Business Chief - February 2022 by Business Chief Europe

EMEA EDITION

February 2022 | businesschief.com

EXCLUSIVE: Steve Varley, Global Vice Chair Sustainability, EY

CSOs of Global Organisations

Sustainability Live: Leading Executives Share ESG Insights Food Waste: How Technology is Tackling the World’s Food Waste Crisis

When you empower women, you empower communities and nations Ayumi Moore Aoki Founder and CEO Women in Tech and Social Brain, Forbes Business Council, TEDx Speaker

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The Business Chief Team EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

SCOTT BIRCH CREATIVE TEAM

OSCAR HATHAWAY SOPHIE-ANN PINNELL HECTOR PENROSE SAM HUBBARD MIMI GUNN JUSTIN SMITH REBEKAH BIRLESON JORDAN WOOD DANILO CARDOSO PRODUCTION DIRECTORS

GEORGIA ALLEN DANIELA KIANICKOVÁ

PRODUCTION MANAGERS

PHILLINE VICENTE JANE ARNETA ELLA CHADNEY PRODUCTION EDITOR

JANET BRICE

VIDEO PRODUCTION MANAGER

KIERAN WAITE SAM KEMP DIGITAL VIDEO PRODUCERS

EVELYN HUANG JACK NICHOLLS MARTA EUGENIO

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JOE MARRITT

MANAGING DIRECTOR

LEWIS VAUGHAN

CHIEF OPERATIONS OFFICER

STACY NORMAN CEO

GLEN WHITE

JAMES WHITE RICHARD TURNER MARK CAWSTON JASON WESTGATE

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FOREWORD

Maintainability

“Sustainability needs to be kept top of the corporate agenda in 2022 and beyond”

BUSINESS CHIEF MAGAZINE IS PUBLISHED BY

Momentum is essential for any business or movement, which is why sustainability needs to be kept top of the corporate agenda in 2022 and beyond. After a frankly disappointing COP26 meeting in Glasgow, one thing became clear – while there is some desire from governments to tackle climate change, it is business that will drive meaningful change. That’s not just because they want to, but because they have to – their customers demand it and will simply look elsewhere if organisations fail to meet their ESG expectations. Becoming more sustainable is a business opportunity, not a roadblock, and more and more global companies are realising that and adjusting their processes, products and people accordingly. It is an exciting time. Faced with existential threats and pandemics, it would be easy to hide ourselves away, bury our heads in the sand and simply hope for the best. That cannot happen. The best and brightest business leaders are embracing the opportunity and staying on the front foot. Sustainability needs maintainability – and that will be discussed in depth at our Sustainability LIVE event taking place 23-24 February in London, and as a hybrid event for our global readers. We urge you to take part, and join the revolution.

SCOTT BIRCH

scott.birch@bizclikmedia.com

businesschief.asia

CONTENTS

Our Regular Upfront Section: 10 Big Picture 12 The Brief 14 Trailblazer: Leena Nair 18 Five minutes with... Ayumi Moore Aoki

Steve Varley Interview EY: Creating business value from sustainability and ESG

Committed to Net Zero data centres by 2030

Aggreko powers smooth energy transition

Interxion HP

Aggreko

DE & I

The state of Diversity and Inclusion in 2022

Sustainability LIVE Preview

Leading Executives Share ESG Insights

Food Waste

How technology is tackling the world’s food waste crisis

110 76

Global Air Cylinder Wheels Reinventing the wheel in an evolving industry

CSOs of Global Organisations

COMING SOON FO LLOW N OW

EDU C ATE • M OT IVAT E • E LE VAT E

About March8

March8 is an inspiring and informative community for women executives, entrepreneurs, professionals and overachievers. We recognise, celebrate and champion the achievements and contributions made by women in both business and society. Our community offers practical and compelling career, financial and lifestyle resources to help women take their careers to the next level and achieve a work-life balance.

A BizClik Media Group Brand

FO LLOW N OW

BIG PICTURE

Sustainability LIVE London, UK

Diversity in the workplace is vital for the sustainable success of any organisation. That is just one of the many topics that will be delivered, discussed, and debated at Sustainability LIVE, taking place from 23-24 February in London and online. Sustainability is about much more than just climate change, although that is the existential threat we all face. After the relative disappointment of COP26, this is a welcome boost as business leaders come together to show the way forward to meet targets and goals with meaningful change. Remember – if you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem. Join the revolution...

February 2022

Sustainability Live 2022 is on the way!

businesschief.com

THE BRIEF The Calendar

February and March 2022. Watch Gartner’s hour-long webinar Finance Technology Innovations for 2022 on February 9th delves into where finance leaders are focusing their technology efforts, from process automation to advanced data analytics, and offers best practices to help you deploy the right technologies. Read In Amp It Up: Leading for Hypergrowth with High Expectations, Urgency and Intensity, Frank Slootman, CEO of Snowflake (which saw the software industry’s biggest-ever IPO in 2020) shares his experience in taking three firms public in this guide to improving performance without making massive change. Attend As forward-thinking business leaders look to address environmental and social concerns, like DE&I, hybrid event Sustainability LIVE (Feb 23-24) will deliver two days of compelling content from more than 60 of the world’s leading sustainability leaders. Expect keynote addresses, roundtables, Q&A sessions and 1-2-1 networking. Listen to The Diary of a CEO with Steven Bartlett, ex-CEO of Social Chain and new Dragon on TV show Dragon’s Den, delivers weekly solo and guest sessions uncovering the untold truths of lives and careers with guests including founders of Starling Bank (Anne Boden) and Gymshark (Ben Francis).

February 2022

Business Chief Book Club Transformation in Times of Crisis Co-authored by Nitin Rakesh, CEO of IT solutions firm Mphasis and internationally renowned academician Jerry Wind, Wharton Professor of Marketing, this practical tome addresses the opportunities to be had in a crisis. Easy to read and described by co-author Rakesh as a “handy roadmap to cultivating resilience through disruption”, this multi award-winning book delivers specific guidance, via eight principles, for entrepreneurs and businesses to create post-pandemic opportunities, from speeding up digital transformation and design for personalisation at scale to reinventing one’s talent strategy. The book is loaded with insightful quotes, citations of successful businesses, from Zoom to Toyota, and analysis with each principle written in a practical way to make implementation simple, and a list of questions to help readers assess how their organisation is aligned with the principle discussed.

“Success comes from choosing repeatedly, not choosing once. Many people subscribe to what I call the 'Myth of the Single Choice.' They think people are successful because they take one mighty risk. The opposite is true. A career is built over many, many choices" Sukhinder Singh Cassidy

Author of business book Choose Possibility, in which Singh Cassidy recommends re-framing the way we look at our careers, so instead of striving for perfection, striving for progress.

500

The number of speakers expected at Women Tech Global Conference 2022 (June 7-9). Featuring a wide variety of live events hosted across various time zone (Americas, Europe, APAC), delivering keynotes, industry-specific summits, career growth expo, workshops, discussion groups, and 1:1 networking. Expect speakers from Google, Microsoft, Intel, Amazon, EY, IBM, SAP, Salesfoerce, Red Hat, Siemens and Deloitte.

TOP 3 C-Suite Podcasts For CMOs, CFOs and CIOs, we highlight the top three podcasts to inform, instruct and inspire.

SPOTLIGHT ON… Nonfungible tokens (NFTs) As non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are set to infiltrate more areas of our lives, here’s how to stay up-to-date. Read In The Comprehensive Guide: NFTs, Digital Artwork, Blockchain Technology, NYU Stern Professor Marc Beckman explores where NFTs will take business and branding in the 21st century. Listen One of the first NFT podcasts, with 100+ episodes, The Nifty Show discusses recent NFT news and brings on creators to showcase new projects. Or, check out The Mint Condition, which delivers weekly in-depth interviews (40-plus) about specific NFT topics with key people. Watch TEDTalk ‘How NFTs are building the internet of the future’ is a 10-minute breakdown from technologist Kayvon Tehranian on why NFTs are a technological breakthrough. While Consensys’ on-demand webinar ‘NFTs & The Metaverse: Ready for takeoff?’ provides an overview of the NFT market to help organisations reap the benefits. Attend For in-person NFT business events, head to Las Vegas and TokenSmart’s 3-day NFT.land, set to deliver education on cutting-edge topics with industry thought leaders; or to Dubai and the World Blockchain Summit (Mar 23-24) to hear from leading global crypto, blockchain and NFT experts including bitcoin pioneer Nick Spanos.

1 FOR THE CMO CX Decoded A semi-monthly podcast designed to deliver insights from leaders driving the evolution of customer experience, with a focus on digital touch points, customer journeys, respectful data management and voice of the customer. Topics range from analysing the B2B marketing playbook to practical use cases of AI in marketing. Guest have included Bank of America’s president of retail banking and CMO of the American Dental Association. 2 FOR THE CFO CFO 4.0 Podcast In this weekly podcast, host Hannah Munro, MD of financial transformation consultancy itas, looks to the future of finance and the changing CFO role, covering topics like building a highperformance finance team and leading a successful financial digital transformation. Munro talks to finance insiders about how to transform processes, people and data, with guests including psychologists, consultants, economists and finance heads at The Economist, TTM Healthcare, Sage, among others. There are 60+ episodes. 3 FOR THE CIO CIO Leadership Live Maryfran Johnson, executive director of CIO programs at IDG, hosts this twice-monthly podcast featuring an in-depth interview focused on leadership, innovation and business strategy, including with IT leaders from Ecrisson, Vanguard, UNICEF, Cargill, Harvard and TIAA. There are 70+ episodes. businesschief.com

TRAILBLAZER

Leena Nair The first female, first Asian and youngestever CHRO of Unilever, Leena Nair is now taking her passion for people to Chanel as she leads the fashion house into 2022

eena Nair is a woman of many firsts. As well as being the first female, first Asian and youngest ever CHRO of Unilever, she has been the first female in nearly all roles she held at the consumer goods giant over the last three decades – including the first female manager to opt for a factory stint and the first woman in Unilever’s Management Committee in 90 years. But the Indian-born British national is not done yet. After three decades with Unilever, five as CHRO, Nair has been tapped by Chanel for the French luxury group’s top job, making her the first luxury brand CEO of Indian origin and the first from an HR background. “Nair has built a global reputation for progressive and human-centred leadership, delivering significant business impact,” Chanel said in its statement announcing her hire.

February 2022

It’s certainly true that Nair has been critical in the building of Unilever into a purpose-led, futurefit organisation, one that has become the employer of choice in more than 50 countries worldwide. As Unilever CEO Alan Jope puts it: “Leena has been a pioneer throughout her career at Unilever, but no more so than in her role as CHRO, where she has been a driving force on our equity, diversity and inclusion agenda, on the transformation of our leadership development, and on our preparedness for the future of work.” Leena Nair – achievements as CHRO of Unilever You would think that having overall responsibility as CHRO for the company’s 150,000-strong human capital across 190 countries would have been achievement enough, but Nair’s strong leadership, HR expertise, and passion for people was instrumental in helping to drive the continued growth of both Unilever’s profits (US$50.7bn) and its purpose. Unilever is one of the world’s most socially conscious companies, scoring a best-in-class rating on S&P Global Rating’s ESG Evaluation in 2019, and crowned industry leader in personal products with continued scores of 90+ in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index since 2016. It is also one of the world’s most diverse and inclusive, and it has been Nair’s leadership on this in particular that has created such an industryleading culture.

