ESG Team

ESG and Sustainability Team

Led by Deborah Ng, GMO’s ESG and Sustainability team provides subject-matter expertise, tools, and resources to aid our ESG investment integration efforts. The team partners with GMO investment teams and our dedicated quantitative ESG Research team.

ESG Research Team

GMO's dedicated ESG Research team focuses on ESG research and modeling in collaboration with our investment teams. The team helps GMO keep pace with the quickly evolving field of ESG through thoughtful and innovative research.

Meet the team

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Deborah Ng

Head of ESG and Sustainability

Ms. Ng is the Head of ESG and Sustainability at GMO. Prior to joining GMO in 2022, she was the Head of Responsible Investing at Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan (OTPP), where she spent more than 18 years. At OTPP, Ms. Ng developed and led the Plan’s Responsible Investing Strategy and climate change initiatives and headed OTPP’s Responsible Investing team. She was responsible for key deliverables across several pillars, including climate change and ESG thought leadership and innovation, ESG integration frameworks and tools, and corporate engagement. Ms. Ng and her team also provided insights and subject-matter expertise to the global direct investment teams. Previously at OTPP, Ms. Ng was part of OTPP’s Strategy & Asset Mix team, where she focused on the research, evaluation, and introduction of innovative asset allocation strategies designed to help meet the Plan’s long-term liability objectives. Ms. Ng currently sits on the Investment Committee of the United Church Pension Plan and is a past board member of the Global Real Estate Sustainability Benchmark (GRESB BV). Prior to her years at OTPP, she founded Acuity Communications, assisting investment firms such as UBS Securities, CIBC WM, and Desjardins Securities with their investment research requirements. Ms. Ng earned her Bachelor of Commerce and Master of Finance from the University of Toronto, where she was also awarded with a Directors Award from the Rotman School of Management. She is a CFA charterholder.

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Chris Heelan

ESG Research Team

Dr. Heelan is a researcher at GMO and is responsible for ESG-related quantitative analysis across the firm’s investment product strategies and asset classes. Previously at GMO, he was the Machine Learning Development Lead for the Investment Data Solutions team. Before joining GMO in 2020, he was a senior quantitative research associate at Brown University where he worked in the Neuroscience Department using cloud computing and machine learning to analyze large-scale brain data sets. Dr. Heelan earned his bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering and Biomedical Engineering from Vanderbilt University, and his MS in Innovation Management and Entrepreneurship and Electrical Engineering and PhD in Electrical Engineering from Brown University.

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Kenneth Hsu

ESG Research Team

Dr. Hsu is a researcher at GMO and is responsible for ESG-related quantitative analysis across the firm’s investment product strategies and asset classes. Prior to rejoining GMO in 2021, he was a portfolio manager and principal at QMA. Previously at GMO, he was a quantitative researcher on the Emerging Markets Equity team. Dr. Hsu earned his BS, MS and PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, majoring in control theory with minors in mathematics and financial engineering.

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Timothy Wheeler

ESG Research Team

Dr. Wheeler is a researcher at GMO and is responsible for ESG-related quantitative analysis across the firm’s investment product strategies and asset classes. Prior to rejoining GMO in 2021, he was a portfolio manager and principal at QMA. Previously, he was a quantitative researcher on the Emerging Markets Equity team. Dr. Wheeler earned both his bachelor's degree and his PhD in Mechanical Engineering with a Designated Emphasis in Computational Science and Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley.

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