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Werner Rehm

PartnerNew Jersey

Works at the intersection of strategy and finance with high tech, industrial, and pharmaceutical clients to identify and prioritize corporate strategies for the energy transition, performance improvement, and growth

Werner is a corporate-finance expert and one of the leaders of S&CF Insights, McKinsey’s center of competence for financial and capital-markets analysis, M&A, and valuation. He also leads the firm’s work in investor relations and investor communications.

Werner advises teams and clients on in-depth financial analyses, corporate and business unit valuation, M&A, capital structure, dividend policy, investor relations, and capital-market diagnostics to identify, value, and prioritize corporate strategies. He works across all industries and has deep experience in the high tech, industrial, transportation, and pharmaceutical sectors. He currently focuses most of his work and research on the impact of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues, and the energy transition on corporate value and the recognition of this value in capital markets.

Examples of Werner’s recent client work include assessing the value impact of moving to net zero for several chemicals and oil and gas companies, a portfolio review for a high-tech company that resulted in the divestiture of a business unit and significant change in its capital-investment policy, preparation of an investor day for the new CEO of a European client, and M&A target screening for an industrial company seeking growth in the energy transition.

Beyond Werner’s direct client work, he has written extensively on value creation, investor relations, and M&A. He is a member of the editorial board for McKinsey on Finance, the firm’s quarterly publication on corporate-finance topics. His current research focuses on value creation and communication from ESG initiatives.

Born and raised in Germany, Werner has worked in several McKinsey offices, including in Berlin, Boston, Frankfurt, and New York, throughout his career.

Published work

A different high-growth story: The unique challenges of climate tech,”  McKinsey Quarterly, January 2024

What your most important investors need to know,” McKinsey & Company, November 2023

Investors want to hear from companies about the value of sustainability,” McKinsey & Company, September 2023

The triple play: Growth, profit, and sustainability,” McKinsey & Company, August 2023

The investors you want disdain ‘short termism’,” blog entry, McKinsey & Company, August 2023

A word of caution about internal rate of return and sell-downs,” blog entry, McKinsey & Company, May 2023

The times for multiples: Five situations when multiples need more than a second look,” McKinsey & Company, April 2023

The true value of share repurchases,” blog entry, McKinsey & Company, May 2023

The investors that matter still want you to focus on the long term,” McKinsey & Company, April 2023

The times for multiples: Why value creation always comes first,” McKinsey & Company, March 2023

How you finance M&A won’t affect overall value creation,” blog entry, McKinsey & Company, March 2023

Stop obsessing about earnings accretion,” blog entry, McKinsey & Company, March 2023

Markets versus textbooks: Calculating today’s cost of equity,” McKinsey & Company, January 2023

Don’t use multiples to measure M&A success, please,” blog entry, McKinsey & Company, January 2023

Rethink performance metrics when inflation is high,” blog entry, McKinsey & Company, October 2022

A biotech survival kit for a challenging public-market environment,” McKinsey & Company, September 2022

Chemicals and capital markets: Growing sustainably,” McKinsey & Company, April 2022

On target: How to succeed with carbon-reduction initiatives,” McKinsey & Company, May 2021

Should you start issuing EPS guidance again?,” McKinsey & Company, March 2021

Bias busters: Seeing strategy alternatives in the momentum case,” McKinsey Quarterly, March 2020

Is a leverage reckoning coming?” McKinsey & Company, May 2019 

Education

Technical University of Darmstadt
MS, mechanical engineering

Cornell University
MEng

Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University
MS, management