Ms. Nell Minow

Nell Minow is Vice Chair of ValueEdge Advisors. She was Co-founder and Director of GMI Ratings from 2010 to 2014, and was Editor and Co-founder of its predecessor firm, The Corporate Library, from 2000 to 2010. Prior to co-founding The Corporate Library, Ms. Minow was a Principal of Lens, a $100 million investment firm that took positions in underperforming companies and used shareholder activism to increase their value.

Her other professional experience includes serving as President of Institutional Shareholder Services, Inc., and as an attorney at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Office of Management and Budget, and the Department of Justice. Ms. Minow was named one of the 30 most influential investors of 2002 by Smart Money magazine and, in 2003, was dubbed "the queen of good corporate governance" by Business Week online. In 2007 she was named as one of the 20 most influential people in corporate governance. In 2008 she was the sole recipient of the International Corporate Governance Network award for exceptional achievement in the field of corporate governance. She has authored over 200 articles and co-authored three books on corporate governance with Robert A.G. Monks, most recently the 5th edition of an MBA textbook titled Corporate Governance, published in 2011. Ms. Minow is a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and the University of Chicago Law School.

She served as a board member of the 50/50 Climate Project, which educated and engaged investors on the critical role of corporate governance in confronting climate change. It merged with Majority Action in 2018. Today, the Climate Majority Project works to harness the power of investors to promote climate responsibility on corporate boards and accelerate economy-wide decarbonization. Her keynote address will focus on her experience working on promoting environmental sustainability from a shareholder activism perspective.