More measurable (and sustainable) New Year 2022, less miserable future!

What you measure is what you get. That’s why what to measure is the question we should ask every day. 

We are all wondering about our role in and contribution to sustainable development. In September 2015, a total of 193 UN member states committed to promoting 17 shared goals aimed at ending poverty, protecting the planet, and ensuring prosperity for all. 

Today, this is seen everywhere. Companies are working hard to get their sustainability score cards shine. And to calculate the carbon footprint improvements. And that is great, as there is no silver bullet but rather lots of small improvements! No one alone moves the needle for the better, but everyone together will.

The expectation is that every organization is contributing to some of the UN goals. But the challenge is to quantify it, proof it and build a plan to improve it. Can you measure it? 

We have discussed this also at Wirepas and realized we can make an impact on many of the goals. It is a great concept to study and challenge your thinking on sustainability. Even as a SW technology company, there is a lot you can do both internally and externally.  

Internally, we recently started to use a new third-party platform to measure, discuss and share employee matters [goal 3]. The “vibe” update of the organization is available every morning. We can see where and why we are excited as well as where the pain points and concerns are. It also gives the possibility to answer questions made anonymously on the spot [5, 8]. This visibility does not leave any excuse not to react and improve. We have let the employees choose their preferences for the best working hours and place to the extent it is possible. Encouraging and supporting exercise, without pushing one model or one sport [5, 10]. 

What is overly exciting at Wirepas is what we can do externally - and not just in terms of the carbon footprint but also the carbon handprint: we can help others achieve their sustainability goals with our technology [9, 11, 12, 13, 17]. That is one of the greatest inspirations I have had in my career, the leverage we are enabling. 

We can see already tens of use cases and thousands of projects making good for sustainability. This is also probably one of the reasons why our organization rates purpose so high in our surveys and discussions [8]. The impact ranges from helping factories to have an affordable connection to thousands of sensors to predicting machine failures and production downtime [11, 9, 12] to hospitals where nurses can save time from non-value add tasks like locating equipment [8]. We are helping to build a whole new level of visibility in supply chains by connecting shipped items from containers to pallets and down to parcels for fully automated location, inventory, and condition information [11, 12, 9]. Consumers get almost real time data on their electricity consumption thanks to our connectivity, and it can guide them for more responsible consumption [11, 12, 13]. 

Recently, we got our connectivity included in the 5G standard, as the first non-cellular 5G. This enables more open partnerships and ecosystems in the market [17, 10]. Our product architecture and business model remove monopolized models where local radio spectrum is owned by a single party. It democratizes the connectivity to all, big and small players [9, 10]. Anyone can take it into use without intermediaries. And it is by far the most affordable 5G technology, enabling increasingly “measuring points” that improve the sustainability impact [10, 11, 12]. 

When the UN released 17 goals six years ago, I admit I did not pay much attention to them. Not that I did not recognize and rationalize the importance of sustainability, but they did not resonate enough for me to use them as a guideline. Today, sustainability is one of the leading values for Wirepas. We have learned that our customers make technology selections also based on sustainability factors, not only performance justifications. Those can be e.g., the least level of infrastructure [9], no wires [12], lowest power consumption [12], privacy [10], no vendor lock-ins [10] and own control of the service [8].  

Looking back, it is nice to see that we have made so many right, sustainable choices for the sake of making rational products for the market of massive IoT. This makes us even more excited about pushing the boundaries further! 

Is sustainability about being rational and humble? I think so. It’s about being driven by your carbon handprint, not only footprint.  

Go measure your sustainability! We want to help you to make your business the most sustainable way.