Technology helps achieve a transformation towards a circular economy

Madrid, February 14, 2020 - "Digital technologies are helping companies to achieve a major transformation towards a more circular economy, in order to benefit the protection of increasingly important ecosystems," said Elena Rodríguez, the head of open innovation and innovation ecosystems at Opinno, at the event "The law of digital transformation: types of benefits" organized by Madrid Network Innovation, the first in a series dedicated to accelerating the impact of the digital transformation on organizations.

For the World Economic Forum, a proper development of the digital transformation can mean an added value of about 12.7 trillion US dollars for society in 2025, according to Elena Rodríguez, "it is believed that the development of new technologies can lead to a considerable decrease in CO2 emissions, approximately 26 billion tons by 2025".

The Opinno board commented that an innovative company always has to look for new and better ways to manage its resources, so digitization has become the key to sustainable asset optimization, so that a company can minimize the threats to its business."Innovative technologies such as Big Data or artificial intelligence can help companies achieve sustainable development that can improve their growth and participation in society," she said. 

Sustainable business practices not only contribute to the moral and ethical aspects of a company, but can also increase long-term profitability. In addition, sustainability can improve a company's ability to recruit talent, retain employees and attract customers. 

In addition, these methodologies can help a company achieve greater corporate social responsibility, expedite the acquisition of government contracts, and improve its public relations. In this regard, Elena Rodriguez stated that "there is a need to decouple economic growth from ecological impact, improve sustainability reporting and increase customer engagement". 

Sustainability extends to the concept of creating a strong and durable technological and organizational infrastructure. To achieve a sustainable situation, organizations must be well structured, focus on specific data that can contribute to its improvement, highlighting their performance in visible figures that can be verified live, and invest in digital technology that is a vehicle for positive change. For the Opinno directive "the time has come to lose the fear of digitalization, since it will not condemn employees, but will help them to prosper". 

She also concluded that "An innovative company has to be aligned with a sustainable model, and for example to support this premise, the Opinno team is developing project strategies that are committed to driving long-term sustainable and inclusive economic growth.