I always tell HR people they need to ‘walk with swagger!’ HR is no longer a backroom department, it’s a vital part of running any successful business. And if you want to support your people, you need to understand how the business works, and you need to be visible within the business. So, get out there and make some waves! businesschief.com

TRAILBLAZER

Unilever | For a more equitable and inclusive world

Under her tenure as CHRO, Unilever achieved a 50/50 gender balance across global leadership with Nair leading a pioneering agenda with bold new social commitments, including recent pledges to pay the living wage across its entire supply chain by 2030, and equip 10 million young people with essential skills by 2030. She created numerous projects, many of which were pioneering the future of global work. She spearheaded the Unilever ‘discover your purpose’ workshops, catering to 6,000 employees to date; pioneered the four-day week pilot programme currently being explored in New Zealand; instigated the U-Work program, which joins the flexibility of contact work with the security and benefits of an in-house role; and 16

February 2022

initiated U-Renew, a paid learning sabbatical programme to help workers upskill, currently under test. Throughout her three-decadelong career at Unilever, Nair innovated in the delivery of culturerich programmes, having previously initiated as Unilever’s VP of HR for South Asia the Career by Choice programme, to help women who’d fallen off the career ladder re-join the workforce. Leena Nair - how did she get there? It was almost exactly 30 years ago, in February 1992, when Nair arrived at the doors of Unilever. After securing an MBA from India’s oldest business school (XLRI), she secured a graduate management trainee role at Unilever in Hindustan, where

I am so inspired by what Chanel stands for,” says Leena. “It is a company that believes in the freedom of creation, in cultivating human potential and in acting to have a positive impact in the world she worked her way up from the factory floor. Cutting her teeth on a handful of managerial roles in employee relations and in HR, Nair landed her first leadership role in 2006 as general manager of HPC and Foods and Head of Management Development, where she led the move of the company’s Foods business from Bangalore to Mumbai and created a model for building capability that is now used company-wide. Within 10 months, she was promoted, becoming the first woman on the Unilever South Asia leadership team. Responsible for the firm’s growth in five markets with a business size of US$6.75bn, it was here that Nair embedded performance culture

as a way of life for Unilever, improving productivity levels by 33% within two years and transforming employee relations into a proactive employeecentric function. Flash forward six years, Nair is promoted to Global SVP Leadership and Organisation Development and Global Head of Diversity and Inclusion, where she was instrumental in driving the company’s employer brand to a record high and advancing the diversity agenda to industry leadership. She also spearheaded the creation of a worldclass leadership centre in Singapore and was the lead on key technology innovations simplifying the firm’s core HR offerings. It was in 2016 when Nair finally landed the top HR job. Relocating to London in 2016, she took the global HR reins as CHRO of Unilever and ran with it. And why wouldn’t she? For someone whose purpose is to “ignite the human spark for a better business and better world”, Nair was certainly living her dream job. And she was recognised for it with HRH Queen Elizabeth II acknowledging Nair as one of the most accomplished Indian business leaders in the UK. Now, in 2022, as human-centred leadership becomes more central to business success that it has ever been, Nair is taking her purpose and passion for people to the business of fashion, where she will run the show globally for Chanel, which generated sales of US$10.1bn in 2020, and employs more than 27,000 people internationally. businesschief.com

FIVE MINUTES WITH...

Ayumi Moore Aoki Founder and CEO Women in Tech and Social Brain, Forbes Business Council, TEDx Speaker and mother of four Q. YOU QUIT YOUR MARKETING DIRECTOR ROLE IN 2008 AND TAUGHT YOURSELF HOW TO CODE. WHAT INSPIRED YOU TO MAKE SUCH A BIG CHANGE?

» In 2007, I was living the perfect

life as it had been sold to me: I had a high-powered career as the comms director of a French group of hotels and casinos, a beautiful house, two amazing children, even my dogs looked like they came out of a fairy tale. But I wasn’t happy. In fact, I wasn’t living the life I wanted to, I was suffocating inside it. So, I decided to change everything, including career and husband! It was the most difficult period in my life until now. How did I start to live my dreams and act? I learned how to code so that I could build websites, I worked on digital campaigns and I even built small apps. I realised that the digital skills gave me the freedom I was looking for.

Q. WHAT WAS THE ‘LIGHTBULB’ MOMENT AND MOTIVATION FOR LAUNCHING WOMEN IN TECH?

» I attended an all-women’s dinner in Lisbon during Web Summit, November 2017. I remember sitting there and just taking in the energy 18

February 2022

from these incredible women, from all over the world. I felt so alive! It felt good to meet and connect with other female entrepreneurs like myself, working in technology. I knew we were largely outnumbered by men, as women represented less than 20% of the tech industry. But what I didn’t know is that this gender gap was getting bigger every year, and this for the past 40 years!

It was a turning point for me. I felt a mix of emotions: I was in shock, I was angry, I was determined. I had to do something to change things. So, I decided to create Women in Tech. I imagined it as a catalyst for change, focusing on 4 core areas that are a call to action: education, business, social & digital inclusion and advocacy. A platform for real projects that would drive change. businesschief.com Magazine.com

FIVE MINUTES WITH...

Why is it crucial to empower women in Tech? | Ayumi Aoki | TEDxIST

Q. WHY DID YOU FEEL YOU HAVE TO BE PART OF THE SOLUTION TO THE WIDENING GENDER GAP IN THE TECH SECTOR?

» I learned very early in life the

importance of women’s rights, of taking action and of not being a victim in any situation. If we want things to change, we have to be part of the change and make it happen. I believe that action is the utmost form of integrity. Technology is part of every single aspect of our lives. Not only does tech drive our economy, it also invents our future. Products and services are being developed based on the perspective of only one half of the population – men. Helping women and girls to advance is not only good for society, and ethical, but smart and good for the economy. When you empower women, you empower whole communities and nations. 20

February 2022

Q. WHAT IS THE MAIN MISSION OF WOMEN IN TECH? AND HOW FAR HAVE YOU COME IN REALISING THAT MISSION?

» Women in Tech is an international

non-profit organisation on a mission to close the gender gap and to help women embrace technology. We promote girls’ and women’s empowerment around the world, offering solutions to address societal equity gaps in STEM through programs, services and events. With our Head Office in Paris, we are a Global Movement with chapters in 6 continents, reaching over 100.000 members.

Q. WHAT DO YOU SEE AS THE BIGGEST ISSUES AND CHALLENGES?

» I think that the main issue today

is giving women access to funding. When you know that less than 3% of

VC funding goes to female-led startups we know that there is still huge progress to be done.

Q. WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE TO YOUR YOUNGER SELF JUST STARTING OUT?

» I failed many times throughout my life, and I wouldn’t change a thing. It’s through these challenges that I learned about myself, my inner resilience and what really matters

to me. I’m so much stronger than I thought I was. However, I would tell my younger self to trust my gut feeling more regarding people I meet. Every time I had an instinctive understanding of someone, it turned out to be true (in a good or bad way). Also, to keep toxic people away and surround yourself with people who have light in them. Genuine human connection is one of the biggest gifts in life. businesschief.com

SHAPING THE FUTURE OF SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS

2022

February 23rd-24th STREAMED & IN PERSON TOBACCO DOCK LONDON

LAST CHANCE TO SECURE YOUR SPOT!

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Confirmed Speakers Include:

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Global Health, Safety & Sustainability Associate Director

Global Chief Sustainability Officer

Fidelity International

Manulife Financial Corporation

Roy Cheung

Mary-Jane Morifi

Global Head, Sustainability Solutions, Engineering Plastics

Chief Corporate and Sustainability Officer

Covestro

Tiger Brands Limited

Øistein Jensen

Sandeep Chandna

Chief Sustainability Officer

Chief Sustainability Officer Tech Mahindra

Odfjell SE

COMMIT TED TO NET -ZERO DATA CENTRES BY 2030

February 2022

INTERXION

WRITTEN BY: CATHERINE GRAY PRODUCED BY: LEWIS VAUGHAN businesschief.com

INTERXION

Lex Coors, Chief Data Centre Technology and Development Officer discusses the company's commitment to its sustainability strategy

s the interconnection hub for the world’s leading businesses, Interxion provides its clients with sustainable data centres and the right connectivity to interconnect, transact and grow businesses. The company has more than 700 connectivity providers in over 290 data centres across more than 24 countries. With its significant global footprint, Interxion’s clients can expand their reach geographically. This is because the company’s services provide clients with the proximity needed for latency-sensitive applications, and offers interconnection on a global scale. Founded in 1998, the company has changed massively over the years and has had to adapt to the changing technological landscape. Lex Coors, Interxion’s Chief Data Centre Technology and Development Officer and Visiting Professor at the University of East London, has been with the company since its infancy in 1999. Having witnessed first-hand the immense evolution of Interxion, Coors explained how it has changed over the years, he said: “Interxion started by working in minute trading. We then moved into data centres, where we collected as many carriers together with the internet exchanges, creating the first communities of interest with enterprise customers. Then when cloud technologies came, we incorporated those into our operations too.” 26

February 2022

INTERXION

Interxion ZUR3 data centre

Example of an image caption businesschief.com

Emergency Power

Hybrid energy

zwarttechniek.com

Service

When it matters most. In an increasingly connected world, where datacenters have become an integral part of society’s critical infrastructure, a stable, secure power supply is more important than ever. Zwart designs, builds and maintains emergency power installations for the world’s most demanding datacenter owners and operators. Together with it’s engine partner Mitsubishi, Zwart’s installations ensure a trusted back-up solution for our customers throughout Europe and Africa “When it Matters Most”. Over 90 years of experience are applied every day to ensure the highest standards in all aspects of project design, delivery and service. The Mitsubishi engines are recognised for their reliability and cost-effective operation and are ideally suited for mission critical applications. With over 100 gensets currently installed across multiple Interxion sites throughout Europe and Africa, Interxion can ensure that it delivers the highest levels of availability and uptime to its customers. As part of a shared commitment to delivering greener solutions, Mitsubishi and Zwart have recently announced that their datacenter emergency power installations can be operated with 100%HVO diesel,

a non-fossil fuel based alternative that reduces CO2 by up to 90%. Furthermore, Zwart and Mitsubishi are working closely with Professor Lex Coors from Interxion on his vision to the “Road to Zero”, an ambitious and challenging project to eliminate all emissions during non-emergency use by applying innovative maintenance and testing programs and developing custom equipment to ensure the high reliability reputation of Zwart’s solutions is maintained. Jim Craig, Managing Director of Zwart said, “Only by working together can we deliver on the ambitious targets for climate neutral datacenters in 2030” Lex Coors, Chief Datacenter Technology and Engineering Officer at Interxion, a Digital Realty Company stated “As a board member of the EU Climate Neutral Datacenter Pact I am committed to driving the Road to Zero and I am encouraged by the progress being made by Zwart and Mitsubishi in this respect”

Learn more

info@zwarttechniek.com

INTERXION

LEX COORS

EXECUTIVE BIO

TITLE: CHIEF DATA CENTRE TECHNOLOGY & ENGINEERING OFFICER

Datasector over the last 10 years by Broadgroup

LOCATION: NETHERLANDS

( 2010 ), and again by DCD (2016) . Since 2019, Lex is working with the University

Over the past 25 years of his career, he

of East London to investigate the issues around

has built exceptionally strong credentials

sustainability for Datacentres and was recently

in the design of versatile, cost-effective and energy-efficient data centre infrastructure. During his time with Interxion he has pioneered

appointed as Visiting Professor. At the EUDCA Lex is the Chair for the EUDCA Policy Committee where he represents the

several new approaches to data centre design

interest of the European Commercial Data

and management, including the improvement

Centre Operator Community both politically and

of power ratio efficiency between server load

commercially. Further Lex is Board Member of the

and transformer load, and the industry’s first ever

European Climate neutral datacentre pact. Lex

modular approach to data centre architecture.

is member of the iMasons Advisory Council. He

Lex received already two times the Personal Judges Award for Outstanding Contribution to the

February 2022

studied Mechanical Engineering and Management and Economics in Rotterdam, The Netherlands.

INTERXION

Committed to Net Zero data centres by 2030

Now Interxion can provide its customers with a hybrid cloud solution. These cloud technologies have also become increasingly significant with the emergence of the global remote workforce, who are more reliant on the cloud to access information remotely. The push towards these technologies is increasing as more companies utilise cloud software services to secure and back up their IT infrastructure. “We’ve changed significantly over the years. Now we embrace a lot of digital technologies to support our operations and have incorporated them into our platforms. We deal with medium-sized data and once we collect this data, the company and our algorithms can learn from that to help us optimise our operations. Technology has definitely changed the way we measure data, as the algorithms now do it for us,” Coors added. This evolution lends itself to Interxion’s commitment to its customers. The company

“ We have changed significantly over the years and now we embrace a lot of digital technologies to support our operations” LEX COORS

CHIEF DATA CENTER TECHNOLOGY & ENGINEERING OFFICER, INTERXION

has needed to adapt as its customers’ needs have changed, as Coors explained: “We have a lot of enterprise customers who require the efficiencies of the colocation services we offer. With the introduction of cloud technologies, we now work together with the large cloud players and some of their most critical applications are in our data centres. This is because we represent the core of all the networks coming together.” businesschief.com

WE BELIEVE THAT IT’S EVERYONE’S DUTY TO IMPROVE THE FUTURE OF OUR PLANET

This year, Mercury launched Our Planet, Our Duty, our plan for Responsible Business. Our Planet, Our Duty is our promise to help create a more sustainable environment around us. For more information please visit:

www.mercuryeng.com

INTERXION

Interxion PAR8 data centre

“ We have been able to say that for a few years 100% of our data centres are running on sustainable energy” LEX COORS

CHIEF DATA CENTER TECHNOLOGY & ENGINEERING OFFICER, INTERXION

Adding to this, the Chief Data Centre Technology and Development Officer explained that as Interxion’s customers have grown and expanded, so has the number of data centres the company has to offer. Building sustainable data centres for the future The data centre provider is committed to its sustainability targets and in his role, Coors works to ensure that all of Interxion’s colocation services have a minimal impact on the environment. Explaining why sustainability is so important to the company, Coors said it is so important, he regards it “as a social corporate responsibility.”

