Software that grows with the sustainability movement

Sustainability functions are still typically splintered among departments, managed on disparate spreadsheets and focused on compliance — but shifting market dynamics are now challenging that model, pushing the conversation to the C-suite as part of strategic decision making.

从风险和资源管理，财务或产品的设计，一个领先的可持续发展管理软件供应商说，机遇和需求已经超出大多数公司目前的能力。必威体育2018

“我们认为市场正在发生深刻变化，”该公司今天称为直到PE International首席执行官克里斯托夫Wilfert，告诉GreenBiz独占。“[必威体育2018可持续性]被移动到不同的议程。公司希望将其规模为核心业务。”

That realization pushed Wilfert's team to rethink their own business model. Today, the company is unveiling a new name — thinkstep — and a flagship product offering positioned as a new kind of software solution for companies to better integrate sustainability into their core business.

宽阔的软件平台，thinkstep.one，将允许在一个共同的平台，使应用程序的功能从一个平台的大公司，政府机构和大学规模的可持续性决定由各地住房数据的操作。必威体育2018

“thinkstep.one brings together all of the company’s intellectual property to help solve customer sustainability challenges,” according to a thinkstep statement.

Along with a central common data platform, the release includes the availability of 70 software application suites for product design and innovation, product reporting, compliance, life cycle assessment, corporate sustainability reporting, energy management, environmental health and safety management, supplier engagement and building portfolio management. Many of the applications are supplied by partner companies such as Trucost.

此举把可持续性纳入的其他企业必威体育2018功能的场所。正如公司例如Salesforce，SAP和甲骨文一直在为人力资源的业务应用，销售管理和财务集中的数据库平台，thinkstep是促进可持续发展的所有功能的中央数据库平台。必威体育2018

Wilfert said he believed the product is the first in the market.

“我们现在看到的是现在是时候加强它 - 我的意思是更广泛的可持续发展议程，” Wilfert在GreenBiz接受记者采访时说，政府官员和企业越来越多地思考这一挑战的严重性必威体育2018上下文从气候变暖超过2度Celsuis保持地球。

Wilfert posits that 2015 is the beginning of a year, and a decade, when things will begin to change fast, starting with momentum building up to the United Nations COP2 Paris meeting, where it is hoped an international agreement will finally be reached on holding back greenhouse gas emissions. He said his company is stepping up to the challenge at a crucial time.

“thinkstep下划线严格分析，我们已知，并采取行动和影响力的使命，” Wilfert说。“你知道的越多，就越是。”

Why now?

因为它承载了客户和客户，包括大型企业如联合利华，卡夫食品，英国央行和欧洲委员会的年度研讨会的总部设在德国斯图加特，软件供应商和咨询正在这些公告。研讨会的与会者听到关于在本文中移动到GreenBiz.com同一时刻的变化。

该公司介绍了新的软件和相关更名为大成，它提供了其3000个客户的一切组合。它已被越来越多的热映，Wilfert表示，随着软件和数据销售增长30％，去年和预订100％的增长。他说，去年的增长是相当于美元3000万$。

Many of its partner application providers have already built software to work with the platform.

技术人员将推出其第一能源效率web application to work on the platform. With it, companies can assess their energy and cost savings potential.

Trucost, meanwhile, integrated its data capital valuation and Life Cycle Assessment software to work on the think step platform. Previously natural capital valuation and LCA and product design might have been managed as separate activities in a company, but because the scarcity of natural resources informs how to sustainably design a product, they are inherently linked.

该平台采用云技术，使客户可以快速部署应用程序，但该公司将其描述为“下一代云”，即允许两个专有的云应用BASD。这两种“无缝集成到这个平台。”现有的世界粮食不安全状况和软件的GaBi公司已经建成了新的平台和现有的世界粮食不安全状况顾客移植过来。

Until now, the company's leading products were SoFi, software to manage sustainability reporting on carbon, energy managment, supply chain and healthy and safety, and GaBi, which is for life cycle assessment, product carbon footprint, resource and energy efficiency and the like.

What is in represented in this move is the interdependence of decision making and the need to have what Wilfert calls "a single version of the truth," inside companies looking for best practices.

“So we think it makes a lot of sense to start with an architecture that acknowledges the need for a single platform with multiple applications," Wilfert said.

Until now, typically in a company, "There are 10 different walls and a variety of applications that people use, one for product management, corporate responsibility, that all touch on sustainability. Yet everyone looks at it in terms of their role, but what’s needed, when you think about it, is a single version of the truth, so when you switch out the energy source for the manufacture of a product, it will change the composition of the product and thus product design.”

例如,如果一个企业公司改变了energy source at a manufacturing plant, that is going to affect the composition of the product. Until now, different parts of an organization often do not interact, so an act like changing an energy source at a single plant might not trickle back to product development, yet ideally it should be reflected in product design.

Thinkstep.one, Wilfert said, makes it simpler and more seamless for companies to make changes that improve efficiency and sustainability.

“They can see at the design stage, versus after the product is made, how it will be sustainable," Wilfert said. "It requires lifecycle management.”

早期的评论来斯图加特会议出来给thinkstep.one软件平台，并更名竖起大拇指。

2degrees公司董事总经理奥利弗Hurrey啾啾，这是“令人耳目一新推出看起来令人惊叹的产品。”

Laura Storm, executive director of Sustainia, tweeted “Congratulations @pe_experts on the new name and brand! Clear proof that#sustyis the only way forward to succeed in business #ThinkSymp15."

詹姆斯·法瓦博士，thinkstep首席可持续发展策略时也表示，现在必威体育2018市场上的意见可持续发展作为一个成功的工具。

“Companies are no longer just reacting to being told to be more sustainable – business leaders are driving change by using sustainability to boost their economic performance – reducing cost, mitigating risk, improving brand value and increasing sales,” he said in a blog post he plans to publish later today.

An example, Fava explained, is the Kenco coffee brand. Kenco switched from glass jars to refill packs.

“This one move reduced the packaging weight by 97 percent and the energy to manufacture it by 81 percent,” he said. "The change was marketed on its environmental benefits, and helped to grow market share for Kenco, it also saved money."

所以thinkstep.one平台，蚕豆写道，“使个人能够专注于各种形式实施变革，推动效益，减少影响和创造价值，而不是追逐数据，操纵多个电子表格和收集信息，以满足不同的合规性要求。“

Until now, the company's leading software product has been its SoFi solution that allows companies to obtain financial-grade sustainability information from their own operations, supply chain and products. That software is cerfified by the GRE for G4 content compliance and is also accredited for carbon reporting by the CDP.

但法瓦和Wilfert说的操作和决策的相互依存呼吁中央决策和更快的决策和实施工具的一个新的水平。

“Environmental, social and compliance factors are becoming increasingly central to companies’ ability to operate successfully. At the same time, value chains and product life cycles have become ever-more complex, not just because individual issues are now more in the spotlight, but because these issues are increasingly interacting with each other," Fava said.

Thinkstep表示，其thinkstep.one目前正处于测试阶段，将在半年内完全可用。