Six organisations, six unique journeys; each in search of a future where a notoriously carbon-intensive industry can reduce its impact on the environment
to a sense of solidarity and duty to do something about environmental impact and act now. As a result, we began implementing initiatives at different levels of the company.” Earlier this year, the company published its second sustainability report (for fiscal year 2020), which outlines its advances in three primary areas (planet, people & communities and governance). This report will continue to be an annual occurrence. Subsequently, in May, EVS announced environmental, social and governance (ESG) research firm Morningstar Sustainalytics had awarded it a ‘low risk’ rating of 13.5 – down 9.2 points from the previous year and in the seventh percentile of Sustainalytics’ global universe of more than 15,000 rated companies. Specific developments include a major reduction in the impact of staff travel – including a requirement, starting this July, that those ordering company cars must choose electric vehicles – and multiple measures at EVS sites, such as the installation of solar panels and water reuse. On the R&D side, the company has long been shifting more towards software- based solutions. Although in terms of hardware: “We’re looking at how this tech can take up less rack space for customers, as well as how we can reduce the energy consumption.” Like every contributor to this piece, Verlaine stresses the importance of collective action around sustainability. “It’s not something you can do on your own.” He says that the general reaction to EVS’s programme has been very positive. For the next steps, the company is currently reviewing its materiality matrix – a tool that allows a business to identify and prioritise the ESG issues that are most critical to its own organisation – and establishing longer-term sustainability targets.
Words by David Davies
TAKING INITIATIVE
Sébastien Verlaine, the head of marketing and communications at live production solutions innovator EVS, highlights a sequence of events in 2020-21 as having been decisive in shaping the company’s sustainability path. “We began to review some of our processes when we acquired the media network infrastructure company Axon in 2020,” he recalls. “Soon after that, we had flash floods in Belgium and Germany, which really impacted some of our people who work there. That contributed
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