By Saurabh Rai

Reflecting on 2024, the geospatial sector has witnessed transformative advancements, driven by innovations that integrate GIS, AI, and IoT into critical domains. The development of the Ayodhya Sustainability Index as a milestone in leveraging geospatial intelligence for sustainable urban planning, environmental conservation, and heritage preservation. This initiative has set a global benchmark, showcasing how technology can balance growth with cultural preservation. 

The year also saw India embracing national initiatives like Naksha, Bhuvan, and SVAMITVA, which propelled sustainable development, urban planning, and disaster management using geospatial solutions. These programs reflect the sector’s growing influence in addressing complex challenges.

Looking ahead to 2025, the integration of geospatial technologies with AI, IoT, and big data is poised to transform industries such as agriculture, logistics, and renewable energy. 

The focus will be on leveraging these technologies to tackle global issues like climate change, rapid urbanization, and resource management. With data-driven tools at the core, the industry aims to drive impactful and sustainable change, fostering innovation and supporting national priorities. 

With precise data-driven insights, industries can make informed decisions, optimise resource allocation and implement sustainable practices.

In agriculture, for instance, geospatial tools combined with AI can enhance crop monitoring, predict yield and manage water resources effectively. In logistics, they streamline operations by providing real-time data on traffic, weather and optimal routes. Renewable energy sectors can benefit by identifying ideal locations for solar and wind energy projects, thus accelerating India’s transition to cleaner energy sources.

The integration of geospatial technologies aligns with India’s national priorities, such as building resilient infrastructure and achieving sustainable development goals. 

As geospatial intelligence continues to evolve, it promises to play a critical role in shaping a more sustainable, resilient, and technologically empowered future.

Saurabh Rai is the CEO of Arahas, a provider of Geospatial, AI, and Sustainability Technology services. The opinions expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect the views of CIO Dimension.

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The world produced a staggering 62 million tonnes of e-waste in 2022, marking an 82% increase since 2010.This figure is projected to grow by another 32% to reach 82 million tonnes by 2030. (Source: UNITAR). The numbers are staggering. While efforts are on to prevent and manage e-waste, we must embrace more sustainable ways to address the e-waste problem, which is reportedly the fastest growing solid waste stream in the world. 

This World Environment Day, we feature a homegrown Indian company that’s pioneering environment-friendly, sustainable practices in the telecom technology  – a field with a high e-waste footprint. In fact, this company’s commitment to eco-friendly practices sets them apart in the industry. 

The greener the better

Chennai-based Telekonnectors, a leading brand that offers communication headsets, analog phones, copper cable testers, and Air-Traffic Control solutions, has a few decades-old story in ‘green telecom’ and sustainable product lifecycle. 

Karthik Krishna Murthy, Managing Director & CEO of Telekonnectors says, “Employee turnover and hence disposal of personal use telecom products amongst our customers is as high at 45% every year. One can imagine the amount of e-waste that gets generated. If we are to treat our plant with respect, we ought to manage and recycle the amount of waste that gets generated.”

The company’s TLK Buyback program is just one of the many ways in which the company works toward this goal. The program ensures recycling and safe disposal of plastics, cables, and other e-waste, in addition to encouraging clients by incentivizing them. “Our buyback program ensures that we collect all headsets including those of other brands to dispose of them safely,” Karthik highlights. 

And there’s more! The company’s ‘green’ philosophy reflects across the entire product lifecycle. “All companies including our customers have a responsibility to sign up to Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). We have taken this responsibility seriously. Right from product engineering, design, design for manufacturing and customer servicing, we are enforcing a culture of environmental friendliness. So we are pushing through a behavioral change within our employees and an appreciation of the same with our customers,” elaborates Karthik. 

End-to-end sustainability

Hence, the aspect of sustainability is not an after-thought for Telekonnectors, but something the company consciously incorporates right at the design stage of the products. Karthik maintains that they focus on picking more sustainable materials for production and packaging to ensure minimal environmental impact, both during its lifespan and after its usability has ended. 

