Slow execution of investment projects often means substantial revenue losses for companies. However, accelerating investments generally results in higher investment costs. Our paper integrates this investment speed tradeoff in a reduced-form model of project development to create an empirical proxy for firm speed. We examine how deviations from industry-average speed in the execution of large investments in oil and gas facilities worldwide from 1996 to 2005 affect firm value, as measured by Tobin’s q. We find substantial variation in investment speed among firms in the oil and gas industry. Using a linear correlated random parameter model to allow for unobserved firm heterogeneity, we show that firms’ speed capabilities have high market value. On average, accelerating a firm’s investments by 5% (or 1 month) relative to the industry norm due to organizational capabilities increases market value by $214.3 million. Additionally, we show that the effect of speed on firm value varies widely among firms and is amplified by good corporate governance but often mitigated by the level of firms’ debt.