A merger between The Corporate Library, GovernanceMetrics International (GMI) and Audit Integrity was announced on Thursday as the organizations seek to create a corporate governance ratings and research business, the companies say.
With this new model, the united firms intend to reshape the face of the corporate governance market by allowing investors and corporate stakeholders to obtain the most up-to-date and sophisticated governance ratings and risk services. The new business will operate under the GMI name.
‘[This] means there will be ratings and research, done in a thorough and objective way, for the majority of public corporations – both in established and emerging markets,’ says Jack Zwingli, CEO of GMI. ‘Investors and other stakeholders also have a place to turn to help them assess the quality of corporate management.’
According to the governance research team, the merger occurred in July and since then integration efforts have been underway. Now the Audit Integrity capabilities have been added to the existing platform.
Each of the firms involved in the merger has developed a reputation for providing objective governance ratings and research that are useful to global investors, pension plans, regulators, insurance firms and others concerned about governance risks.
‘There is a big, growing, global need for corporate governance information,’ says Zwingli. ‘We wanted to gain the scale and scope, global expansion, a more complete set of data, integrating research with risk tools.’
The merged firm serves more than 20,000 public companies and foresees continued growth in overseas markets by promoting a unified strategy for risk services, ushering in a new generation of corporate governance risk ratings.
‘It is an affirmation that corporate governance, and the broader area of environment, social and government issues, is here to stay. The market has spoken, and there is a great need for global, integrated risk services targeting corporate governance,’ says Zwingli.
To further enhance the benefits of the merger, the board for the new business will include risk analytics and governance experts like GMI co-founders Howard Sherman and Gavin Anderson.
‘As a client of all three firms, we look forward to the next generation of services the newly combined organization will be able to provide,’ says Anne Sheehan, director of corporate governance for CalSTRS, in the release announcing the merger.
