Avantor's DEI Employment Practices: What the Company's Own Documents Show — and What They Mean for Employees

Published August 27, 2026 · Last updated August 27, 2026 · By Fett Law — Michigan Employment Discrimination Attorneys

Between 2019 and 2024, Avantor, Inc. described four kinds of race- and sex-conscious employment practice in its own published reports and SEC filings: leadership pay tied to an "employee representation" goal, race- and sex-conscious candidate sourcing, numeric representation targets for women and "Historically Underrepresented Ethnicity" leaders, and career programs offered "for women and people leaders of color." Avantor and its subsidiary VWR International, LLC hold federal supply contracts with GSA, the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of Defense. Practices of these kinds were the basis of two False Claims Act settlements with the U.S. Department of Justice — IBM's $17,077,043 in April 2026 and Deloitte's $21,500,000 in August 2026, in which the whistleblower was paid $4,300,000. Both resolved allegations only, with no determination of liability.

Key facts

Did Avantor tie executive pay to diversity targets?

Avantor's 2022 sustainability report describes the change twice. The chief executive's letter states:

"In 2022 we linked specific Environmental, Social and Governance Goals to executive compensation." Avantor, 2022 Sustainability Report, p. 1

And the report's governance discussion is more specific about which goals:

"we have incorporated measurable targets related to leadership diversity and greenhouse gas emissions into the annual Incentive Compensation Plan" Avantor, 2022 Sustainability Report, p. 37

Avantor's proxy statements filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission name the metric. The proxy filed March 31, 2023 states: In 2022, these goals included employee representation and reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. The proxy filed March 29, 2024 repeats it for the next year: In 2023, these goals included employee representation and reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.

What that means in practice: for two performance years, a portion of what Avantor's executives were paid moved with how many people of a given sex or ethnicity held leadership roles. When compensation depends on a demographic count, the people making hiring and promotion decisions have a financial reason to care about the demographics of the people they choose. That is the operative fact — not the label on the metric.

Sources: Avantor 2022 Sustainability Report · Avantor 2023 Proxy Statement · Avantor 2024 Proxy Statement (SEC)

Did Avantor use race- and sex-conscious candidate sourcing?

The 2023 proxy statement lists among the year's accomplishments:

"Established partnerships with diverse recruitment partners to drive more diverse candidate pools" Avantor, 2023 Proxy Statement (filed March 31, 2023)

The 2022 sustainability report quantifies the effect on senior-level candidate pools:

"We increased female applicants for director-level and above job posts by 173% year over year" · "Increased diverse candidates by 67% with deployment of job post optimization platform" Avantor, 2022 Sustainability Report, p. 14

The 2024 proxy carries the same measurement forward — HUE candidates for Director+ roles improved by 4% in 2023 — and attributes it to work with Talent Acquisition and diverse recruitment partners, advancements in our culture of inclusion, and Avantor's brand reputation of DEI focus to attract top talent.

For director searches, the same proxy states that the Nominating and Governance Committee actively considers individuals who possess a diversity of ideas, including by ensuring that women and racially and ethnically diverse are presented for consideration — and, on a departing director, that The Board is conscious of the impact of her departure on board diversity and will be actively considering that impact as part of this search.

For an applicant, the practical question is whether being counted in a demographic category changed who reached the shortlist. Avantor's own reporting measured recruiting success in exactly those categories, at director level and above. Whether that changed any individual decision is a fact question — and it is the sort of fact question that documents, dashboards and recruiter instructions answer.

Sources: Avantor 2022 Sustainability Report · Avantor 2024 Proxy Statement (SEC)

Did Avantor set racial and gender representation goals?

The 2023 proxy statement states the goals and the result in one line:

"Set and achieved aggressive leadership representation goals – 37% female and 23% underrepresented ethnicities." Avantor, 2023 Proxy Statement (filed March 31, 2023), p. 6

The following year's proxy reports performance against a named ethnicity goal:

"Exceeded Historically Underrepresented Ethnicity (HUE) leadership representation goal by 3%, ending 2023 with 27% representation." Avantor, 2024 Proxy Statement (filed March 29, 2024), p. 6

The 2022 sustainability report frames the objective as a standing company goal — Increase representation of women and ethnic/racial minorities serving in management and leadership roles — and the chief executive reported the attainment: we achieved our leadership diversity goals for 2022, with women now accounting for more than 36% of leadership positions at Avantor. The report puts the figure at 36.1%.

Read alongside the compensation metric described above, the goals were not aspirational statements sitting in a report. They were numbers the company set, measured, reported publicly, and — for two performance years — paid executives partly by reference to.

