Investments Asset Owner Platform...
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Case Study
May 29, 2023
As a company with over a century of history of product evolution and reinvention, innovation has been at the core of everything Dow achieves. From...
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Case Study
May 29, 2023
As an investment firm privately and wholly owned by its partners, Baillie Gifford thinks in decades, not quarters. This investment philosophy has been applied across...
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Case Study
May 22, 2023
Investors want to reward companies that demonstrate their ability to generate value and deliver real-world contributions to tackling climate change. That requires robust, well-rounded transition...
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Case Study
March 1, 2023
In 2017, Votorantim alongside CPP Investments created a new joint venture focused on investing in Brazil’s power generation market over the long term.
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Case Study
March 1, 2023
IFM Investors’ purpose is to protect and grow the long-term retirement savings of working people. To keep delivering on our purpose, we believe that it’s...
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Case Study
March 1, 2023
At Dow, our ambition is to become the most innovative, customer-centric, inclusive, and sustainable materials science company in the world.
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Case Study
March 1, 2023
Long-term investing is at the core of our identity at Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ). We see it as a journey, not...
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Case Study
March 1, 2023
Net zero by 2050 hinges on a significant leap toward clean energy in this decade. That’s because 73% of the world’s emissions come from the...
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Report
March 7, 2024
The annual FCLT Summit, held on 28 February 2024, brought together FCLTGlobal members and friends to map out the next steps in our shared mission...
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Article
January 27, 2025
On 21 January, FCLTGlobal convened its annual Davos CEO Roundtable for leaders from across industries to discuss how Europe has real opportunities for appreciation if...
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Article
July 3, 2024
Over the last several years, it has become clear that investing in climate-related assets in low and middle-income countries is critical to achieving successful decarbonization...
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Article
April 24, 2024
Artificial intelligence has already changed the way data is compiled and processed on a mass scale – and in particular in the investment industry, reshaping...
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Article
November 10, 2021
Corporate R&D spending increased significantly during the pandemic, setting the stage for a future boom in innovation and value creation. Is this a sign of...
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Article
August 23, 2021
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Article
December 9, 2019
Returns to successful R&D can be transformational for an organization and for the broader society in which it operates.
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Article
October 5, 2018
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Podcast
May 27, 2025
“We have the humility of an LP, but we also have the rigor of a GP. So, when you combine those two, you get something...
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Podcast
April 29, 2025
"The capital requirements to capture the growth opportunities in these trends are so significant that […] they outstrip what is available from governments and […]...
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Podcast
June 24, 2024
"We are in the top of the first inning with AI. It's beginning to revolutionize business efficiency and operations, and the possibilities for future innovations...
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Podcast
June 26, 2023
"We've created all sorts of noise around what is a fairly straightforward activity of deploying real capital in the real world into projects that create...
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Podcast
June 5, 2023
Lucy Parker, Strategic Advisor at the Brunswick Group, and co-author of “The Activist Leader: A New Mindset for Doing Business” joins the Going Long podcast...
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Podcast
August 15, 2022
Rachelle Sampson is an Associate Professor at the University of Maryland’s Smith School of Business and the inaugural winner of the Panmure House Prize, an...
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Podcast
January 24, 2022
“There's no such thing anymore as a corporate strategy and a sustainability strategy. The overall corporate strategy has to have sustainability woven into it.”
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Podcast
September 27, 2021
Mary Pryshlak joins the podcast to discuss the latest edition of Wellington's Future Themes, an annual project that explores the structural trends shaping our world...
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Podcast
August 30, 2021
In focusing largely on wealth preservation, are fund managers stifling growth and innovation?
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Podcast
March 22, 2021
Heather McGregor, Dean of Edinburgh Business School at Heriot-Watt University, joins the podcast to share details newly announced Panmure House Prize.
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Toolkit
August 9, 2020
An interactive R&D Scenario Engine that allows corporate boards, executives, and risk committees to determine their optimal R&D allocation between short, mid, and long-range projects....
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April 29, 2025
"The capital requirements to capture the growth opportunities in these trends are so significant that […] they outstrip what is available from governments and […]...
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