Bondalti, Brisa, CUF, Fidelidade, Galp, José de Mello, Servier and Trivalor are the eight founding companies of the Center on Longevity Leadership, the new research hub of CATÓLICA-LISBON, presented last week at the business school in Lisbon during the first Sustainability Week of the Universidade Católica Portuguesa. The founding companies have committed to playing an active role in developing solutions that address the emerging challenges of an increasingly older and more heterogeneous population.
The launch event opened with remarks from Filipe Santos, Dean of CATÓLICA-LISBON, who framed the creation of the new center within the school’s strategic commitment to sustainability and societal innovation. The session continued with a presentation of the Center on Longevity Leadership by Céline Abecassis-Moedas, Academic Director, who underlined the project’s scientific ambition and transformative mission. The program also featured a keynote address by Lisa Taylor, CEO of Challenge Factory, titled “The Talent Revolution: longevity and the future of work”, offering an international perspective on the impact of longevity on the labor market. The event concluded with a roundtable moderated by Amélia Rita Monteiro, Director of Research at the Center, bringing together Carla Sousa Pontes, Head of Longevity at CUF Tejo, Mafalda Honório, Head of Longevity Marketing at Fidelidade, and Mónica Chaves, Founder and CEO of Brandkey and Idade Maior, in a discussion that highlighted the potential of the new center to shape Portugal’s social, economic and organizational landscape.
According to Céline Abecassis-Moedas, “the longevity phenomenon is reshaping the structure of Portuguese and European society. Life expectancy has now surpassed 82 years and continues to rise, while fertility rates remain far below replacement level, resulting in a less youthful population increasingly concentrated in older age groups. Portugal is already the fourth most aged country in the world, with one quarter of its population over 65 and only 2.6 active workers per senior. This transformation has direct effects on the labor market, where the only growing segment is that of older workers, and on consumption trends, as citizens over 50 are expected to become the main economic driving force in the coming decades. These trends are no longer projections but undeniable data that management, the economy and society must confront.”
The creation of the research center is the result of two years of continuous work, during which CATÓLICA-LISBON developed projects that shaped the strategic vision now anchored in the new center. Among these initiatives is an international study on intergenerational workforce models, conducted in partnership with the University of Louisville in Kentucky. “We will continue to develop research projects with international partners such as the University of Louisville and the Stanford Center on Longevity, for which we both serve as ambassadors,” says Amélia Rita Monteiro, Director of Research at the Center on Longevity Leadership.
The AGEnergy group was also established, bringing together nine companies — Brisa, CUF, Fidelidade, Galp, José de Mello, Santander, Servier, Trivalor and VdA — in a collaborative space dedicated to intergenerational innovation and experimentation with new management approaches. In parallel, the school has been training executives through the Longevity Leadership program, now preparing its third edition, and has introduced a longevity-focused curricular unit in The Lisbon MBA, aligning future leaders with the structural dynamics shaping the twenty-first century.
The mission of the Center on Longevity Leadership is grounded in empowering leaders and organizations to thrive in an era defined by longevity, through research, education and societal impact. Its structure is organized around three axes — Talent, Market and Society — designed to translate longevity into a transformative force with direct implications for leadership, business strategy and public policy. The aim is to produce actionable knowledge and contribute to concrete responses to one of the most structural challenges of the century.