Hear from our Procurement Game Changer
How it all started
Deutsche Telekom aims to be the industry-leading and the industry-changing figure. One of their many initiatives is committing to decarbonization targets aligned with Science Based Targets. The sustainability team is not solely responsible for driving the company’s sustainability strategy forward and achieving set targets. Like in many global companies, when it comes to Scope 3, Deutsche Telekom’s procurement team is in charge of the most significant portion: 98,5% of the company’s carbon footprint.
About Deutsche Telekom:
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Global telco organization headquartered in Bonn, Germany with 108+ billion EUR revenue.
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Present in 50+ countries, 240+ million customers, and 200,000+ employees worldwide.
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Pioneer of social issues such as climate protection, data privacy, and diversity
Challenge
Both Procurement and Sustainability teams need accurate data to speedily and strategically tackle Scope 3. Deutsche Telekom knows that the best way to reduce emissions is by collaborating with their biggest suppliers, driving collective action, and ensuring transparency in a significant segment of their emissions profile.
The team learned that not only was it impossible to calculate supply chain emissions via spreadsheets, but it also created a static view and lack of alignment within the organization.
Deutsche Telekom needs accurate and up-to-date data on their suppliers, spend, and emissions, with the ability to manage it. To achieve effective collaboration between functions and with their suppliers, there must be one source of truth for the whole organization.
Solution
To get a single source of truth for Scope 3 emissions, Deutsche Telekom partnered with Sievo. Sievo CO2 Analytics automatically extracts, enriches, and maps the company’s procurement data to carbon data. The tool helps Deutsche Telekom to understand their supply chain emissions and suggests insights on data quality improvements and decarbonizing opportunities.
Starting with spend-based and quantity-based calculations for most, the team is constantly working on their carbon footprint accuracy by using CDP data to find industry emission factors for their suppliers.
Deutsche Telekom’s Sustainability team can add any custom factors from their suppliers directly into the system. This level of granularity enables more informed decision-making, fueling the company’s targeted sustainability initiatives.
Suppliers are key in tackling Scope 3 emissions. That is why Deutsche Telekom focuses on collecting supplier-specific factors and identifying hot spots in categories, regions, and suppliers to better understand their suppliers’ sustainability performance and consider it part of the evaluation criteria when choosing their suppliers.
Suppliers who also committed to Science Based Targets are visible in Sievo CO2 Analytics, giving Deutsche Telekom a direct comparison of their emissions and reduction targets.
Results
Sievo CO2 Analytics has become the single source of truth for Deutsche Telekom’s supply chain emissions, with Procurement, Sustainability, and Finance teams accessing it 2000 times per month.
Now, the company has a holistic overview of their Scope 3 emissions with the ability to drill down into emission hotspots. CO2 Analytics solution gives the team complete control in mapping and calculations, as well as comprehensive visibility in emissions development over time and target performances.
Without manual work and freed-up time, Deutsche Telekom can prioritize their sustainability strategy in a realistic manner and focus on decarbonization with suppliers.
One of the radical changes that the team finds necessary after understanding their Scope 3 emissions is the need to make contracts based on carbon reduction. Creating binding agreements based on suppliers' sustainability and their targets is the way for Deutsche Telekom to half their emissions by 2030 and become climate neutral in scope 3 by 2040.