To highlight how the company is supporting the global efforts to fight climate change, Coors outlined the work Interxion has been doing to reduce its carbon emission: “We started looking into our sustainability strategy over seven years ago. Initially, we started looking at energy efficiency in 2009 and even before that, we called it our energy overhead. Now, we have been able to say that for a few years, 100% of our data centres are running on sustainable energy.” Interxion has pioneered energy-saving designs within its data centres to ensure they run on sustainable energy. The company has harnessed everything from arctic winds, underground aquifers and even the Baltic Sea in order to reduce its carbon footprint. Working with big players in the technology scene has been crucial in supporting businesschief.com

Interxion Amsterdam Data Tower

700

connectivity providers in over

290

data centres across

European countries

February 2022

INTERXION

Interxion, as it looked to add a sustainability focus to its operations. Coors explained that, despite Trump’s dismissal of sustainability initiatives in the United States, big customers such as Microsoft, AWS, Google and Facebook still maintained their commitment to their own sustainable targets. As a result, these big clients still expected Interxion to provide energy-efficient data centres. Interxion’s own sustainable ambitions Although Interxion is keen to support its clients’ sustainability targets by providing them with data centres run on renewable energy, the company is ambitious with its own targets. Outlining the company’s ambitions, Coors said: “Our corporate target

“We are passionate about sustainability because you cannot design a data centre well without this understanding” LEX COORS

CHIEF DATA CENTER TECHNOLOGY & ENGINEERING OFFICER, INTERXION

is a 68% reduction in scope one and reducing to two emissions by 2030. Scope one is the direct emissions, such as diesel usage; and scope two is the indirect emissions.” He continued: “I think that these targets are so ambitious because we have close to 300-plus data centres around the globe. We’re committed to this programme and we're driving year-on-year programmes to achieve this.” Supporting these ambitions is Interxion’s internal function, The Energy Strategy Group. This group has participants from businesschief.com

SCHNEIDER ELECTRIC

The transition to cleaner data centres We spoke with Schneider Electric’s SVP Secure Power Europe, Rob McKernan, to NAME SURNAME discuss JOB TITLE, how the company COMPANY NAME create a new era is helping of sustainable data centres ROB MCKERNAN, SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, SECURE POWER EUROPE, SCHNEIDER ELECTRIC

Can you tell me about Schneider Electric? Schneider Electric is the leader in digital transformation of energy management and automation and the world’s most sustainable corporation in 2021 as ranked by Corporate Knights. As a business, we enable digital transformation across several key sectors including data centres, infrastructure, and industries. We do this by integrating world-leading processes, renewable energy, and highly efficient technologies with software and services, to drive sustainability throughout the lifecycle.

What is your role and responsibilities? As the SVP for Secure Power in Europe, my role is to empower our country leaders to support our customers within the data centre, industrial and critical IT spaces. This includes working with our customers to define their infrastructure strategy and the business outcomes they hope to achieve through

any accompanying sustainability or digital transformation initiative. From designing and specifying the technologies, to making them more efficient and reducing their carbon footprint, my role is to connect customers with our experts and empower them to transform their businesses sustainably.

Can you talk me through your company’s own sustainability initiatives? At Schneider Electric, we have many sustainability initiatives in place. They include the Schneider Electric Sustainability Impact (SSI) – in which we aim to help customers save 800M tonnes of carbon emissions by 2025. To-date we have helped reduce CO2 by 319 million tonnes, which is a great start. We are committed to reaching carbon neutrality across all company sites by 2025 and are aiming to achieve net-zero operational emissions by 2030. We also aim to achieve net zero emissions throughout our entire supply chain by 2050 and have committed to using no gases or SF6 by the end of 2025.

Why do you think it is important that data centres become more sustainable? Our industry has been working to reduce its energy consumption and lower carbon emissions for many years. One might argue that it is an exemplar to other industries. As large consumers of energy, it has a responsibility to commit towards sustainability and to reducing its environmental impact. New data centres can be designed to be resource efficient, however, it’s paramount that we don’t forget about inefficient legacy facilities. Here, Initiating modernisation or energy efficiency programs and switching to renewables are two key steps that legacy operators can take to become more sustainable.

How is your technology supporting this transition to more climate-conscious companies? I believe that from a technological perspective, achieving sustainability requires a combination of hardware, software, and digital services. However, it requires far more than just the technologies and any business hoping to reduce its environmental impact should carefully consider its strategy. At Schneider Electric we’re developing solutions to help operators meet demands for sustainability and resilience. Our Galaxy VL UPS is the industry’s most compact threephase solution, is powered by lithium-ion and offers up to 99% efficiency. We’re innovating in the design space, using prefabricated technologies to design resourceefficient facilities, and creating edge computing systems that can be deployed sustainably. Further, our vendor-agnostic EcoStruxure™ IT DCIM software helps end-users to not only measure their energy usage but monitor their mission-critical environments from anywhere to increase the reliability of their sites. Our DCIM software delivers smart analytics with predictive capabilities alongside built-in cybersecurity analysis, physical and environmental security monitoring – a complete solution for today’s operators. Finally, we’ve created an Energy and Sustainability services bureau, helping customers extend the lifecycle of their infrastructure and reduce their carbon

impact. We also have a business that’s dedicated to helping customers procure renewable energy.

How do new and emerging technologies support this transition to cleaner data centres? Technologies have a key role to play in future data centres, which must be adaptive, resilient, sustainable, and efficient. However, technology is just one aspect, and a more holistic approach to design and operations is needed. At Schneider Electric, we believe the sector can address this through five steps. First, operators must adopt sustainable practices from the outset, creating global climate strategies that are transparent and measurable. Secondly, they must maximise the use of renewables to decrease their carbon footprint. Thirdly, by establishing resource efficient designs, operators can take a more repeatable approach to deployment and drive efficiency. Fourthly, reducing CO2 within the supply chain is crucial, and partnering with businesses that are aligned with the same ambitions can play a key role in addressing scope 3 emissions. Finally, the utilization of circular materials that can be recycled is essential to reduce landfill.

What can we expect from Schneider Electric in the future? One area we’re particularly excited about is the development of new sustainability metrics specifically for data centre operators. For many years PUE has been a great measure of efficiency, however, the landscape is changing, and as our industry works towards net zero, it’s essential that sustainability metrics evolve to reflect this ambition. Our mission is to be our customers’ partner for efficiency and sustainability, so we’ll continue our work to build the sustainable and resilient data centres of the future, and help the industry reduce its carbon impact.

Discover more about EcoStruxure™ IT”

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Full insights into your data center, edge or colo infrastructure with DCIM. EcoStruxure™ IT Advisor A vendor-neutral planning, modeling and optimization tool.

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senior management and is dedicated to developing, implementing and governing the overall energy strategies; including: • Intelligent energy buying • Continually improving Interxion’s energy efficiency and Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) • Establishing the value of energy as a core service to its customers. Collaborating with strategic partners To ensure the success of reducing its ‘scope one’ emissions, Interxion looks to its partners to help provide sustainable products and services to improve its operations. With Mitsubishi, Interxion is looking at different ways to reduce the amount of diesel the company uses in its day-to-day operations. As a significant polluter, Interxion is keen to reduce its diesel use and as a result, reduce its scope one emissions. The company continues 38

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“ Technology has definitely changed the way we measure data, as the algorithms now do it for us” LEX COORS

CHIEF DATA CENTER TECHNOLOGY & ENGINEERING OFFICER, INTERXION

to work hard on this with Mitsubishi and its other partners, Schneider and Mercury. Understanding the importance of partner collaboration is crucial to ensuring the success of Interxion’s sustainable ambitions, as Coors explained: “It’s key that our partners’ sustainability targets align with our own. We have also realised that our partners can’t support our sustainability targets all by themselves, so they need the operators of the data centre to explain the issue we're trying to solve.”

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“Our partners listen to what the problem is and then we talk about it, to see if there's a common interest, before we start working on the solution,” he added. Interxion’s alignment with the European Commission Keen to support the global efforts against climate change, Interxion also works closely with other data centre providers and cloud providers within the Climate-Neutral Data Centre Pact. This collaborative effort between these providers came after the European Commission announced that data centres should be climate neutral by 2030.

This Pact was set up as Interxion was keen that players in the data centre industry would meet these collective goals, ensuring the targets would be drafted by those with knowledge of the industry itself. Coors himself is on the board of directors with five other key players in the European data centre industry. Expanding on the aims of the association, Coors said: “We spoke about how to become a more sustainable industry and realised we’re all already on the road to reaching these targets set by the European Commission. We formed the Climate Neutral Data Centre Pact and defined

INTERXION MEETS THE DEMANDS OF THE DIGITAL ECONOMY WITH TAILORED SOLUTIONS FROM SCHNEIDER ELECTRIC Today’s data centres are fast evolving; they have become the very beating heart of the digital economy. These mission-critical environments are far more than the legacy data storage and processing facilities of the past. They are gateways to emerging new markets and digital platforms from which businesses can expand their reach to connect with every aspect of our digital lives. Such evolutions require a combination of energy efficient technologies that support demands for both sustainability and resilience, and secure IT platforms capable of supporting an incredible amount of real time data. To meet the needs of its customers, Interxion, a Digital Realty company, has continued to respond with greater connectivity, more redundancy and power, while continuing to align with today’s environmental and security standards. As Fabrice Coquio, president of Interxion France, notes, “Data centres are the first brick upon which we build the digital economy,” and for nearly two decades Interxion

has been laying those bricks one by one, now operating more than 100 state of the art facilities across Europe, with a commitment to offering customers a complete portfolio of flexible data centre solutions. For more than 15 years, Interxion has enjoyed a long-standing and successful partnership with Schneider Electric to deliver innovative colocation solutions. Schneider Electric has supported Interxion throughout the design, construction, and operational stages of its high-density data centre environments; providing flexible architectures that include energy efficient cooling solutions, resilient power protection systems such as its Galaxy UPS, PDU and switchgear, and EcoStruxure™ IT management software to deliver uptime, sustainability and efficiency for its customers, while keeping the environment in mind. LEARN MORE IN OUR CASE STUDY, HERE.

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INTERXION

five pillars to achieve carbon neutrality.” “The first pillar is clean energy. So by 2025, 75% of all data centres shall be running on clean energy and by 2030, 100% of them will be. Then we need to look at energy efficiency to make sure the data centres are efficient, this is pillar number two. The third pillar looks into reusing energy. We also have the circular economy as the fourth pillar and finally, we look at water usage. These five pillars form the base of the association,” he outlined. Approved by the European Commission’s Executive Vice President Frans Timmerman, the association sets up its own regulatory framework and is run without external legislation. Embraced by Interxion, the 40

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association is a collaborative space that sets ambitious but achievable sustainable goals for data centre providers. Including most of the continent's key players, the current signatories of the pact represent 90% of the industry in Europe. Just this year, the pact presented its first policy paper to the European Commission following its request. The policy paper includes a comprehensive set of 19 recommendations. These recommendations cover public procurement regulations from the procurement and development of renewable energies that can be used by the cloud and data centre industry, to supporting the development of circular

water and energy management, and recycling in the ICT sector. A signatory himself, Timmerman commented on the pact the day it was created, he said: “Citizens across Europe are using ever more technology to go about their daily lives and they want this technology to help secure a sustainable future for all. Today’s pledge – from important parts of the data industry – constitutes a promise to society and offers a welcome first step towards achieving our common ambitions for a smart and sustainable future.” Signatories of the Climate Neutral Data Centre Pact have agreed to implement measurable energy efficiency targets,

purchase 100% carbon-free energy, prioritise water conservation, reuse and repair servers, and look for ways to recycle heat. This pledge is particularly significant when considering findings from the International Energy Agency. It found that data centres consume approximately 200 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity, or nearly 1% of global electricity demand, contributing to 0.3% of all global CO2 emissions. Both Interxion and Coors, along with the Climate Neutral Data Centre Pact, recognise the importance of transforming the industry to reduce the damaging effects it can have on the climate. Expanding on this, Coors said: “We are passionate about sustainability because you cannot design a data centre well without this understanding. If you do not understand sustainability well, you can build a data centre, but it will not meet the targets for the future. That's why this is so important for us.”

