UK’s Highest B Corp Score Awarded to Private Equity Firm, Future Business Partnership

London-based, private equity firm, Future Business Partnership (FBP), announces it has certified as a B Corp with a UK-leading B Impact Assessment score of 174, more than doubling the certification requirement of 80.

The firm’s score is also #1 in the world among equity investors and investment advisory firms of which there are more than 700 that are B Corp certified.

Founded in 2019, FBP is a private equity firm that stands out for its distinctive features, both in terms of the diversity of its founders and its unique fee structure. Unlike conventional firms, FBP only earns fees when the companies in which it invests demonstrate measurable improvements in both environmental impact and financial performance.

The extended FBP team includes professional investors and business leaders, providing the best ethical and sustainable consumer brands with ethically-motivated capital and expertise in growth as well as sustainability, ultimately working to drive the sustainable transition of the household consumer goods industry.

Commenting on the news, Co-Founder and Managing Partner, Vish Srivastava says: “It may come as a surprise to a lot of people that a private equity firm can score so highly as a B Corp, but we have evolved the typical profit maximisation business model. Profits are vital but we also focus on environmental impact with our success resting on how well our companies advance on sustainability measures, as well as the health of their P&L. We believe profits and purpose can succeed together, so we’ve built a new investment model which connects the two.

“We tie 100% of our success fees to social and environmental progress in our portfolio companies, as well as capital gain. To ensure objective measurement, we rely on the B Corp assessment—an external, transparent, and continually improved methodology. It assesses the impact of the entire organisation, not only on customers but also on the environment, its workers, its community and all its stakeholders.”

Co-Founder and Managing Partner, Tracey Huggett, adds: “We set ourselves the challenge to build a private equity firm that is a real engine for growth in purpose-driven, environmental champion brands; making it easier for consumers to make sustainable choices without sacrificing price, quality or convenience. That’s one of the ways in which we have scored highly in B Corp’s fully transparent B Impact Assessment, because we have created a model that amplifies impact by scaling impactful businesses, but also adds incremental impact by further improving the credentials of those businesses. All transparently measurable and independently verifiable.

“The B Corp movement is growing so fast that we need to make the most of this moment to get the message out that private equity can be part of a healthy, sustainable economic system.”

Household consumption, the largest sector of the economy, is responsible for more than 60% of greenhouse gas emissions globally and a huge amount of resource degradation.

Every business FBP backs will drive the decarbonisation of this sector, through circular economy, resource efficiency, or greener product design. Food, packaging, personal care, waste reduction, hygiene products, manufacturing, beauty products, deliveries, health and wellness and cleaning products are just some of the areas where FBP is looking to invest in brands that are addressing these sectors with green alternatives.

FBP has made two investments to date, in Netherlands-based baby care brand, Naïf, and in Big Green Smile, an ecommerce platform that curates the best eco-home and green personal care products for consumers across Europe. Both businesses, established market leaders in their niches, have been certified with B Corp’s high standards of social and environmental performance.

“A combined focus on impact and returns has helped us gain the support of some great institutional investors” says Vish, pointing to FBP’s backing by Queensland Investment Corporation and Certior Capital, representing underlying pension funding from Australia, Denmark and the Nordics. “But more than anything our mission helps us attract strong talent to our team and to the businesses in which we invest. Investors know talent is a key driver of value creation and returns. It’s a clear demonstration of how impact can enable success.”

The pair have a long track record in scaling consumer businesses, having invested £650m between them in their previous roles including time working at Bluegem Capital, Terra Firma, DB Partners, MidOcean and Neo where on average their investments tripled in value.

Chris Turner, Executive Director of B Lab says: “We know that FBP is going to be a fantastic addition to the community, and we’re excited to see the work that it has done to integrate the B Impact Assessment score into its investment criteria.

“This is a clear signal that the principles of the B Corp movement and stakeholder governance are driving investment towards business as a force for good.”

As of August 2023, there are 7,351 certified B Corporations across 161 industries in 92 countries.

B Impact Assessment Score
There are 5 areas of assessment in the B Corp certification process. FBP’s score of 173.9 is made up as follows:

Customers 57
FBP scored highly based on the fact that it only works with companies with high environmental and social standards and an ethical mission, in which it invests to help scale their positive impact. When FBP invests it empowers the growth of businesses that are better for the planet in terms of CO2 emissions reductions and other environmental impacts.

Workers 43.3
The team who work at FBP have been enfranchised by their founders in building a workplace in which they want to work, with best-in-class workplace policies and an inclusive and welcoming culture.

Community 36.9
Like many other B Corps, FBP tries to work with others in the movement. This keeps its supply chain ethical and helps ensure that its scope 3 emissions are reduced to a minimum as many B Corps are actively managing to reach carbon neutrality.

Environment 14.2
As a knowledge-based service company, FBP doesn’t have a big environmental impact to mitigate. Its main impact comes from its physical offices at Sustainable Workspaces which are sustainably operated thanks to renewable materials and water saving facilities for example.

Governance 22.1
FBP scored highly for the fact that its founders are from diverse groups in terms of gender and ethnicity, and it has a 50/50 gender split across its founding partners, Board of Directors, and investment team.