The EY organisation and IBM have announced a global collaboration to focus on environmental, social, and governance (ESG) solutions to assist enterprises in accelerating business transformation through value-led sustainability. The EY and IBM teams will seek innovative services that integrate sustainability with business strategy, support their initiatives’ rapid and scaled implementation, and redefine how value is made for their business, stakeholders, people, and the planet.
EY teams have considerable experience advising firms on sustainability strategy and transformation. In contrast, IBM has unique technological capabilities as well as a portfolio of software to monitor, deliver, and report on sustainability targets. By bringing a comprehensive understanding of evolving data standards, both industry experts are attempting to handle the vast challenges of ESG data.
The EY and IBM teams intend to create products that are integrated with cutting-edge technology, such as hyper-scale public cloud and ERP systems-of-record. Collaborative products are aimed to accommodate client preferences across varied hybrid IT infrastructures, including:
1. Accounting and management of greenhouse gas emissions in scope 3
2. ESG Managed Services
3. EY Sustainable Enterprise Asset Management (SEAM) platform for carbon capture, analysis, and decision support in scopes 1, 2, and 3.
This collaboration is expected to leverage EY’s leading Climate Change and Sustainability Services, and Technology Consulting practises, as well as IBM’s software, which includes the IBM Envizi ESG Suite, IBM Environmental Intelligence Suite, IBM Maximo Application Suite, IBM TRIRIGA Application Suite, IBM Turbonomic Application Resource Management (ARM), and IBM Supply Chain Intelligence Suite, to develop a set of frameworks and accelerators to assist companies in operationalising decarbonisation action plans at the asset level.
EY and IBM teams are already working together in a variety of ways to provide value-led sustainability, including:
The EY SEAM platform, which leverages IBM Maximo Application Suite, assists enterprises in capturing and calculating carbon emissions data, reporting it in accordance with regulations, and setting targets to motivate action. The technology may be used on any public cloud to help enterprises in asset-heavy industries like civil infrastructure, telecommunications, energy, transportation, and manufacturing.
The EY Sustainable Travel Approval Tool (STAT), created in collaboration with IBM Consulting, is intended to encourage employees to book more sustainable travel options while also supporting an organisation’s carbon ambition by providing users with greater visibility into both the financial and carbon footprint impact of business travel. Since its rollout across 41 markets within the EY organisation, the tool has significantly reduced one-day travel from 18% to 3% of total trips and raised train rail reservations to 36% compared to 10% in FY19 in countries where train rail is a feasible alternative.