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SUSTAINABILITY

EY: CREATING BUSINESS VALUE FROM SUSTAINABILITY AND ESG Steve Varley, EY Global Vice Chair – Sustainability, talks exclusively to us about creating business value from sustainability and ESG WRITTEN BY: SCOTT BIRCH

Month 2021 February 2022

Steve Varley EY Global Vice Chair – Sustainability

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SUSTAINABILITY

ustainability. It’s the mantra of the moment when it comes to business success – an essential area of focus for any organisation serious about remaining relevant. It is also an opportunity – a chance to differentiate from the competition while also doing ‘good’. It’s a fact: sustainability is good for business, and businesses need to adapt swiftly. That is nothing new, but when the Big Four consultancy firms (Deloitte, EY, KPMG, PwC) allocate their leading minds to helping clients create business value from sustainability and accelerate transitions to a lower-carbon future, you know it is top of the agenda. Steve Varley stepped into a newly created role at EY that was the first of its kind among the Big Four, leading the consultancy’s climate change and sustainability agenda

globally while also leading EY’s overall environmental sustainability strategy across the US$36bn professional services organisation and its 300,000 people. It’s fair to say Varley doesn’t just ‘walk the walk’ when it comes to sustainability but leads others along the route. EY achieved carbon neutrality in 2020, became carbon-negative in 2021, and has a net-zero commitment for 2025. Varley is also founding co-chair of the S30 – a group of 30 Chief Sustainability Officers from some of the world’s leading businesses, launched in 2020 in collaboration with HRH The Prince of Wales’ Sustainable Markets Initiative. In this exclusive interview, Varley discusses his new role, the challenges ahead for global organisations, and what business leaders need to do right now to secure our future. businesschief.com

Steve, please explain your role at EY? I help EY clients create business value from sustainability and ESG, from reframing strategy and accelerating transformation to how they govern, operate and build trust. I also lead EY’s overall environmental sustainability strategy and decarbonisation efforts, including our carbon ambition, which saw us become carbon negative in 2021 and will get us to net zero in 2025. You joined EY in 2005 – how has the consultancy changed during that time? EY has changed a lot in the past 15 years, in many ways driven by the introduction of disruptive technologies like AI and blockchain to help clients tackle big challenges. However, one of the biggest changes I’ve seen is the move across all EY service lines – assurance, tax, consulting and strategy and transactions – towards a model that is focused on helping clients build long-term value for all their stakeholders, especially their shareholders. 46

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This focus on stakeholder capitalism is the bedrock of the EY strategy, called “NextWave”, through which all 312,000 EY people contribute to helping create and protect long-term value for clients and wider society. Do you think sustainability is top of the corporate agenda right now? Yes – sustainability is increasingly being viewed as extremely important by business leaders. For some leaders, the starting point is ESG but a major theme for most is carbon reduction and the climate. Even before COP26, business was beginning to realise its crucial role in tackling the climate crisis. Many companies have set net-zero targets, and more are being announced every day. In Glasgow, business was highly visible, and we heard multiple world leaders reference the growing role of the private sector in their speeches. And it’s not just about decarbonisation – businesses are also looking at the impact of issues like biodiversity

SUSTAINABILITY

STEVE VARLEY TITLE: GLOBAL VICE CHAIR - SUSTAINABILITY INDUSTRY: CONSULTANCY LOCATION: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM

and nature loss, water shortages, the circular economy, and plastics. But the bottom line is that businesses need to shift focus away from setting targets that may be many years in the future to reducing their absolute emissions today – and evidencing action each year. Is aiming to be net-zero by 2025 ambitious, or achievable? What are the biggest challenges? It is ambitious but it’s also achievable. We’re a professional services organisation and our biggest asset is our people, so we don’t face many of the same complexities and challenges as some industries. It’s going to take some businesses longer to adapt, but those that can move faster, like EY, need to do so. A big challenge we face is helping our people take actions that will reduce their carbon footprint as they go about their work – for example, by taking fewer flights. We have a seven-point carbon point action plan to help us achieve our carbon ambition and

Steve leads EY’s climate change and sustainability agenda globally in a recently created role that is the first among the Big Four consultancy firms. He helps EY clients create business value from sustainability and accelerate their transition to a lower-carbon future. He also leads EY’s overall environmental sustainability strategy across the US$36bn professional services organisation and its 300,000 people. Steve is leading the organisation’s efforts towards decarbonisation and has overseen its achievement of carbon neutrality in 2020, carbon-negative in 2021, and netzero commitment for 2025. Steve was previously EY UK&I Regional Managing Partner and Chair of EY UK, leading the US$3.5bn business and its 17,000 employees. He originally joined EY in 2005 and has nearly 30 years of client and consulting business experience in various sectors including pharmaceuticals, oil & gas and public services. Steve was a member of the Business Advisory Group to UK Prime Ministers David Cameron and Theresa May and was also the UK Government’s Business Ambassador for the professional services industry during this time. Steve is founding co-chair of the S30, a group of 30 Chief Sustainability Officers from some of the world’s leading businesses, launched in 2020 in collaboration with His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales’s Sustainable Markets Initiative.

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part of that is the EY Engagement Carbon Calculator, which is a tool that enables EY people to assess the amount of carbon they emit, has been a big help in helping our people understand and then work to reduce their carbon footprint when delivering client work. Members of our Global Executive – the most leadership body at EY – also have their performance judged against progress on our ESG metrics, which include our carbon reduction ambition. This is important because it helps set the tone right from the top of the organisation. Tell us about S30 – who is nvolved and what your role is? What does S30 hope to achieve? The S30, which is part of the Sustainable Markets Initiative (SMI) led by HRH The Prince of Wales, comprises Chief Sustainability Officers from some of the world’s most influential companies and its aim is to

“ We’re seeing lots of CEOs now putting sustainability at the heart of their business strategy and looking for ways to create value from becoming more sustainable” STEVE VARLEY

GLOBAL VICE CHAIR - SUSTAINABILITY, EY

accelerate business action on sustainability. It was launched in collaboration with EY and [communications agency] freuds, and S30 members represent companies with a total market capitalisation of US$6.7tn, revenue of more than US$2.3tn and more than five million

Responsible Leadership: An interview with EY’s Global Vice Chair – Sustainability

February 2022

employees. It’s all about helping business leaders in sustainability to work together, learn from each other, raise their profiles and influence within their organisations, and take collective action. Its members are focused on outputs and actions that drive best practice and will collectively benefit not only the S30 but the business community as a whole. Sustainability is about a lot more than ‘just’ climate change and decarbonisation. How is EY tackling issues like DE&I? That’s true – there is far more to ESG than sustainability. EY has been on a DE&I journey for decades and we’re still on it. We work hard to cultivate a diverse and inclusive culture, where all our people can feel like they belong and are empowered to be themselves at work. We’ve always believed that setting the right tone and agenda from the top of the organisation is critical and that’s why, in 2020, we formed our Global Social Equity Task Force to develop and prioritise cohesive global actions specifically addressing inequity and discrimination. The EY Global Executive, the senior-most

governing body, has also signed a Global Executive Diversity & Inclusion statement which is a commitment to hold ourselves accountable at the highest level. There’s lots more to say about this but hopefully this gives a flavour of how seriously we take DE&I at EY. Do you think the general public, and business, have differing views on what sustainability means and what matters most to them, or are they aligned? I think there’s been the beginning of convergence in priorities and goals on this agenda across all stakeholder groups. COP26 was a great example of multiple groups coming together for collective action on climate change, and I really believe everyone there shared many of the same common beliefs. There’s still a long way to go, and there will be differences to overcome, but I’m optimistic about the change I’m seeing and the impact of incoming generations on the private sector. When you look at a business like EY, its 312,000 people reflect the communities in which it operates around businesschief.com

the world. It’s inevitable that the views of those people will have an impact on the business. I often hear the phrase ‘sustainability is good for business’ – how is that so, and is that even more true now and in the future? It’s definitely true today and it’s going to become even more of a focus for business in the future. Sustainability has now gone mainstream, and especially after COP26 – sustainability is everybody’s business. We’re seeing lots of CEOs now putting sustainability at the heart of their business strategy and looking for ways to create value from becoming more sustainable. What’s really exciting is seeing business apply its innate skills at innovation, embracing disruption, and problem-solving to tackle the biggest issues facing the planet, and do so while creating value for all. When advising organisations on sustainability, what are their biggest concerns, and how can you help them most? The biggest concern from business leaders is how to become more sustainable, while 50

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also protecting business value. The CEO of a Latin American multinational once said to me: “We can’t afford to go green by first going red” – I think this captures the dynamic very well. The kind of client work we at EY have been doing to help businesses achieve this include building business models to support green consumer products, assisting companies seeking to invest in solar and wind and helping turn oil companies into integrated energy companies, among many other things. We want to build on this work and continue to develop services that help our clients find value in becoming more sustainable. Regarding COP26, was it just ‘blah blah blah’ and can businesses change the world in ways governments seem reluctant to? Going into COP26, existing national commitments projected a temperature rise of between 2.7C to 2.9C. With commitments agreed under the Glasgow Climate Pact, the latest analysis suggests we are looking at an increase of 1.8C to 2.4C. While this is an improvement, it isn’t 1.5C – and the commitments agreed to date will

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require detailed plans, measurement and accountability. I think businesses have a huge role to play in helping keep 1.5C alive – they must develop plans with real, measurable targets and transparent roadmaps to meet them. They must also build trust in their commitments and report on their plans every year. Stakeholders won’t wait and the planet can’t wait for COP27 for answers – business has an unprecedented opportunity right now to lean in and take action. Efforts to protect the natural world have yet to achieve the same high profile as those to limit climate change but I think it’s important that business thinks about sustainability in broader terms than just the climate. COP15 is focused on protecting biodiversity and I think it’s important that business engages with this too, despite it generating fewer headlines.

“ EY has been on a DE&I journey for decades and we’re still on it” STEVE VARLEY

GLOBAL VICE CHAIR - SUSTAINABILITY, EY

When it comes to measurement and accountability, how do you do that in a way that is fair, universal, and transparent? Holding companies accountable to the climate commitments they make is critical. However, the frameworks that currently exist for helping companies calculate and report their carbon footprint aren’t subject to the same level of rigour as financial reporting businesschief.com

SUSTAINABILITY

February 2022

“ Businesses need to shift focus away from setting targets that may be many years in the future to reducing their absolute emissions today” STEVE VARLEY

GLOBAL VICE CHAIR - SUSTAINABILITY, EY

– and this needs to change. Improved reporting and transparency will lead to increased corporate accountability and investor confidence. It was encouraging to see this issue on the agenda at COP26 and the launch of the International Sustainability Standards Board was welcomed by many. We all understand it’s going to be a difficult journey, but leading companies are already seeing the benefit of incorporating clear and transparent ESG goals into their corporate strategy. As a father of two, what are your hopes, and fears, for the years leading up to 2030? I often get asked about my views as a father, but while having children does give me a slightly different perspective, I focus on the universality of the challenges we face as humanity. It doesn’t matter how old you are, where you are, or what your family situation is – sustainability really is everybody’s business. Over the coming years, my main hope is that businesses and governments develop sustainability targets with teeth from measures that matter, keeping 1.5C alive and protecting the planet for future generations. businesschief.com

AGGREKO POWERS SMOOTH ENERGY TRANSITION WRITTEN BY: DOMINIC ELLIS

February 2022

PRODUCED BY: BEN WIGGER

AGGREKO

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AGGREKO

February 2022

AGGREKO

For more than 60 years Aggreko has helped businesses manage their power demands – and now the focus is on doing so sustainably as LNG and renewables rise in stature

ar from its Glasgow HQ and the COP26 conference halls, around 150kms north of Kalgoorlie in Western Australia, Aggreko has been embarking on a new phase of industrial sustainability. It has been integral to the development of a newly commissioned gas station at Ora Banda Mining’s Davyhurst Gold Mine, part of a broader global strategy to assist miners decarbonise their modular energy solutions. Formerly running on diesel, the project – which provides around 8MW of power output – is believed to be the first to incorporate latest gas technology and involves a ‘virtual pipeline’ of gas being trucked over 650kms. It was installed in three months. “We are very excited about this project,” said Rod Saffy, Global Head of Mining at Aggreko. “It’s going to save about 25,000 tonnes of CO2 and a great example of new technology coming to market, and miners having the foresight to commit to cleaner energy on site.” Saffy says it now has similar projects up and running in four countries – two in Australia; two in Canada; one in Spain; and it is about to commission one in Chile. They are all between 6-10MW loads – five involve LNG truck gas and one is CNG compressed gas, and the distances are roughly the same, spanning between 500-1,000kms. businesschief.com

AGGREKO

Aggreko powers smooth energy transition

Aggreko is on a mission to cut the amount of fossil diesel fuel used in customer solutions by at least 50% by 2030 and aiming to be net zero by 2050. The sustainable fortunes of its own business, and that of its clients, are very much entwined. “LNG continues to be a strategically important option, and it’s certainly becoming more popular and providing a better option for our clients. Most mines that are running on diesel would prefer to run on gas,” said Saffy. He foresees no reason why you can’t add a solar battery energy storage, and any other renewable, to this LNG arrangement. “A good example would be our Granny Smith mine, where we have a gas-powered station and solar farm attached, and we’re looking at a wind option too,” he said, adding 58

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“ The Davyhurst project is going to save about 25,000 tonnes of CO2 and a great example of new technology coming to market, and miners having the foresight to commit to cleaner energy on site” ROD SAFFY

GLOBAL HEAD OF MINING, AGGREKO

AGGREKO

that it was one of the largest renewable microgrids in the world. Power scale is a factor; if the loads get too high, nearing 30MW, then a lot of trucks are required as well as increased gas storage on site which means an increase in capital. “At this point it may make more sense to build pipeline infrastructure to the station, so it’s very situation dependent.” Amid the transition from diesel to gas, renewables will continue to grow in stature, and batteries will reduce emissions further. But access to gas can be a challenge. “Not many mines have good access to pipelines, which traditionally has been a barrier to considering gas as a cost effective option. However, we are seeing a trend where there are now more options available in the market to liquefying and transporting gas from the nearest pipeline,” said Whyte.