Sources: Avantor 2023 Proxy Statement · Avantor 2024 Proxy Statement (SEC) · Avantor 2022 Sustainability Report

Did Avantor run programs restricted by race or sex?

The fullest description Avantor published reads:

"We launched Career Accelerator and Leadership Academies for women and people leaders of color to support skills building for career advancement with a focus on the unique challenges that face leaders who are the first or the only of marginalized identity in role." Avantor, "Creating a Culture of Innovation and Inclusivity at Avantor: Developing Our Associates," July 25, 2023

The 2023 proxy statement lists the same initiative among the year's human-capital accomplishments:

"Piloted Career Accelerator and Leadership Academies to support diverse associates currently in, or seeking, leadership roles." Avantor, 2023 Proxy Statement (filed March 31, 2023)

Career-development programming is not a small benefit. Programs of this kind supply coaching, executive visibility, and — as Avantor put it — support for people "seeking" leadership roles. An employee who was not a woman or a person of color, and who therefore was not in the described audience, did not receive that. Whether the programs were formally closed to other employees or simply built and marketed around a protected characteristic is a factual question that internal eligibility criteria, nomination lists and enrollment records would answer.

Avantor also operates eight employee resource groups it calls Associate-Centric Teams: Avantor Latinos Moving Ahead (ALMA) ACT, Diverse Abilities ACT, Global Black ACT, New Professionals ACT, Pan Asian Middle East ACT, PRIDE Network ACT, Women in Business ACT and VETS ACT. By the FY2024 report, Avantor stated that ACT [p]articipation is open to all associates — regardless of identity, background or experiences.

Sources: Avantor, "Creating a Culture of Innovation and Inclusivity at Avantor" (July 25, 2023) · Avantor 2023 Proxy Statement · Avantor 2024 Sustainability Report (FY2023)

How Avantor's DEI program changed, 2019–2026

For anyone assessing a claim, the sequence matters more than the current state of the website. The conduct that would support a claim happened while the earlier documents were accurate, and the documents themselves are still available to prove what the company said it was doing.

Why these practices matter legally

Title VII protects everyone. The statute makes it unlawful to discriminate "because of" race, color, religion, sex, or national origin — language the Supreme Court has read to protect members of every group. In Muldrow v. City of St. Louis (2024), the Court held that a plaintiff challenging a discriminatory job transfer need show only some harm to a term or condition of employment, not a "significant" one. In Ames v. Ohio Department of Youth Services (2025), a unanimous Court rejected the rule some circuits had applied requiring majority-group plaintiffs to make an extra "background circumstances" showing. Together those decisions lower two barriers that used to stop cases like these early.

Section 1981 reaches race claims directly. 42 U.S.C. § 1981 prohibits race discrimination in the making and enforcement of contracts, including employment contracts. It requires no EEOC charge first, has a four-year limitations period, and imposes no cap on damages.

The False Claims Act route for federal contractors. On April 10, 2026, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that IBM would pay $17,077,043 to resolve False Claims Act allegations that it failed to comply with anti-discrimination requirements in its federal contracts — the first settlement under the DOJ's Civil Rights Fraud Initiative. In August 2026 the government resolved a second, larger matter: under a settlement agreement effective August 21, 2026, five Deloitte entities agreed to pay $21,500,000, of which $9,995,000 was restitution, covering conduct from January 1, 2017 through the settlement date. The certification hook is specific — Title VII as incorporated into federal contracts and FAR clause 52.222-26 — and the government's theory reached not only what Deloitte certified to its contracting agencies but what it "publicly represented" about its compliance. The agreement adds a second and independent theory: that Deloitte "allocated costs to its federal government contracts relating to these practices and sought payment and reimbursement under its federal government contracts for such costs." The whistleblower was paid $4,300,000. Both settlements resolved allegations only, with no determination of liability, and Deloitte denies the conduct.

Avantor's contractor status is the parallel fact. Avantor, Inc. and VWR International, LLC hold GSA Multiple Award Schedule contracts, a National Institutes of Health Blanket Purchase Agreement, and a Department of Veterans Affairs Federal Supply Schedule contract, and sell to the Department of Defense under the GSA contracts — the government said so itself in announcing the parties' July 31, 2024 settlement of unrelated overcharging allegations. Federal contracts of that kind incorporate the anti-discrimination clause at FAR 52.222-26. Whether either False Claims Act theory could reach any particular practice at Avantor would depend on the certifications Avantor actually made, what its own documents show it was doing at the time, and whether any costs of those practices were allocated to federal contracts.

And a limit worth stating plainly. A Justice Department settlement resolves only the United States' claims. The Deloitte agreement expressly reserves charges filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission — including "charges which may allege the same covered conduct described in this Agreement" (¶ 5(d)) — reserves "any liability of individuals" (¶ 5(g)), and reserves administrative liability and suspension and debarment (¶ 5(c)). Nothing in a federal settlement compensates an employee or an applicant.

