Research Outline

ESG Reporting Companies

Goals

To inform the development of an Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) practice by identifying the top 10 providers of ESG reporting services, including an overview of each company's ESG service offerings, both overall as well as particularly related to website development and hosting.

Early Findings

Top 10 Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Reporting Services

  • An extensive review of industry reports (e.g., CSE), media coverage (e.g., Pensions & Investments, Medium) and industry association resources (e.g., Society for Corporate Governance) revealed that there are no publicly available rankings of the top ESG reporting companies.
  • However, the research team identified a number of prominent ESG reporting services during the initial hour of research, specifically:
    • OneReport is a provider of corporate responsibility as well as (ESG) data management and reporting services. Notably, OneReport has served "leading organizations" since its establishment in 2003, and now benefits from the enhanced scale and reach of its new parent company (Nasdaq).
    • IW Financial is another "leading provider" of ESG research, risk assessments and reporting services. Moreover, in a fashion similar to OneReport, this established ESG reporting firm now leverages the additional scale of its new parent company, corporate governance services company Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS).
    • Enablon is a top competitor of OneReport and IW Financial, and facilitates corporate reporting in areas including the environment & sustainability and governance, risk & compliance.
    • Sustainablytics is another "leading independent global provider" of ESG and corporate governance research and reporting services.
    • Vigeo Eiris similarly is an international provider of ESG assessments and associated support services.
    • RepRisk is unique in the ESG reporting space given that the firm leverages machine learning in combination with analysts to provide ESG data, reporting and monitoring services.
    • Glass Lewis serves over 1,300 clients globally and provides services including reporting & disclosure and environmental and social factor analysis.
  • We therefore recommend proceeding by providing a competitive analysis for each of the preceding 7 established firms that offer ESG reporting services.