TITLE: GLOBAL HEAD OF MINING INDUSTRY: MINING LOCATION: GREATER SYDNEY AREA

EXECUTIVE BIO

Global knowledge at local level The advantage of global companies is when entering countries which may not be as developed, you can take established clean energy policies and commitments into these regions, added George Whyte, Managing Director, Australia Pacific and Global Mining Sector Leader at Aggreko. “We are definitely the only true global company operating across all continents. We apply global standards to mines, regardless of the country,” he said. The company has seen rising demand in Africa, South and North America. It’s not only new mines which keeps Aggreko busy – mine expansions as well as scaling down a mine’s power needs is also important. “There is an increasing trend, and definitely those running on diesel are looking to run on gas,” he said. Aggreko is looking at alternate fuels, and as they become readily available, it will look

ROD SAFFY

Rod Saffy is the Global Head of Mining for Aggreko. Rod started with Aggreko in 2013 as an Area General Manager in the AusPac region, before quickly climbing the ranks to his current global position with the company. He is a business management professional with extensive experience in sales leadership, project management and engineering. Having managed some extremely large teams of more than 250 employees, Rod has developed a high level of skill in people management, business and strategic management, sector deployment, complex matrix management and high performing teams. With a Masters Degree in Engineering Business Management, and having worked for such companies as General Electric and Moog in previous roles, Rod has a strong background in the mining industry. His knowledge and experience are deeply ingrained, and he brings a deep understanding of the challenges and complexities of the mining sector to each project he engages in.

AGGREKO

GEORGE WHYTE TITLE: MANAGING DIRECTOR, AUSTRALIA PACIFIC AND GLOBAL MINING SECTOR LEADER INDUSTRY: ENERGY & MINING George Whyte became Aggreko AusPac’s Managing Director in 2013. He previously served as Sales & Marketing Director and Area General Manager, and has held various leadership roles within Aggreko since joining in 1999. George brings extensive experience in the mining sector, having introduced the company’s Mine Cooling services and Life of Mine IPP contracts, and more recently solar hybrid solutions. Some of the company’s recent successes under George’s helm have included Gold Fields’ Granny Smith Gold Mine Power Station and Rio Tinto’s Amrun and Gove Power Stations. George’s recent focus has been to globalise Aggreko’s Mining Services with consistent standards of Quality, Technology and Expertise. He is very driven to support Aggreko’s customer base through its energy transition strategy. George holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from Deakin University.

EXECUTIVE BIO

LOCATION: GREATER MELBOURNE AREA

at technologies which will support these fuels. He foresees thermal power will continue to play a key element in hybrid solutions. “When you think about renewables, it’s going to be a combination of solar, wind and storage. To achieve a high penetration, you will need all three. Everyone has different targets. We would like to reduce emissions for our customers and have a pathway to that.” Typically solar accounts for less than half of your thermal load, but Saffy believes that will rise as batteries become more efficient. “Mines will be able to access more storage.” he said. Aggreko is exploring how it can integrate green hydrogen into its fleet, and combine it with renewables and battery storage to build efficient and resilient hybrid systems, which will help customers achieve their sustainability goals.

“ It’s been a very busy year for us, and we’ve not seen the same issues in mining that we have in some of our other sectors” ROD SAFFY

GLOBAL HEAD OF MINING, AGGREKO

Targeted approach to partnerships Predominantly Aggreko operates independently, often executing the engineer, procure, construct and manage (EPCM) process themselves.

Although many peers offer renewable solutions, not many have the experience required when managing off-grid mine power. “Occasionally we’ll partner with specialist providers,” said Saffy. “In Chile, we’re installing a power station at 4,500 metres above sea level and using specialist local contractors. “We are also technologically ‘agnostic’, and prefer to design a bespoke solution which will include the best combination of renewable and thermal technology.” While most sectors have been impacted by the pandemic, mining, with its remoteness and scale, has weathered it better than most. “The mining sector is used to managing risks, and has a lot of controls in place,” added Whyte. “It’s been a very busy year for us, and we’ve not seen the same issues that we have in some of our other sectors. We are businesschief.com

1962

Year Founded

400+ Number of Employees (AusPac)

£1.365bn Revenue British Sterling (2020)

February 2022

AGGREKO

“ I wouldn’t say it is for all companies but EaaS is a hot topic and increasingly miners are saying 'we do mining, you do energy' ” ROD SAFFY

GLOBAL HEAD OF MINING, AGGREKO

businesschief.com

DID YOU KNOW... MINERS ADOPT SUSTAINABLE SOLUTIONS Whyte said it is starting to see some companies adopt charging stations and believes hydrogen is definitely going to be a technology that presents itself in the near future. “It feels that hydrogen is at the same place that wind and solar were 10 to 15 years ago - it’s a matter of time,” Saffy said. “Whether it’s electric or hydrogen, it will mark a step change to ramping up green energy. Integration will be another game changing phase, not just the facilities but also the mobile equipment.”

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OPPORTUNITIES AND THREATS The greatest opportunities are the pace of change with the energy transition, and market expectations. “We’ve seen this sharp acceleration in customer collaboration, and need for ‘fast track’ options,” said Whyte. The principal threat is the new technology, as it always carries investment risk, he adds. “But the advantage of miners outsourcing it means they stick to their core business. We are confident in our experience to manage the energy technology.”

AGGREKO

“ It feels that hydrogen is at the same place that wind and solar were 10 to 15 years ago - it’s a matter of time” ROD SAFFY

GLOBAL HEAD OF MINING, AGGREKO

very optimistic about the outlook in the next year or so, despite disruptions to the supply chain. “We aim to replicate Australian mining standards globally for consistency, both in terms of energy technology and compliance. A lot of developing countries are looking for the same standards, so that’s a unique offering being global. We’ve seen a great demand in the appetite among the global mining houses to engage with us.” He said its key value propositions are its in-house technology and flexibility. “Aggreko’s scale and access to equipment, as well as investment in technology, is a great platform to start with,” said Saffy. “We can meet customers’ early contact needs and as things change, we can bring in new technologies and deliver it under the same long-term contract.”

“We have committed to investing hundreds of millions of pounds a year to support our energy transition commitments towards becoming a Net Zero business by 2050.” The mining sector needs more flexible solutions, and Aggreko focuses on mobile and modular and integrating them with technology. Aggreko is able to offer flexibility by leveraging its short-term contract business division, and its business model allows for low cost for upgrades / swap outs which reduces risk for miners. Energy-as-a-Service (EaaS) is also rising in importance. “I wouldn’t say it is for all companies but EaaS is a hot topic and increasingly miners are saying “we prefer to do mining and we leave energy to specialists such as Aggreko,” said Saffy.

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E T A T S E H Y T T I S R E V I D N F O I O S U L C N I D AN 2 2 0 IN 2 66

February 2022

DE&I

Diversity and Inclusion are key to business success and sustainability. That is the popular theory, but are organisations practising what they preach? WRITTEN BY: SCOTT BIRCH

verywhere you turn, it seems business leaders (let alone politicians) are extolling the virtues of diversity and inclusion. In the race to a sustainable future and a fairer society built on responsible business activity, diversity and inclusion are crucial to success. We speak to Shobha Meera, Chief CSR Officer, Capgemini Group and Amy Lynch, Head of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at Thoughtworks UK to gauge their views on what has changed and what more needs to be done to properly embrace diversity and inclusion – and reap the business benefits. How has the diversity and inclusion landscape changed in the last two years? SM: Diversity and Inclusion have become far more central to the Board and CEO agenda. There are several driving forces that go beyond regulation and governance. D&I is being shaped by the evolving profile of the modern workforce which increasingly places a premium on inclusive culture and purpose. Racial justice, a greater understanding and value for diverse abilities and neurodiversity, and advocacy are also businesschief.com

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DE&I

Shobha Meera

Amy Lynch

TITLE: CHIEF CSR OFFICER

TITLE: H EAD OF DIVERSITY, EQUITY AND INCLUSION

COMPANY: CAPGEMINI GROUP As the Chief CSR Officer for the Capgemini Group, Shobha drives the strategy for its corporate social responsibility mandate which constitutes three pillars: Diversity & Inclusion, Digital Inclusion, Environmental Sustainability. Working alongside the global CSR network and 270,000+ colleagues who are passionate about the health of our planet & society, she is committed to achieving the ambition for Capgemini to be a global CSR leader. For most of her career, Shobha has been a business and sales leader with extensive experience in sales management & transformation, most recently in the Financial Services space.

“ It starts with you. Your actions and the team you build will speak more about your commitment than anything else” SHOBHA MEERA

CHIEF CSR OFFICER, CAPGEMINI GROUP

COMPANY: THOUGHTWORKS UK Amy has worked with technology teams for more than a decade and currently heads up diversity & inclusion for Thoughtworks in the UK. Amy is passionate about social justice and committed to amplifying those who often go unheard and underserved. She has been included on Northern Power Women's 2019 Future List and champions a more equitable future for all.

other emerging factors that are changing the D&I landscape. “Verna Meyers once said – diversity is being invited to the party, inclusion is being asked to dance.” While we’ve certainly made progress, there is still room for improvement. AL: The range of issues businesses now think about in comparison to 2 years ago is broader. Events such as BLM, the murder of George Floyd, the impact of the pandemic and remote working, to name a few, have meant businesses now realise that there are so many different experiences that we need to think about when we are thinking about diversity and inclusion. businesschief.com

DE&I

“ Diversity and inclusion boosts innovation and creativity and helps to build resilience” SHOBHA MEERA

CHIEF CSR OFFICER, CAPGEMINI GROUP

What are the biggest benefits of diversity and inclusion for business? SM: Quite simply, it comes down to company performance – diversity and inclusion boosts innovation and creativity and helps to build resilience. AL: Creative and innovative companies rely on a diverse workforce. Again, our research found that growing businesses were significantly more likely to see the business benefits of championing DEI issues than those scaling back. Most commonly cited, over a third of growing businesses believed championing DEI issues was a key part of better relationships with employees (versus 18% of contracting businesses) and led to better staff retention (32% versus 17%). Do we need more D&I in the C-suite? SM: Undoubtedly – changes start at the top. Diversity in the C-suite is one of the most important factors for driving broader D&I improvement and shaping a culture that values different types of leaders, talent, and abilities. 70

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DE&I

Leadership teams can also drive collective mobilization: affirmative networks and employee resource groups for colleagues to engage with and contribute to make the diversity and inclusion agenda a reality. At Capgemini, our goal is to have to reach 30% women in exec leadership positions by 2025. In parallel, as leaders should lead by example, from 2021, all of our managers and executives will enter an inclusive leadership training path, starting with workshops on unconscious bias, to develop new mindset and behaviours. Beyond gender diversity, the group is also committed to ethnic diversity wherever we operate. We are a founding member of the World Economic Forum's “Partnering for Racial Justice in Business” initiative, a coalition of organizations and multinational company leaders committed to creating fair and just workplaces for people whose ethnic identities are under-represented and to eradicate racism at the workplace in a sustainable manner. AL: Yes! There are a number of different reasons for this. We need C-level people that are making decisions to be representative of the communities that they serve, otherwise they will not be making the decisions that will have the greatest impact, and be of the greatest benefit, to most individuals. There is a need to create a culture where all people feel seen, respected and heard. Without this, there is a strong possibility people will leave. This is not just about having people from minority groups in decision making roles, but also encouraging people to be role models for other future leaders of the organisation as well. businesschief.com

What countries or regions are embracing D&I and which have more work to do? SM: North America, the UK, Australia, and several European countries have made solid progress, and this is the topic on every CEO’s agenda. However, progress is less consistent in some developing countries and in Asia. AL: At Thoughtworks, we are committed to diversity and inclusion across all our regions and have global aspirational goals in place to continue increasing gender representation in tech. However, aligning 72

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efforts across regions can become more complicated when you take into account nuances such as socio-political and legal factors in different countries. For example, race and ethnicity continues to be a big focus for Thoughtworks in the UK, as well as other regions like North America, Brazil, and Germany. In India this area is more complex, however Thoughtworks India has been leading on LGBTQ+ inclusion for many years which is particularly important given some of the laws that still exist, preventing LGBTQ+ people from being fully accepted.

