Wayne Balta, VP of corporate environmental affairs and product safety, and chief sustainability officer, IBM
IBM's top sustainability executive is Wayne Balta, VP of corporate environmental affairs and product safety, and the company’s chief sustainability officer.
IBM, led by CEO Arvind Krishna (pictured, top of page), also develops cloud-based sustainability software tools for partners and customers to leverage. And the IBM Sustainability Accelerator provides credits for IBM Cloud and IBM Environmental Intelligence Suite Data APIs to nonprofit and government organizations worldwide that are embarking on sustainability initiatives.
The timeline below, updated regularly, further explains IBM's sustainability strategy, key milestones, customer engagements, partner integrations and more. Check back regularly for updates.
November 2023: IBM Sustainability Milestones
Multiple updates...
Data Integration: Global IT consulting firm Deloitte and IBM are integrating their sustainability software to "help clients accelerate emissions reductions strategies and make sustainability programs an embedded part of their organization’s core business."
Training: IBM SkillsBuild has launched free educational courses focused on sustainability. The courses, IBM said, include: (1) Introductory courses will help establish a foundation with historical insights and fundamentals to connect sustainability and technology. (2) Mid-level offerings in design thinking and green entrepreneurship will encourage learners to grow their skills. (3) Advanced coursework will ask learners to apply their skills to sustainability topics across AI, cybersecurity, and ESG reporting.
Sustainability Accelerator: The IBM Sustainability Accelerator announced five new projects focused on water management. Participants include The University of Sharjah, The University of Chicago Trust in Delhi, The University of Illinois, Instituto IGUÁ and Water Corporation.
October 2023: Sustainability Milestones
Jim Kavanaugh, CFO, IBM
Sustainable Supply Chains: Demand for Asset & Supply Chain Management software continues to grow, and the company continues to help customers run sustainable operations, CFO Jim Kavanaugh said during IBM's earnings call. CEO Arvind Krishna also weighed in, stating: "Businesses and governments around the world are looking for opportunities to address demographic shifts, make their supply chains more resilient and improve sustainability." Actual revenue figures for IBM's supply chain software and associated sustainability consulting services were not disclosed.
September 2023: Sustainability Milestones
IT Solutions for Sustainability: Nearly 90% of midsize and large organizations plan to increase their IT spending on sustainability over the next year, an IBM survey of global business leaders found.
ESG Software - Scope 3 Emissions: IBM's software can help organizations accelerate the capture, calculation and analysis of Scope 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The solution involves the integration of NLP in the IBM Envizi ESG Suite, the technology company said.
Food Supply Chains: The company and iFoodDS launched a software solution to address the FDA's Food Traceability Rule, FSMA 204(d). The new solution is called iFoodDS Trace Exchange. According to Christina Shim, global head of product management & strategy, IBM Sustainability Software: "By collaborating with iFoodDS, we can provide even more help to enterprise clients and their trading partners as they work to become FSMA compliant and can take a major step toward the industry's goal of creating a safer, transparent, and sustainable food supply chain."
AI Training: IBM committed to train two million learners in AI by the end of 2026, with a focus on underrepresented communities.
August 2023: IBM Sustainability Milestones
COP28 Conference and AI Software: IBM will sponsor the COP28 conference. The effort will include emphasizing Watsonx to help organizations build AI (artificial intelligence) applications that drive sustainability and efficiency.
AI and Sustainability:IBM has developed a prototype "brain-like" chip that could make artificial intelligence (AI) more energy efficient, BBC reported.
Artificial Intelligence for Sustainability:IBM is touting AI as a way to "accelerates the conversion of data into sustainability insights that help leaders make informed decisions in real-time." Still, AI applications can also boost energy consumption and associated carbon emissions, some critics have warned.
July 2023: IBM Sustainability Strategy Milestones
Multiple updates...
Cloud Carbon Calculator - General Availability: IBM has launched a Cloud Carbon Calculator dashboard to "help enterprises track greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions across cloud services and advance their sustainability performance throughout their hybrid, multicloud journeys," the company said.
Cloud Carbon Calculator - Beta Test: The calculator is an "AI-informed" that's "dashboard designed to give clients access to standards-based cloud emissions data for IBM Cloud workloads with just a few clicks." The calculator is in beta testing as of May 2023.
April 2023: Sustainability Strategy Milestones
Multiple updates...
Partnership - New York Stock Exchange: The company is collaborating with the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) to help support NYSE-listed companies with their environmental, social and governance (ESG) efforts. The effort involves limited-time software discounts for IBM Envizi ESG Suite.
Partnership - ERP Software: An SAP partnership involves ERP software sustainability initiatives. ERP, short for Enterprise Resource Planning, typically involves a suite of back-end business management software.
Sustainability Strategy: The company provided an update on its sustainability strategy here.
IBM Revenues & Sustainability Opportunities: "Many clients are leveraging our technology and expertise to advance their sustainability agendas," IBM CEO Arvind Krishna said during the company's April 2023 earnings call. He touted partnerships involving EY's sustainability consulting practice, and a relationship involving Siemens that "integrates software from both companies to enable sustainable product development." Still, Krishna did not share any specific facts, figures or research to pinpoint the size of the sustainability opportunity.
Partnership: The company and Siemens Digital Industries Software are expanding their partnership to "develop a combined software solution integrating their respective offerings for systems engineering, service lifecycle management and asset management," the companies said.
Research - Consumer Goods, IT Spending & Sustainability: Consumer goods companies are boosting their technology budgets by 34% to align sustainability and operations and drive growth, according to a study from the company and The Consumer Goods Forum.
Mainframes: The company is positioning new z16 and LinuxONE solutions to help customers consolidate their servers and reduce data center energy consumption by 75%.
March 2023: IBM Sustainability Strategy Milestones
Multiple updates...
Partnership - IT Consulting: EY Consulting & IBM Software partnered to assist customers with sustainability strategies in such carbon-heavy industries as civil infrastructure, telecom, energy, mobility & manufacturing.
Request for Proposals: The company is accepting proposals for the next cohort of the IBM Sustainability Accelerator, which will focus on water management solutions. This program "applies IBM technologies, such as hybrid cloud and artificial intelligence, and an ecosystem of experts to enhance and scale projects focused on populations vulnerable to environmental threats," the company said.
Engagement:etisalat by e& will leverage IBM sustainability software to help to help the company's environmental, social and governance (ESG) strategy.
Research - CEOs on Sustainability: Fully 81% of organizations have a sustainability strategy in place and 53% of the CEOs rated sustainability as a top priority, according to an IBM CEO Study from 2022. However, only 35% of the polled organizations have started executing sustainability initiatives, the study revealed.
Note: This blog originally published in July 2023. Regularly updated thereafter.
Sustainable Tech Partner is a digital media platform and online community. Our content empowers technology partners and their customers to achieve a sustainable future.
