By Margaryta Kirakosian 27 Jan, 2020

BlackRock has made several senior personnel changes in an effort to strengthen its sustainable investing platform, according to a memo seen by Citywire Selector.

As part of the firm’s pledge for full ESG integration across all investment portfolios by the end 2020, the asset manager has appointed Meaghan Muldoon as global head of ESG integration.

Muldoon was most recently head of BlackRock Sustainable Investing EMEA. She will now be in charge of integrating ESG factors in the overall risk evaluation across all of the investment functions at the firm.

Muldoon will continue to report to BlackRock’s global head of sustainable investing, Brian Deese, and will partner with its co-head of risk and quantitative analysis Ed Fishwick.

The announcement follows BlackRock CEO Larry Fink’s open letter, which stated that investors are waking up to the challenges posed by climate change and this will lead to some structural and seismic changes to the way the asset management industry operates.

Product and tech boost

On the product development side, Tom Fekete will take on the head of sustainable investing product and strategy role for EMEA. He was most recently head of products at iShares.

Fekete’s main goal will be to establish the asset manager as a sustainability leader in the region and will tap his precious experience in senior product-focused roles at the firm.

Another new appointee is Garima Kapoor, who will report into Fekete and focus on sustainability initiatives in EMEA region.

However, the firm is also making a push on the tech side, extending its sustainability capabilities to its Aladdin platform.

As part of this effort Mary-Catherine Lader is named head of Aladdin Sustainability, with the remit of delivering differentiated ESG data, analytics and tools at scale for investors and clients.

She will also lead the development of a climate risk technology offering. Mike Kent will join her team to focus on climate analytics.