DE&I

“ We need C-level people that are making decisions to be representative of the communities that they serve” AMY LYNCH

HEAD OF DIVERSITY, EQUITY AND INCLUSION AT THOUGHTWORKS UK

What is the best single piece of advice you give a CEO when it comes to D&I? SM: It starts with you. Your actions and the team you build will speak more about your commitment than anything else. AL: Remain open, humble, listen and learn, and understand that even though an employee’s experiences are different to your own, this doesn’t mean they aren’t valid. DEI issues will not be solved with the wave of a magic wand, yet it's important and requires you to be intentional with your approach, businesschief.com

February 2022

DE&I

“ There is a need to create a culture where all people feel seen, respected and heard” AMY LYNCH

HEAD OF DIVERSITY, EQUITY AND INCLUSION AT THOUGHTWORKS UK

measure what you can, and learn step by step is the best approach. What does the next 12-18 months look like to you when it comes to D&I? SM: For us, it is about building on progress. Capgemini is committed to increasing the diversity of our workforce and have made ESG commitments including reaching 40% women in our teams, and 30% of female exec leaders. Yet gender representation is only one piece of the puzzle, we are focused on broader diversity and equity goals, and we are working to strengthen our culture through multiple pathways including leadership models, D&I training, ERGs, allyship, and much more. AL: At Thoughtworks, our goals for the next 12-24 months are looking at how we reduce voluntary attrition, increase diverse representation and improve engagement for people from underrepresented communities. We do this against the continuing backdrop of remote and hybrid working, which itself has raised a number of DEI issues that need attention – from supporting parents and carers to the problems of presenteeism. businesschief.com

GACW

February 2022

GACW

REINVENTING THE WHEEL IN AN EVOLVING INDUSTRY WRITTEN BY: JOHN PINCHING PRODUCED BY: MARK CAWSTON

businesschief.com

GACW

‘Reinventing the wheel’ has been a great motivation for GACW. The company’s Air Suspension Wheels reach optimum levels of performance and last for decades

lobal Air Cylinder Wheels (GACW) is a company driven by a steel will to transform the mining industry through its pioneering Air Suspension Wheels. Its emergence in the industry is a response to a conundrum which has remained unsolved for decades – how do you reinvent the wheel? Mining is almost as old as time itself and while the industry has moved with the times, some things have remained the same. For the wheels typically used in global mining operations, time has stood still. Even in the digital era, wheels have remained strangely, almost defiantly, antiquated. Too often sophisticated mining operations have persevered with the old-fashioned inflatable tyres. These have been prone to combustion, skidding, blowouts, and lateral sway, while also being completely unsustainable, impossible to dispose off, and responsible for polluting oceans throughout the world. Indeed, a study published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, estimated that tyres account for as much as 10% of overall microplastic waste in the world’s oceans. In contrast, Air Suspension Wheels (ASW) uses a complex combination of long-lasting steel, inwheel suspension, pneumatic wizardry, energy efficiency, and replaceable treads to optimise performance and provide mining systems – from gold to coal – with

February 2022

GACW

Reinventing the wheel in an evolving industry

ultra modern reliability and, mercifully, a vital venture into corporate sustainability. It is indisputable proof that change is happening and it concerns the one thing that should keep businesses moving (but so often does the opposite). President & CEO of GACW, Zoltan Kemeny, is the visionary behind ASW, but also a mining luminary who has been determined to evolve an element of the industry which had stalled for decades. “I saw the tyres as the weak link in the critical interface,” reflects Zoltan. “When the existing rubber hits the road or the terrain, you run the risk of flat tyres, fire, and damage from repeated use. I thought, there's got to be a better way – these wheels must be designed with the same precision as the vehicle itself, with a metallic structure, reactive suspension, and mechanical parts. The identification of that weakness became an inspiration at first, and then an obsession.” 80

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Highly qualified in the field of engineering, Zoltan has used all his experience and knowledge of mining to create a dynamic wheel which works in tandem with other machinery and, critically, the environment in which it operates. Wheel of fortune Clearly the most important plot point on the ASW journey is the elimination of the inflated tyre – a burden which would not be able to survive in the modern mining ecosystem. For centuries, repeatedly pumping up and patching up beaten-up old tyres has been the unsustainable sticking plaster on the mining industry, frequently bringing operations to a grinding halt, wasting valuable time, and creating economic problems in the process. By replacing the traditional design with a predominantly metallic structure – which has steel walls, easily replaceable rubber gripping tracks, and suspension under the chassis – the wheels represent a fully

GACW

integrated solution, allowing free-flowing mining projects without hazardous overreliance on old technology. It is a gateway to the future and a message to the wider world about the positive motivations of mining businesses. When Zoltan started forming the blueprint for ASW he was well aware of the old adage about the ‘pointless reinvention of an existing idea’, but his response is progressive rather than restrictive: “People say, ‘oh

you’re reinventing the wheel’ but that’s just thinking inside a box – you have to look beyond that. Yes, the wheel is already invented, but is it always perfect? No – there are certain areas where the wheel is far from perfect, particularly in the military, forestry construction and, of course, the mining industry.” “The rubber tyre can so easily be damaged by fire, or just with a knife. If you have a steel wheel, which operates the

“THESE WHEELS MUST BE DESIGNED WITH THE SAME PRECISION AS THE VEHICLE ITSELF, WITH A METALLIC STRUCTURE, REACTIVE SUSPENSION AND MECHANICAL PARTS. THE IDENTIFICATION OF THAT WEAKNESS BECAME AN INSPIRATION AT FIRST, AND THEN AN OBSESSION” ZOLTAN KEMENY

PRESIDENT & CEO, GLOBAL AIR CYLINDER WHEELS businesschief.com

GACW

CT Hydraulics (Nqoba)(Pty)Ltd ‘Quality in Hydraulics’ Specialise in the design, manufacture and repair of all types of hydraulic & pneumatic cylinders. CT Hydraulics is affiliated to most of the OEM’s in Southern Africa in the mining industry and often our design improvement recommendations are implemented worldwide. CT Hydraulics have been instrumental in the design of the GACW cylinders. CT Hydraulics is accredited with ISO 9001-2015 quality system.

GACW

Zoltan Kemeny TITLE: PRESIDENT & CEO INDUSTRY: MINING

EXECUTIVE BIO

LOCATION: ARIZONA Zoltan Kemeny has written and co-written over 200 national and international technology patents – issued or pending – in the field of seismic, mechanical, structural, civil, and earthquake engineering, as well as medical electronics, semiconductor, control systems, green energy, engine technology, and optics. He contracted short-run productions of seismic isolators for data centres in Shanghai, China, and sold his licensee upon request in Tokyo, Japan. He owns five small businesses and partners in two other enterprises, which are exclusively dedicated to his own patented technologies. He serves on the board of Eliances where he is an SME on values.

“ PEOPLE SAY, ‘OH YOU’RE REINVENTING THE WHEEL’ BUT THAT’S JUST THINKING INSIDE A BOX. YES, THE WHEEL IS ALREADY INVENTED, BUT IS IT ALWAYS PERFECT? NO” ZOLTAN KEMENY

PRESIDENT & CEO, GLOBAL AIR CYLINDER WHEELS businesschief.com

GACW

“ WE'RE NOT LIMITED TO AN OFF-THE-SHELF SOLUTION. WE ASK THE CLIENT WHAT THEIR SPECIFIC CHALLENGE IS AND, BY WORKING TOGETHER, WE CREATE A SOLUTION.” ZOLTAN KEMENY

PRESIDENT & CEO, GLOBAL AIR CYLINDER WHEELS

February 2022

GACW

same way, then it is impossible to do that. With ASW, you can ride over an IED in a war, or an explosive, and still keep running,” adds Zoltan. It is this robust approach, attention to detail and focus on design which is taking GACW into the next stage of development. Wheels of your mind When it came to testing the new wheels, GACW had a rather novel approach, starting with small vehicles and gradually moving on to monster machines. It started with the humble wheelchair, before progressing to an SUV and then the giant trucks. Sales SVP at GACW, Harmen Van Kamp, who became Zoltan’s indispensable right hand, strategic partner and friend from the get go, knows the potential of taking ASW to the next level, including improving their impact on the sacred arena of sustainability: “Tyres are by far the least innovated part of mining, but they’re also considered the biggest issue – environmentally, it's the most negative aspect of mining. There are many campaign groups that have identified tyre problems and are urging improvements on mining sites. “Controlling the vehicle is also one of the most dangerous jobs on the mine site, so reactions to ASW from a safety perspective have been really positive.” In terms of the disposal of rubber tyres, the process over the last couple of centuries has been far from sophisticated. “You can't really scrap them,” says Harmen. “The only way to get rid of them is to dig a big hole and throw them in there. It then takes about 150 years for disintegration to take place.” It is this kind of statistic which puts mining under the microscope. The launch of ASW, however, has also coincided with mining companies needing to boost their green businesschief.com

GACW

credentials – essentially future-proofing an ancient industry for the next generation. GACW has been explicitly told by organisations that, as part of their lower emission goals, they need to be more responsible when it comes to wheel usage. After all, there is only one thing better than recycling wheels and that is not having to recycle them at all. “A lot of mining operations want to slash their CO2 emissions by 50-60% by 2030 and the use of ASW is going to become a big part of that,” notes Harmen. Testing times During the long journey from conception to roll-out, mining equipment will reach the 86

February 2022

hallowed ground of ‘technology readiness level’. During trials in South Africa, the ASW successfully reached the proof of concept stage, as the wheels excelled in the fields of durability, versatility, and performance. It also convinced Zoltan and Harmen that the ‘crazy’ idea of replacing the rubber tyre could become a stark reality.

GACW

Following the initial trial, GACW moved on to the United States – it was crunch time for the ASW as it faced its most demanding tests. “In America, we have been going through rounds of much more destructive testing, pushing the wheels to their very limits,” reflects Harmen. “Along the way, we have been making final minor

improvements, resulting in the best wheel we can possibly produce.” Getting the most formidable wheel made is something GACW will not cut corners on, and that means investing heavily in collaboration. “We team up with strong partners, because at our heart we are an engineering firm,” insists Harmen. “We are proudly working with the best cylinder manufacturer, the best wheel manufacturer, and the best compound manufacturer. These entities combine to deliver the best wheel possible – a wheel that can fundamentally change how organisations approach mining.” businesschief.com

GACW

“ WE TEAM UP WITH STRONG PARTNERS, BECAUSE AT OUR HEART WE ARE AN ENGINEERING FIRM” ZOLTAN KEMENY

PRESIDENT & CEO, GLOBAL AIR CYLINDER WHEELS

February 2022

GACW Production line GACW currently has the potential to produce hundreds of wheels every year, while its manufacturing partner has 18 facilities all over the world, allowing for significant global distribution. The use of ASW is also a bespoke solution and the company is keen to work with clients to meet their exact mining specifications. “We're not limited to an off-the-shelf solution,” concludes Zoltan. “We ask the client what their specific challenge is and, by working together, we create a solution. Historically a company would choose a rubber tyre and build the vehicle around it. With ASW, we can do the opposite by taking the existing vehicle and integrating a made-to -measure wheel. Subsequently, this method opens up many more possibilities.” The brand of forward-thinking epitomised by ASW is certainly drawing the attention of tier one global mining companies, whose commitment to tech and modern solutions is growing exponentially. Many have even included the embracing of innovation within new mission statements. It's become a pivotal exercise for companies to implement new technology on a mine site, then throughout a country, ultimately resulting in global rollouts. With this in mind, ASW is set to make a seismic impact on mining operations across all continents, taking the industry into unchartered territory and yielding new opportunities in the search for sustainability. The opportunities for mining companies to reboot their systems with the ASW are manifest, while the chance to engage with the public about how they operate represents a unique milestone. The dawn of change has arrived for mining and over the coming years GACW will play a pivotal role in its transformation. Evidently, ‘reinventing the wheel’ is possible after all.

businesschief.com

EVENT PREVIEW

LIVE

Leading executives share ESG insights Hybrid event Sustainability LIVE will see global business leaders share their insights on climate change, net-zero, diversity, inclusion and all things ESG WRITTEN BY: TOM SWALLOW

f sustainability topped the corporate agenda in 2021, 2022 will see it driving meaningful change. After the relative disappointment of COP26 in Glasgow, with governments failing to make significant commitments, many people are hoping big businesses can make the changes required to prevent a climate disaster. And that starts this month when leaders from some of the world’s biggest companies converge on London for the two-day Sustainability LIVE conference. We believe that insights are the most powerful means of discovery when building strategies for decarbonisation and working toward net-zero emissions and more social responsibility. During 2021, we were able to speak to some of the leading sustainability organisations and 90

February 2022

individuals from across the globe and find out how organisations implemented their sustainability plans while setting targets for the future. Organised by BizClik Media Group (BMG), publishers of Sustainability Magazine and Business Chief as part of a portfolio of 12 brands, this show builds on the success of industry shows in 2021 that all showcased sustainability issues. Procurement & Supply Chain LIVE touched on important topics like ESG monitoring, diversity and inclusion in the supply chain and procurement sectors. Technology, AI & Cyber LIVE discussed ethical AI and the importance of technology in developing sustainability solutions. FinTech & InsurTech LIVE brought together leaders from

EVENT PREVIEW

Glen White, CEO, BizClik Media businesschief.com

EVENT PREVIEW

“ As a company, we are in the business to change mobility for good, which means reducing the emissions of the urban transport sector and to turn cities green” AILIN HUANG

