Tech

‘Not Just Another Initiative’: How PepsiCo Combines Innovation and Sustainability


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Photo: PepsiCo

Sustainability may not be the first thing that comes to mind when you open a can of soda, but Athina Kanioura, director of strategy and transformation at PepsiCo, said the desire to make a positive impact on the environment. lies at the heart of her company’s approach.

Whether it’s using artificial intelligence to prevent water leaks in factories, developing bio-thermoplastics for product display stands, or using a private data platform to meet regulatory requirements, PepsiCo is working to ensure that the products it sells are produced, transported, and sold sustainably. the most possible way.

“For us, it’s an integral part of the company,” she said. “It’s all about how we can create a positive environment, whether it’s for the food value chain, for the communities we serve, or for the people who produce and buy our products. .”

PepsiCo’s sustainability efforts are called pep+ (Positive PepsiCo), which President and CEO Ramon Laguarta has described as “the future of the company” and a fundamental transformation of what the company does and how it does it.

Also: Technology for a sustainable future: Challenges and opportunities ahead

Kanioura says technology plays a key role in helping the company make this change, and her organization looks at sustainability through several lenses.

One is the portfolio, which includes the products the company makes, whether it’s soda cans or packs of chips. Another lens focuses on packaging and the shift from plastic to biodegradable materials. Finally, there are significant efforts in agriculture and climate change, especially when it comes to achieving goals and driving innovation.

PepsiCo employs approximately 250,000 people globally and develops a range of data-driven technologies itself, specifically to ensure compliance with environmental, social and governance (ESG) regulations.

However, the company also recognizes that innovation is a team sport, and it works with external organizations to develop innovative solutions to tough sustainability challenges.

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Athina Kanioura says sustainability is an integral part of PepsiCo.

Photo: PepsiCo

“For different capabilities, we have partners,” said Kanioura. “We solve a specific problem we have in this space with a tech startup or an established company.”

Work with startups is led by David Schwartz, VP of PepsiCo Labs, which is a team of experts under Kanioura and tasked with harnessing innovation.

Schwatrz explained to ZDNET last year how the lab — which has scaled up more than 30 startups in more than 200 countries to date — is working on a range of products that will help PepsiCo achieve its sustainability goals.

Examples include a partnership with technology company WINT, using artificial intelligence to prevent water leakage in PepsiCo plants — estimates suggest the system could cut annual water consumption by up to 25%.

In Turkey, PepsiCo is working with Pulse Industrial and BrenPower to monitor and detect steam trap failures in the company’s factories through the AI ​​system.

PepsiCo is also working with UBQ document to turn unsorted household waste, including organics and non-recyclable plastics, into bio-thermoplastics that can be used in product displays.

The aim, says Schwatrz, is to bring these innovations inside the company and produce environmentally beneficial results in the most efficient way possible.

“We’re a big company with critical infrastructure,” he said. “We wanted to ensure the solution integrates seamlessly into the PepsiCo system.”

Across all of these pioneering areas, Kanioura says it’s important to realize that delivering positive results for the environment isn’t just a nice thing to have.

Also: PepsiCo is partnering with startups to tap into new sources of innovation. Here’s how it does it

She emphasized the need to ensure ESG factors are considered in every investment analysis and business decision.

Kanioura said PepsiCo reported ESG metrics across “hundreds and hundreds of KPIs”.

Kanioura says the company has built a separate data platform that aims to create a unified platform for the information it holds — and that represents a step change from what is sometimes can happen in other large companies.

“Data has traditionally been kept everywhere — data can be in spreadsheet form, some data can be kept in a fleet department, someone can have that data in a system other in the farming group or in the factory and some data can be stored on one big platform,” she said.

“If we could have a single data platform for sustainability, it would be very easy to consistently report KPIs. Making sustainability a key factor and parameter in every program what we do will become much easier.”

Kanioura gives an example: the company runs an integrated business plan, where the company makes decisions about its goals for the next three years.

One of these decisions may include a product launch, which will only be successful if the company can treat all variations of sustainability as part of the launch process.

“Unless you embed sustainability KPIs in every part of the process at PepsiCo, you will never be able to make change,” she said.

The aim now, says Kanioura, is to continue honing the approach and ensuring that the technology systems her team delivers — whether they are separate developments or created with the help of others. outside innovators — making it easier to put sustainability at the heart of every business decision.

“We needed to think through all the key areas of our business and then look at how we’d put the sustainability KPIs into each individual program, from what we call ‘divisions’. makes up’ our business, the moving part of our business — we have the largest fleet in North America — and selling to consumers,” she said.

“One thing that I want to emphasize above all is that sustainability is an integral part of this company’s strategy. It’s not just another initiative.”

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