None of the above asserts that Avantor, Inc. violated any law. It describes what Avantor's documents say, and what the law and recent enforcement treat as significant. For the complete framework — the four illegal DEI practice categories and when you can sue — see our guide, Is DEI Illegal? 4 Illegal DEI Practices & When You Can Sue.

Were you affected by these practices at Avantor?

You may have been, if you worked at Avantor, Inc. or VWR International, LLC — or applied there — between roughly 2019 and 2025, and any of these describes you:

• You were passed over for a director-level or above role while the company was measuring, reporting, and paying against how many women and "Historically Underrepresented Ethnicity" candidates reached that level.
• You did not get into Career Accelerator or a Leadership Academy — the programs Avantor described as being "for women and people leaders of color" — and you are not in that described audience.
• You are a leader whose own bonus moved with a representation number. Avantor's proxies name "employee representation" as an incentive-plan goal for two performance years. If you were told what your unit's number had to be, you saw how the target worked.
• You have first-hand knowledge of how the goals were implemented — the dashboards, the slate instructions, the nomination lists, the reporting that turned a published percentage into a decision about a specific person.

A federal settlement is not a substitute for your own claim: when the Justice Department resolved the Deloitte matter, it expressly preserved the EEOC's right to pursue charges alleging the very same conduct, and preserved individual liability. Nothing about that settlement compensated a single employee or applicant.

Fett Law offers a free, confidential consultation, in person or by Zoom, anywhere in the country, and represents employees on contingency — no fees unless the firm wins. Because Avantor is a federal contractor, there is a second possibility worth knowing about: the False Claims Act lets a person with insider knowledge bring a case on the government's behalf and potentially share in any recovery, and those complaints are filed under seal, so the employer is not told while the government investigates. Both Title VII and the False Claims Act prohibit retaliation for asserting rights or reporting. If any of these fits, it costs nothing to find out where you stand — meet our DEI discrimination lawyers, or start below.

What could a claim against Avantor be worth?

False Claims Act whistleblower rewards

Under 31 U.S.C. § 3730(d), a qui tam relator receives 15–25% of the government's recovery when the Department of Justice intervenes, and 25–30% when the relator proceeds without intervention. The Deloitte settlement supplies a paid benchmark rather than a projection: the relator received $4,300,000 — exactly 20% of a $21,500,000 recovery. That settlement also shows why False Claims Act exposure outruns the money actually lost. Of the $21.5 million, $9,995,000 was restitution — roughly the government's single damages — so the resolution came to about 2.15 times the actual loss, because FCA recoveries are built on multiplied damages plus per-claim penalties. As a second illustration, arithmetic alone: an intervened case resolving at IBM's $17,077,043 would pay a relator roughly $2.6–$4.3 million. A contractor with a larger federal book or a longer conduct period could produce a materially larger number.

Avantor's own history shows the mechanism working on its contracts. In the July 31, 2024 settlement of unrelated overcharging allegations, the relator — a former VWR International employee — received approximately $1,100,000 of the $5.325 million recovery. Relator expenses, fees and costs are resolved separately from the relator's share.

Damages in an individual discrimination case

Back pay and front pay are uncapped under Title VII. Compensatory and punitive damages are capped by employer size under 42 U.S.C. § 1981a: $50,000 for employers with 15–100 employees, $100,000 for 101–200, $200,000 for 201–500, and $300,000 for 500 or more. Avantor employs well over 12,000 people worldwide, so the $300,000 cap would apply to a Title VII claim. 42 U.S.C. § 1981 has no damages cap, which is why race claims are frequently pleaded under it, and many state civil-rights statutes have no cap either. Prevailing plaintiffs generally recover attorney's fees on top.

Fett Law's own results give a sense of scale in individual and class employment-discrimination cases: a $10.5 million race and age discrimination class action against Ford Motor Company, a $2 million disability hostile-work-environment and retaliation result, a $1.6 million racial harassment result, and a $1.1 million race and gender discrimination promotion case. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

Class action potential

Class actions are built on one policy applied to many people. Where a company sets a single company-wide representation goal, ties compensation to it, and runs a single development program with a described demographic audience, the common-policy element that class certification requires is at least visible on the face of the company's own documents. For scale, historic employment-discrimination class recoveries include Coca-Cola's $192.5 million (2000), Texaco's $176.1 million (1996), and Novartis's $175 million (2010).

Every case depends on its own facts; these figures show the range the law makes possible, not a prediction. The fastest way to find out what your situation supports is to start a confidential intake.

Sources