HEAD OF SUSTAINABILITY, TIER MOBILITY

some big names in the financial and insurance sectors who also spoke about sustainability in their respective industries. As such a prominent force driving future business success, BizClik Media Group is ready to focus primarily on sustainability 92

February 2022

as it launches Sustainability LIVE, taking place at Tobacco Dock in London on 23-24 February 2022. The conference — sponsored by Microsoft, Interos, SAP and OneTrust ESG — will showcase some of the strategic decisions that organisations have made over the past 12 months and our speakers are likely to divulge their responses to the plans set out by COP26. Welcome sustainability speakers from across the globe With the option to attend the event in person or stream live from anywhere in the world, BMG has accumulated an impressive programme of speakers for the show. As a result, attendees will experience insights from various sectors. Viewers will gain insights directly from PwC, provided by Wineke Haagsma, Director of Corporate Sustainability. “I am really excited to speak at Sustainability LIVE where I will share insights on Sustainability Leadership. We are not B2C or B2B, we are all

B2S. Business to Society. Let's all act accordingly!,” says Haagsma. Sustainability LIVE will also provide ample opportunities to network with other businesses and learn how organisations have been able to navigate the shift to a more sustainable future. A great example of this is Manulife, a long-standing insurance organisation, that will be represented by its Global Chief Sustainability Officer, Sarah Chapman. “I am honoured and excited to be invited to speak at Sustainability LIVE next year. I look forward to sharing Manulife’s journey to net-zero and navigating the challenges and opportunities of the most significant acceleration of ESG issues of our time,” Chapman says. Speaking on behalf of the investment firm, Fidelity, its leader of Global Health, Safety and Sustainability, Ben Clifford, will divulge how the organisation remains accountable for its actions across its business operations. “Really excited to be joining Sustainability LIVE and sharing how we at Fidelity 'Practice what we Preach’ by holding ourselves accountable to the same standards we expect of our investee companies,” says Clifford. Providing access to global sustainability networking Following its success in 2021, BMG leverages the networking platform, Brella, allowing businesses to interact with a global network despite their distance from the event. The company received a high level of interaction through the application during its previous conferences and is confident that networking will be one of the most important features of this year’s Sustainability LIVE. With talks on multiple stages, access to the Brella platform will provide attendees with on-demand viewing of the show, so they don’t miss a thing.

In-person attendees can take advantage of the dedicated networking zone with food and refreshments throughout the event. With the sustainability of business at stake, Sustainability LIVE will act as a catalyst for collaborative change efforts as organisational leaders share their best insights with the world. To find out more about the event and keep up to date with new speakers, check out Sustainability LIVE online or visit Sustainability Magazine to indulge in more industry content.

BUY TICKETS NOW

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DISCOVER WHO MADE THE CUT. Top 100 Companies in Sustainability Read Now

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Creating Digital Communities

HOW TECHNOLOGY IS TACKLING THE WORLD’S FOOD WASTE CRISIS With food waste at record highs, businesses are leveraging technologies like blockchain, IoT and AI to tackle the issue, from detecting food spoilage to redistribution WRITTEN BY: KATE BIRCH

t’s no secret that food waste is at an alltime high, with a staggering one-third of all food produced globally either lost or wasted – that’s 1.3 billion tonnes annually, enough to line up and circle the planet seven times over. According to the United Nations Environment Food Waste Index 2021, an estimated 17% of total global food production is wasted (61% from households, 26% from food service and 13% from retail), while 14% is lost, from farm to retail stage. Add to this the agricultural stage, taking into account food loss during farming, and as much as 40% of all food is lost. Not only is such waste bad for business, amounting to a loss of US$400bn (roughly the GDP of Austria), but it damages efforts to help billions of people who are hungry, and harms the environment – significantly. Food waste and loss causes roughly 10% of global carbon emissions. In fact, if food waste were a country, it would have the third highest emissions after only the US and China. 96

February 2022

And with the world’s population expected to reach 10 billion by 2050, the problems of food security and environmental impact are only likely to increase if changes aren’t made, and fast. Pandemic increased awareness and sense of urgency But things are changing, thanks in part to the pandemic, which has shone a light on the issue, as the fragility of our food chains are exposed. Nearly US$5bn of fresh fruit and veg was wasted in the first month of the pandemic due to the complex supply chain’s inability to quickly redirect shipping and distribution. And while consumers were already demanding transparency around food waste pre-pandemic, this has accelerated exponentially since the onset of COVID-19. According to PwC’s June 2021 Global Consumer Insights Pulse Survey, in just a six-month period, half of all global consumers said they have become even more eco-friendly and expect companies

FOOD WASTE

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FOOD WASTE

Our Food Waste Timeline | Tesco

to follow similar eco-conscious practices. And in the UK alone, in the past year, there has been an 89% increase in food wasterelated Google searches. And corporates are listening. Mentions of ‘food waste’ on corporate earnings calls tripled between the second quarter of 2016 and 2021’s second quarter, found a CB Insights report, while investment into food waste tech startups reached record levels. According to Adam Boutin, a partner at strategic investing firm Capital One Ventures, most companies “are feeling more pressure – and I mean that in a good way – to focus on ESG”. The pressure to make change is starker still considering the Sustainable Development Goals’ target of halving (per capita) global food waste by 2030. It’s a massive undertaking, and one that requires collaborative action throughout the food chain, from farmers, governments and manufacturers through retailers

and consumers. The good news is that collaborative action is becoming easier, not just because of increased commitment to change, but because technology is making change possible, and at a faster rate. Some governments are already on board with strategies to tackle their own food production, and waste. The UAE, which currently imports 90% of its food and wastes US$3.5bn each year, has committed to producing 50% of its food locally by 2051 with initiatives including construction of the world’s largest indoor vertical farming unit in Abu Dhabi and creation of Food Tech Valley, a hub for the incubation of R&D, tech and ideas to achieve zero and reduce waste. Singapore has also put its best foodtech foot forward with a recent injection of US$30m by Temasek and the government in the city-state’s Food Tech Innovation Centre designed to buoy investment in agtech and foodtech. businesschief.com

FOOD WASTE

AgTech to limit loss at the farming level Technology is increasingly being used at an agricultural level (AgTech), to tackle the huge issue of loss and spoilage at the earliest stage of supply chain – farming. Predictions estimate that 15.3%, or 1.2 billion tonnes, of food produced around the world is lost during harvest or slaughter operations, according to a report by WWF-UK. Contrary to the widely held belief that farm-stage food loses are acute in lowerincome regions, the report finds that 58% of global farm-stage food waste actually occurs in the middle- and high-income regions, despite their higher on-farm mechanisation, better infrastructure and more advanced agronomic practices. Having recently landed US$10m in funding, IoT grain-monitoring startup TeleSense uses IoT sensors along with app work to continuously monitor grain and send automatic alerts to users, subsequently mitigating spoilage and insect infestation. While British tech startup RoboScientific has created a device that detects minute changes in volatile organic compounds that livestock and plants emit, which could potentially indicate sickness or spoilage, similar to how a robotic nose might work. This helps agriculturists contain disease or spoilage before it spreads too far and therefore minimise food waste.

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“Food waste is a complex, but solvable issue that requires engagement from everyone across the food system,” says Dana Gunders, Executive Director, ReFED. “From creating more public awareness, to technology innovation, to reevaluating waste-ridden business models, the topic of food waste is finally starting to take centre stage. But a massive acceleration in effort is needed to reach the 2030 food waste reduction goals. That’s why we’re excited to see growing excitement around the space.”

FOOD WASTE

Businesses stepping up to the plate on food waste commitments From farmers to retailers to grocers to startups, businesses are recognising that curbing food waste is good for the planet and good for business. UK grocer Tesco has pledged to end edible food waste entirely, discount retailer Aldi UK and Ireland says it will halve food waste by 2030, and US chain Walmart donates more than 745 million pounds of food globally through its food donation program.

Some are involved in initiatives like 10x20x30, in which 10 of the world’s largest food retailers and providers, including Walmart and Tesco, each engage at least 20 suppliers to halve food loss and waste by 2030. Others are re-evaluating pandemicimpacted supply chains to focus on resilience, adopting new technologies driven by AI, machine learning, IoT and blockchain. Take online British supermarket Ocado, the world’s largest dedicated online supermarket, which in 2020 revealed near zero food waste food figures (0.02%) in what it says is the lowest in the industry. The firm, which has taken the approach to drive down food waste in its supply chain, uses bespoke software which calculates pack items to reduce product damage and decrease food waste. “In 2020, our waste was 0.04%; this contrasts with the industry average waste figure of between 2% and 5%,” Ocado’s CEO Mel Smith told an international audience of food and drink industry leaders at City Food Lecture event early in 2021. “We produce hardly any food waste. This is because we have a really short supply chain, but also because we have a perfect view of what our customers have in their baskets, up to 28 days in advance. This means we are better able to predict what we need from our suppliers and minimise potential waste from buying too much.” Meanwhile, Amazon Fresh has pioneered a machine learning system leveraging data science to estimate future demand, ensuring they are buying products from manufacturers, distributors and local farmers with the most relevant selection and optimal delivery times to limit food waste. And as grocery retailers and other companies prioritise their ESG commitments, startups offering techbusinesschief.com

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5 food waste startups attracting funding With investment in food waste startups reaching record highs in 2021, of US$4bn, we spotlight five foodtech startups that landed both capital and kudos in 2021 for their smart approaches to tackling food waste. 1. Shelf Engine This Seattle-based startup, which secured US$41m funding last March followed by more funding and star backing (talk show host Ellen DeGeneres) in September, has a product ‘Shelfbot’ that uses AI to predict demand for certain foods using a grocery store’s data like sales, weather and foot traffic. Customers include Kroger and Amazon-owned Whole Foods. 2. Olio London-based community surplus food solution Olio, whose app is used to give away unwanted food, for free, nabbed US$41m Series B funding last September, as it looks to expand globally in 10 key markets across Latin America, Northern Europe and Asia. Founded in 2015, OLIO has amassed a user base of five million people and works with big supermarkets to redistribute its surplus food to those who need it. 3. Flowaste Irish food analytics platform Flowaste, which raised US$1.1m seed round last November, uses proprietary image recognition technology to empower food service

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providers and industrial food producers to reduce food waste automatically. Using kitchen data, Flowaste helps to optimise meal prep, ingredient combinations, and portion sizing, while reducing labour costs, to maximise profits and minimise excess. 4. OneThird Named after the amount of food wasted annually and using data-driven prediction of fresh produce to prevent food waste, OneThird raised US$1.7m in a round of funding last April. The startup has created a technology through which inspectors can ‘look inside’ fresh produce using near-infrared sensors and inspect them in seconds. Combining this data with smartphone images of these products and other relevant environmental data, AI algorithms accurately assess produce quality. 5. Apeel Sciences US-based biotech unicorn Apeel, which has developed technology to extend the shelflife of fresh produce, secured a US$250m Series E round of funding last year doubling its valuation to US$2bn with backers including celebrities Katy Perry and Oprah Winfrey and tech sisters Anne and Susan Wojcicki. Apeel has developed an invisible edible coating for fruits and vegetables that slow down the rate of water evaporation and thus degradation

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“ FROM CREATING MORE PUBLIC AWARENESS, TO TECHNOLOGY INNOVATION, TO REEVALUATING WASTERIDDEN BUSINESS MODELS, THE TOPIC OF FOOD WASTE IS FINALLY STARTING TO TAKE CENTRE STAGE” DANA GUNDERS

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, REFED

savvy ways to cut down on food waste are attracting increased funding. Investment in food waste startups reached a record US$4bn in 2021, showing that industries are starting to see solving food waste as a business opportunity, rather than just a matter of corporate social responsibility. VC firm Elemental Excelerator has shelled out around US$500,000 to five growthstage companies addressing food waste, while Maersk Growth – the venture arm of the world’s largest transporter of food – has been an active investor in food waste tech, backing grain monitoring tech TeleSense and food blockchain startup Ripe.io, among others.

of the food’s journey throughout the supply chain, from farm to table. This is critical as 14% of total global food produced is lost between harvest and retail. Knowing at what part of the global supply chain problems arise is typically not known, but emerging technologies like IoT and blockchain can achieve this. Described as being “evolutionary” in the fight on food waste, blockchain has the ability to transform food production increasing the level of safety, transparency and traceability of food from farm to table, and in turn limit waste, says Erik Valiquette, president of the Canadian Blockchain Supply Chain Association. Replacing the current process with a single digital ecosystem run on a blockchain “could be used to store timestamped activity and verify transactions throughout the food supply chain, while working in synergy with other technologies like AI robotics, scanners and IoT to create an infrastructure more efficient and transparent that the one currently in use”, says Valiquette.

