We have seen a rapid increase in the importance of sustainability for companies in the past few years. At Tele2 we are seeing increasing demands on sustainable business practices from customers, investors, and employees. There are also significant new regulations, particularly regarding sustainable finance, that will have a large impact on companies and how they do business in the next couple of years. Our take-away from this is clear: businesses need to do more to contribute to sustainable development!
Lead in sustainability
Earlier this year we launched our updated sustainability strategy. This strategy is based on a comprehensive stakeholder dialogue which included survey and interview responses from over 9,000 stakeholders, such as customers, employees, investors, and suppliers, which were used to update our materiality analysis. In the new strategy we have four focus areas:
• Advance circular economy to combat climate change
• Boost innovation for sustainability
• Maximize potential through an inclusive and diverse workplace
• Protect children in a connected society.
Within these new focus areas our ambition is to “Lead in Sustainability”, which means that we want to take an industry-leading position and differentiate Tele2 from competitors to enable us to win new, and keep current, customers, investors and employees. With this ambition we are linking our sustainability performance with creating business value.
In boosting innovation for sustainability our long-term goal is to use connectivity combined with innovative technology to create new product and service offerings that meet a growing demand from customers, and create sustainability value. The first thing that comes to mind with this long-term goal is IoT, which is an area where it is clear that sustainability and business value go hand in hand. There are many examples from IoT solutions that create both environmental or social benefits, as well as increased business value, in areas such as smart buildings, connected supply chains and industry 4.0. But for many the sustainability value that these solutions create is either intuitive or unclear. We have set about to change that, and make the sustainability impact of IoT solutions measurable and clearly defined. We have set up a project to measure the sustainability impact of our customer cases, to show yet another benefit of IoT!
Business & sustainability value of IoT customer cases
We believe that being able to measure the sustainability impact of our IoT customer cases will increase business value both for us and for our customers. Together we will be able to showcase not only the business benefits of our IoT solutions, but also the impact on the environment, on social factors, and also the financial impact this can have, in the cases where that is possible to quantify. We have set up a framework for IoT sustainability impact which includes possible common denominators of our customer cases, e.g. energy efficiency, and which positive impact each of these denominators can result in. This framework is then applied to IoT customer cases to calculate the sustainability impact that these case have.
Virta: Europe’s fastest-growing platform for electric vehicle charging
Founded in 2013, Virtas digital platform connects all key players in the electric vehicle value chain. Virta’s solutions allows users to see which stations are available and operational in real time, information about users charging, energy use and revenue of stations, and monitoring in real time which stations need service. Charging stations using Virta’s solution are equipped with Tele2 IoT SIM cards.
In measuring the sustainability impact of Virta’s IoT solution it is clear that the main positive sustainability impact is in the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions from fossil-fuel powered vehicles. This impact is significant and a great contribution to the very important fight against climate change which is ongoing.
Cuviva: A ground-breaking solution for connected healthcare
Founded in 2016, Cuviva offers a platform that connects the individual with healthcare professionals and relatives. The platform provides personalised health services, real-time communication and patient data. Cuviva ensures user privacy where the individual’s everyday health measurements and health records over time are safely collected and stored. Cuviva is using the whole Tele2 IoT product portfolio to support their solution., e.g. connectivity infrastructure needed for patients and healthcare centres to connect.
In measuring the sustainability impact of Cuviva’s IoT solution we see a positive sustainability impact in terms of reduced greenhouse gas emissions from patients traveling to and from their doctor, improved healthcare quality through easier access, which in turn could potentially lead to reduced workload on healthcare services leading to more access of services to other patients and/or reduced costs.
Enabling your bragging rights
Using innovative technology that is based on connectivity, such as IoT, can clearly create both business and sustainability value. As the importance of sustainable business practices increases in line with the demands from important stakeholders, it will be necessary for companies to be able to measure the sustainability impact that their products and services have to be able to showcase this, and give you some bragging rights! Using Tele2’s framework for measuring the sustainability impact of IoT customer cases will enable this for our customers, and help them communicate and report on the performance of their increasingly sustainable business practices.
If you are interested in finding out more about how Tele2 IoT could help you create both business and sustainability value, don’t hesitate to get in touch.