RI People & Appointments, Feb. 9: Caisse des Dépôts-backed 2° Investing names executive director

Thierry Philipponnat, founder and former Secretary General of Finance Watch, the not-for-profit EU financial watchdog, has joined the 2° Investing Initiative as Executive Director. The initiative was founded in 2012 by Stanislas Dupré, Hugues Chenet, and Jean Pierre Sicard, with the support of French state investor the Caisse des Dépôts and the French Ministry of Environment. The initiative also said it is opening an office in New York and will now have two legal entities, one in Europe and one in the US, following a €2.5m grant from the European Union. Dupré will head its global program and the US entity. Philipponnat, who resigned from Finance Watch in May last year, is a member of the board of the French financial markets authority (AMF). A former investment banker, he is a former executive board member of Amnesty International in France. Link

Eoin Murray has been named as Head of Investment Office at Hermes Investment Management, the fund management firm owned by the BT Pension Scheme. He will report to CEO Saker Nusseibeh and head the team that issues the ‘kitemark’ given to all new investment strategies at Hermes. Murray joins Hermes from GSA Capital Partners. He was previously Chief Investment Officer at Old Mutual and also held senior positions at Callanish Capital Partners and Northern Trust Global Investments.

German sustainability expert Axel Hesse has joined NordLB Asset Management as a part-time consultant advising on integrating key performance indicators (KPIs) for corporate sustainability that he developed. Hesse said his consulting would centre on assisting portfolio managers in integrating his KPIs into NordLB AM’s existing and future products. NordLB AM currently has around €500m in assets managed sustainably. Hesse is Chief Executive of SD-M GmbH, a Hanover-based sustainability consultancy that co-operates with ESG firm Sustainalytics.

Andrew Walls has been named as finance director of the ‘Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult’, a UK research centre for offshore wind, wave and tidal energy. He trained with PricewaterhouseCoopers before joining the London and Edinburgh-based investment bank Quayle Munro Holdings where he eventually became finance director and company secretary. Announcement

Berndt Brunow will take over as chair of the supervisory board of Finnish pensions insurer and PRI signatory Varma Mutual Pension Insurance Company from Kari Jordan. Brunow chairs food company Oy Karl Fazer, while Jordan is president and chief executive at forestry group Metsä Group. Announcement

South Africa’s Government Employees’ Pension Fund (GEPF) has lost its third senior executive in the space of a few months. Hemal Naran, Head of Investment and Actuarial at the GEPF, is leaving to join Mkoba Private Equity. He will be one of five partners started the fund with offices in Johannesburg and in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Mkoba invests in SMEs in emerging and frontier markets in Eastern and Southern Africa. It follows the departure of John Oliphant, the former principal executive officer of GEPF and ESG Manager Adrian Bertrand.

The Australian Council of Superannuation Investors (ACSI) and CareSuper, the A$9bn (€6.2bn) not-for-profit superannuation fund, have announced the inaugural Michael O’Sullivan ESG Rising Star Award. O’Sullivan was ACSI’s founding president and formerly chair of CareSuper. The award aims to advance the ESG agenda in young professionals. Nominations are open to professionals working in a profit-for-members superannuation fund aged under 35. The winner will receive a $10,000 grant.Paul Mouchakkaa has been appointed Senior Investment Officer (SIO) for Real Assets at the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS). He succeeds Ted Eliopoulos, who was appointed CalPERS Chief Investment Officer in September 2014. Mouchakkaa joins from Morgan Stanley Real Estate Investing, where he’s Managing Director. Before his current position he was Managing Director at Pension Consulting Alliance and was previously a Portfolio Manager in CalPERS’ Real Estate group. Real Assets comprises CalPERS’ real estate, infrastructure and forestland programs.

The 30% Club in Ireland has officially launched led by Marie O’Connor, a partner at consulting firm PwC. The Irish chapter of the growing movement to reach a 30% gender balance on corporate boards also includes Nicky Hartery, chairman of construction firm CRH, Vivienne Jupp, non-executive chairman at state transport body CIE; Michael Buckley, co-founder of recycling firm Greyhound recycling and recovery; Lochlann Quinn, chairman of energy firm ESB; Kieran McGowan, chair of Business in the Community and Gary Kennedy, chair of convenience food manufacturer Greencore. Link

Shankar Athreya has been named head of farmland investments at Insight Investment, the UK-based fund manager with £363bn (€487.8bn) under management. Athreya, previously global head of strategy and business development at Singapore-based Olam International, will report to Reza Vishkai, Head of Agriculture. Link

Mimmi Kheddache-Jendeby has reportedly left her role as head of external equity managers at Andra AP-fonden (AP2), the Swedish buffer fund. She has joined the Center for Applied Research (CAR), State Street’s think tank, as vice-president and senior research strategist, IPE.com reported.

The new £100m Access Foundation, aimed at growing the social investment market in the UK has announced its board. Its chair is John Kingston, founder and director of the Charities Aid Foundation’s social investment fund CAF Venturesome, and board member of Big Society Capital. It has seven board members including Victoria Hornby, director of grants and evaluation for the Royal Foundation of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and Prince Harry and James Perry, chief executive of the Panahpur Foundation. A search for a chief executive is underway.

Environmental, social and governance (ESG) research firm EIRIS is recruiting an analyst programmer to work on its software product EIRIS Global Platform. Link

WWF-Canada is looking to have an Analyst, Impact Investing join the team. Reporting to the Lead Specialist, Impact Investing, the successful candidate will work closely with the campaign group’s conservation teams in Canada and internationally to assist in impact investment portfolio analysis and transaction execution support as part of the development and launch of a conservation impact investment fund. Link

UK social investment firm Numbers4Good, which in 2014 launched two social impact bonds, is hiring an investment director to help create social impact bonds and social investment funds and an investment associate.