Digital supply chain – leveraging IoT and blockchain Technology is increasingly being used to tackle the issue of food waste and is proving especially impactful in providing a digital trail businesschief.com

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Shelf Engine FAQ with Stefan Kalb (Co-Founder & CEO)

“ WE PRODUCE HARDLY ANY FOOD WASTE. THIS IS BECAUSE WE HAVE A REALLY SHORT SUPPLY CHAIN, BUT ALSO BECAUSE WE HAVE A PERFECT VIEW OF WHAT OUR CUSTOMERS HAVE IN THEIR BASKETS, UP TO 28 DAYS IN ADVANCE” MEL SMITH

OCADO’S CEO

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Take San Francisco-based startup Ripe.io. It uses blockchain to create a digital bridge between farmers, distributors, processors, traders, restaurants, grocers and consumers to record and share data on aspects of food’s journey from farm to fork – from the food’s origin and growing conditions to its transportation and contents. IoT connected devices are further being leveraged on the food journey to track and monitor produce and deliver real-time supply-chain transparency and traceability. Sensors on refrigeration units along with data and analytics can monitor fluctuations in performance to predict failures and lead to preventative action, so businesses can re-route or re-allocate produce. Similarly, monitoring sensors in bins offer real-time insights about type and quantity of food waste helping hotels and restaurants plan and reduce. And IoT connected sensors in packaging can help to determine the freshness of a product so distributors can

FOOD WASTE

Did you know…? Food production in its current form, including waste and loss, contributes more than a third of global greenhouse gas emissions, that’s about 17.3bn metric tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent per year, almost 19 times the amount from the commercial aviation industry. Even if all other emissions, from aviation to coal mining, were halted, those from global food production alone are enough to push Earth beyond the internationally agreed goal of limiting global warming to 1.5C.

redistribute accordingly, or consumers can use before shelf-life expiration. And this combined with cloud-based analytics has the potential to reduce food waste by 50% or more, claims post-harvest AgTech company Zest Labs, which works with growers, processors, distributors, shippers and retailers to improve delivered freshness and reduce waste. Zest Labs uses sensors to track the lifespan of fresh produce from the farm to the grocery store. The sensors, attached to pallets, gather information about harvest quality, ageing rates, field conditions and microclimate and uses data-driven analytics so decisions about where to ship the produce can be made.

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Food waste – fast facts Food losses and waste per year are roughly 30% for cereals, 40-50% for root crops, fruits and vegetables, 20% for oil seeds, meat and dairy, plus 35% for fish. I n Africa, the value of lost food exceeds the annual value of grain imports, according to the World Food Programme. isposal of food waste in landfill emits D potent greenhouse gas emissions as it decomposes. In the US, for instance, rotting food accounts for nearly a quarter of methane emissions. n annual investment of US$14bn in the US A alone over the next 10 years can reduce food waste by more than 50% each year resulting in US$73bn in annual net financial benefit – a five-to-one return. That’s according to ReFed’S 2022 Food Waste Forecast. he food currently wasted in Europe could T feed 200 million people; in Latin America, 300 million people; and in Africa, also 300 million people.

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Shelf-life extension – keeping food fresh for longer One of the biggest contributors to food waste in the supply chain is the decomposition and disposal of fresh produce, as nearly half of all fruit and vegetables produced globally are wasted each year, according to the UN. To tackle this, technology is being harnessed to leverage data and tangible insights so everyone from manufactures to retailers can make informed decisions about ordering, distributing and merchandising to avoid waste.

FOOD WASTE

Award-winning US$20bn logistics firm Lineage Logistics is transforming the food supply chain by applying “Silicon Valleystyle technology to the generations-old temperature-controlled logistics industry” to help minimise supply chain waste, says founder Kevin Marchetti. Lineage, which controls 25% of the US third-party cold food chain, uses AI, blockchain, IoT and machine learning to maintain freshness of food en route, including using IoT temperature and vibration sensors to ensure warehouses remain at the correct temperatures and refrigeration systems don’t fail.

Claiming to reduce in-store food waste by up to 50%, Afresh harnesses AI to track demand making it “easier for grocers to manage all aspects of their fresh departments, and, in doing so, dramatically expand their profitability by preventing millions and millions of pounds of food waste,” says Matt Schwartz, CEO, Afresh. Nearly a third less food waste was the result of a collaboration run between a Spanish retailer and Wasteless. The Israeli startup uses AI-powered dynamic pricing to help supermarkets/online grocers recapture the full value of their perishable products and reduce waste, incentivising customers by reducing prices the closer a product gets to its ‘best before’ date. There are technologies too now helping to assess the freshness of food, so decisions can be made. At the storage stage, Strella Biotech leverages IoT networks and data analysis to interpret shelf life, by predicting the ripeness of fruit. It uses biosensors to monitor an increase in ethylene production in fruit, signalling when produce needs to get to consumers before spoiling. And still in its testing stages, Singaporean scientists have created an electronic ‘nose’ that uses AI to sniff out meat freshness. It reacts to the gases produced during decay offering transparency to help cut food waste while also assuring consumers that a food product is still safe to eat despite the fact it may have expired beyond its ‘best before’ labelling. Assessing freshness is being used extensively at retail level too as part of the packaging process. Packaging sensors to extend shelf life IoT sensors and data analysis are being used alongside packaging to trace, monitor and detect freshness. So-called businesschief.com

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intelligence packaging, which uses embedded time-temperature sensors or labels to monitor freshness, addresses the current arbitrary and inefficient system of ‘use by’ and ‘best before’ dates, which inevitably leads to unnecessary fresh produce being disposed of by retailers and consumers because it doesn’t look appealing or has expired beyond its ‘best before’ date. Israel-based Evigence Sensors uses food packaging labels with embedded sensors to detect freshness, with each sensor engineered to correspond to the time-temperature effects for the food it is designed for. Already being used by Russia’s largest food retailer X5 Retail Group, the sensor changes colour if the shelf life is about to expire or if not compliant with storage conditions. 108

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Similarly, UK startup BlakBear, founded by scientists from Imperial College, is targeting food manufacturers and retailers with its freshness sensor labels and a cloud API. The sensors measure the gases (microbiology) that come off protein from inside packages with data sent into the cloud via an app and machine learning determining the level of freshness. Redistributing food before it goes to waste Tackling both food waste/surplus and food insecurity, more recently there has been a surge of tech-enabled solutions empowering potential food waste distribution. Dubbed the world’s first end-to-end solution addressing both food waste and hunger, Copia uses analytics and waste management software to inform businesses of what is being wasted, and why, and to

FOOD WASTE

match them with donors to ensure any excess food is used to feed others. Copia has not only recovered more than five million pounds of edible food from landfills and provided businesses and nonprofits with over US$21m in savings – think actionable insights to help them understand their food surplus trends to reduce overpurchasing – but they are feeding more than 5 million people with food that would be otherwise wasted. There has been a recent surge of apps in the redistribution of food waste space, connecting consumers with F&B outlets to give discounts on excess food at the end of each day – Too Good to Go operates in many cities across Europe and North America, while Yindii and Treatsure operate in Thailand and Singapore, respectively.

Instock in The Netherlands looks to farmers, producers, packaging companies and brokers for surplus food to distribute onwards. While fast-growing UK-founded Olio, now used in more than 100 countries and in partnership with huge businesses like Tesco, redistributes food nearing its sell-by date. “Olio has grown five times over the last year, reflecting a step change that’s taken place as businesses and citizens look to be more sustainable and connect with their local communities,” says co-founder Tessa Clarke. “We have this enormous ambition because humanity cannot continue to puzzle over how to keep global warming within 1.5 degrees and feed a population of 10 billion – whilst continuing to throw away one third of the food we produce and consuming as if we have 1.75 planets.” Food for thought, indeed. businesschief.com

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TOP 10

CSOS OF

GLOBAL

ORGANISATIONS Driving the global efforts for sustainable business and operations across various industries are these 10 sustainability leaders

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TOP 10

ustainability has literally become a fulltime career for some individuals. With climate change higher on the business agenda than ever before, organisations require sustainability leaders to take on new challenges. The responsibilities of these leaders include creating strategies, leading sustainability projects and managing the development of the people and communities affected by their business activities. Many of these individuals have spent years honing their skills for their industries and have become passionate about sustainability, taking it upon themselves to delve deeper into the critical issues that must be addressed to protect people and the planet.

WRITTEN BY: TOM SWALLOW

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Catherine Dolton

Chief Sustainability Officer

InterContinental Hotels Group

Employed by InterContinental Hotels Group for over 20 years, Chief Sustainability Officer Catherine Dolton is in charge of responsibility strategy for the group’s global operations, overseeing the company’s environmental, social and governance (ESG) practices and contributions to charitable organisations or local communities. The company recently launched Journey to Tomorrow, a programme that will drive 10 years of responsible business through a series of ambitious targets set to support people, community development and the planet.

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Charlotte Wolff-Bye

Chief Sustainability Officer

Petronas

Educated at the University of Cambridge and Harvard Business School, Charlotte Wolff-Bye has led a successful career working with organisations like Arcelor Mittal, Equinor, and the United Nations Environment Programme World Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEPWCMC). At Petronas, as the Chief Sustainability Officer, Wolff-Bye is in charge at an exciting time as the company strives to reduce carbon in the fuel industry and modernise conventional fuel solutions with lower carbon alternatives.

TOP 10

Andrew Boyd

Chief Sustainability Officer

Perfetti Van Melle

Since joining Perfetti Van Melle, an Italy-based confectionery company, Andrew Boyd has been responsible for the sustainability initiatives of a global corporation with 17,000 employees that serve 150 countries. Boyd held sustainability roles in other large businesses, including Unilever and Mondelēz International, and is considered an expert in climate change risk mitigation, waste management, water reduction and multi-stakeholder engagement. He also holds extensive knowledge of environmental, social and governance (ESG) reporting and benchmarking.

Judith Wiese

Chief People and Sustainability Officer

Siemens AG

Judith Wiese finds inspiration in people and their incentives to achieve more in their careers. As the Chief People and Sustainability Officer of Siemens AG, Wiese is involved in managing diversity and well-being within the team while also managing sustainability in the organisation. With several years working within organisational culture and talent management, Wiese is well-equipped for more successful years developing people and culture through her position at Siemens. businesschief.com

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TOP 10

Marisa Drew

Chief Sustainability Officer

Credit Suisse

Marisa Drew is proudly involved in the sustainability journey of Credit Suisse. In over 18 years, Drew has developed her career at the company since joining as a Managing Director in charge of global market and finance origination. As the company’s Chief Sustainability Officer, Drew is responsible for ensuring sustainability is considered within its strategies and overseeing finance and impact investment on behalf of the bank’s clients.

Richard Batten

Global Chief Sustainability Officer

JLL

Richard Batten is out to prove just how sustainable real estate can be. As the Global Chief Sustainability Officer of JLL, Batten has 35 years in the property sector, which has provided him with great skills and knowledge of investors, sales, acquisition and funding structures for commercial real estate. Previously, Batten was responsible for industrial and sustainability markets in Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. businesschief.com

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Rebecca Marmot

Chief Sustainability Officer

Unilever

A long-standing member of the Unilever team, Chief Sustainability Officer Rebecca Marmot oversees the company’s sustainability strategy implementation. Before 2019, Marmot worked as the company’s Global Vice President of Sustainability; a leading role in the newly merged Global Sustainability, Global Advocacy & Policy team and Global Partnerships team. Previously, Marmot worked for organisations including L’Oreal, Bell Pottinger, and the UK Department of Trade and Industry.

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Rasmus Skov

Head of Global Public Affairs & Sustainability Solutions

Ørsted

As one of the leading renewable energy organisations that advocates sustainability and climate change, Ørsted is well placed to provoke change in the industry. The leader of its sustainability initiatives, Rasmus Skov, Head of Global Public Affairs & Sustainability Solutions, has been with the company since 2017 when he joined as the Head of Sustainability. His position has since developed into the current role, which incorporates more global operations.

TOP 10

Päivi Makkonen

Head of Supply Chain Sustainability

Neste

Päivi Makkonen, Head of Supply Chain Sustainability, comes from a working background in management, and sustainability and technical marketing. Previously a member of KCL and Metsä Group – a sustainable bioenergy organisation – Makkonen led a proactive role, which put the company ahead of customer sustainability demands. She is passionate about topics like circular economy, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), climate change, emissions, and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Since joining Neste in 2019, during an exciting time for the company, she has managed the strategic initiatives in relation to sustainable business and headed up a global team of professionals spanning Espoo (Finland), Houston, Singapore, Shanghai and Melbourne. This team’s primary role focuses on making changes in the supply chain and improving sustainability communications with suppliers.

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Schneider Electric is one of the leaders in the sector as it proudly represents more than 20 years of sustainability commitment. As the sustainability lead for the organisation, Olivier Blum has been with the company for more than 28 years and continues to make an impact as he emphasises the importance of access to clean energy and digital solutions as basic human rights. In previous years with the company, Blum has held positions in sales and marketing, strategy, management and distribution. He is passionate about finding new business opportunities and engaging with individuals from diverse backgrounds. Blum spends a lot of his time and energy developing the working environment to ensure employees can reach their full potential.

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