CASE STUDY
with

When you invest public money, accountability isn't optional.
Here's how Invest-NL built a reporting process that scales.

From estimates to evidence: how Invest-NL scaled its ESG data collection

28%
14%
Carbon data estimates                 
Halved in a single reporting cycle
40%
5%
R&D and FTE data estimates         
Nearly eliminated entirely
Audit-ready data
Full chain traceable from collection to monetised impact
Zero manual steps
Automatic data flow, no exports, no re-keying
Company-specific KPIs
Beyond standard SFDR, tailored to your portfolio
Andrea_van_Dijk_photo
We are a state-owned investor, so we invest public money. It's really important that we can explain the societal benefit of our investments and be accountable for the numbers we represent. We were also making impactful investment decisions when still playing with Excel spreadsheets, but now we can do this at scale and in a more professional way.
The success team at Apiday really walked us through the implementation, it felt like we were genuinely supported throughout the process. And being able to collect company-specific impact KPIs — not just standard SFDR templates — has been really helpful for our impact calculations and reporting."
— Andrea van Dijk, Head of Impact & ESG, Invest-NL

WHO IS INVEST-NL

A state-owned investor with public accountability

Invest-NL is a Dutch state-owned investor backing high-impact ventures and funds.
With public capital comes public responsibility: every euro invested needs to be accounted for, and every impact claim needs to stand up to scrutiny.

InvestNL_headquaters

THE CHALLENGE

A process built for ten, not seventy-five

For years, Invest-NL collected ESG and impact data the way most investors do: Excel templates sent by email, coordinated across an internal team of investment managers, to roughly 50 portfolio companies and 25 fund managers.

The two-month collection window looked generous on paper. In practice, most responses came in the final two weeks, triggering a scramble of follow-ups, corrections, and manual consolidation into one large file.

The pain point
"The consolidation of the files was a very big pain point. The chance of human error in copying and consolidating files was rather big." — Andrea van Dijk

As Invest-NL's portfolio grew, the problem compounded. A process that works for a handful of investments doesn't survive across 75.
"I concluded this way of working is not scalable," Andrea recalls. "We need something different."

WHAT THEY WERE LOOKING FOR

Specific requirements, not a generic tool

When Invest-NL went to market, they had a specific list: structured data collection with a clear audit trail, company-specific KPIs beyond standard SFDR templates, and a tool that could integrate with their impact calculation layer without manual data transfer in between.

Structured data collection with audit trail
Company-specific KPIs beyond standard SFDR
Integration with impact calculation layer
Adoption across existing portfolio

They also needed adoption. Several fund managers, like Rubio and Extantia, in their portfolio were already using Apiday. That mattered.

WHAT CHANGED

From email chaos to a single traceable thread

The first difference was visible from day one. Replacing the old approach of investment managers emailing templates individually, Apiday ran a joint kickoff webinar with Invest-NL's portfolio.

Immediate impact
"We could already see a lot of engagement at that stage — a marked change from the spreadsheet era." — Andrea van Dijk

The review module replaced fragmented email chains with a single traceable thread per data point. After the switch, fund managers who previously hadn't submitted data — or had sent only partial figures — came through. That's what drove estimates down sharply:

  • Carbon data: estimated figures went from 28% to 14%, halved in one cycle
  • R&D and FTE data: estimated figures went from 40% to 5%, nearly eliminated

FROM COLLECTION TO QUANTIFIED IMPACT

One connected system, end-to-end

Invest-NL pairs Apiday with Impatec, the impact-valuation tool from Impact Institute. Apiday powers the data collection layer; Impatec converts that data into the monetary value of Invest-NL's impact, in euros, with the full methodology visible rather than a black box.

The two run as one connected system. Data collected in Apiday flows automatically into Impatec's engine, and the resulting figures are aggregated back inside Apiday: no exports, no reconciliation, no manual re-keying. The full chain, from collection to quantified and aggregated impact, is traceable and audit-ready.

Apiday
Data collection
and review
Automatic transfer
No exports,
no re-keying
Impatec
Monetised impact
in euros
Audit-ready
Full-chain
tracable

Apiday's API connects with any tool that needs portfolio data - whether for reporting, analysis, or compliance.

Collect once, use everywhere.
Zero human error
"There was no manual step, no human error involved. The data points would automatically end up in the impact calculation tool."
— Andrea van Dijk, Head of Impact & ESG, Invest-NL

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