Similarly, its manufacturing processes are centered around efficiency and waste reduction while the distribution mechanisms are optimized for minimal environmental impact. 

Karthik believes that a product’s sustainability journey does not end there. Factors like high durability and energy efficiency are equally critical. “Typically headsets need to be replaced within 12 months, but we promise our customers a product life of anything between 24-36 months,” he adds. 

Their dedication to sustainability extends beyond environmental practices. Telekonnectors is one of the few companies to champion gender inclusivity across all levels, including its factory floors. “More than 40% of our Manufacturing, R&D and Quality teams are staffed by women. Our production floor has nearly more than 1 woman for 2 employees. We find women being more sincere, committed, delivering less manufacturing faults, and abstaining less from work,” sums up Karthik. 

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Executives and engineers at technology companies around the world are optimistic about artificial intelligence and sustainability as broad concepts, but there is uncertainty around the best path forward to advance these initiatives within their companies.

Those revelations emerged from the 2024 Industrial Technology Index from TE Connectivity. For its second annual report on the state of innovation, TE surveyed 1,000 people representing a wide range of industries in China, Germany, India, Japan and the United States.

“TE has devoted significant resources to sustainability and AI, and we know other companies are doing the same. We wanted to learn more about how these two megatrends are affecting the innovation process and, in turn, how innovation is driving them forward,” said CEO Terrence Curtin. “What we found was that the leaders who set a company’s goals and the engineers tasked with meeting these goals still have some work to do to align for success.”

The survey’s results make apparent the disconnect between leaders and engineers when it comes to rolling out artificial intelligence. Three-quarters of executives say that engineers are responsible for driving AI implementation. However, 68% of engineers wish that leadership would lay out a clearer plan for its implementation. When asked to peer into the near future, 79% of both engineers and executives expect their company to invest more in AI training over the next three years.

When responding to questions about sustainable practices at their companies, most engineers revealed a deep passion for the environment. Eighty-seven percent of engineers agree that it is personally important to them to support climate change solutions in their work. This sentiment is so deeply entrenched in the engineering community that 34% said they would leave their job if their company did not provide opportunities to support sustainable initiatives. 

Survey data indicates that executives need to do some more work to instill confidence in their engineering communities, as there is a five-point difference between the groups when asked if they were satisfied with their organization’s sustainability plan.

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DXC Technology, a Fortune 500 global technology services company, has forecast five ways software will help create a more sustainable future in the next five years.

“Technology has an outsized role in almost every aspect of sustainability – from increasing productivity, efficiency, and cost savings, to monitoring and modelling progress,” said Henrik Hvid Jensen, Chief Technology Strategist, DXC. “As a global IT services leader, DXC sees a number of pivotal ways that technology will help us to drive sustainable development in the next five years.”

1. Organizations will adopt circular economy business models

Globally, natural resources are dwindling and their increased exploitation to cater for global demand is having a negative impact on the environment. To build a competitive global circular economy that produces no waste, companies must adapt their business models to maximize resource efficiency, develop recyclable products, and repurpose waste as new offerings.

One of the biggest challenges of moving to a circular economy is collecting and sharing data about a product throughout its entire lifecycle. Digital product passports (DPPs) offer that capability and promise to act as a transparent record of a product’s sustainability, environmental and recyclability attributes. The European Union is positioning itself as a first mover in the space and expects most products in the region to be covered by DPP regulation by 2030. 

2. AI will help manage natural resources

AI will become increasingly important for tackling most environmental sustainability issues including biodiversity, energy, transportation, and the management of agroecosystems. In the agriculture sector, AI can produce insight and increase automation to improve environmental stewardship and detect diseases and potential infestations before crops or livestock are threatened. Technology not only impacts individual farms’ output, but data generates valuable insights that can positively influence policy decisions at the local or national level.

3. AI will increase the viability of renewable energy

McKinsey estimates that by 2026, global renewable-electricity capacity will rise more than 80 percent from 2020 levels. For example, Europe will add approximately 36 million renewable-class assets, such as solar panels, electric vehicles (EVs), and energy storage, to the grid in 2025, and 89 million by 2030.

Automation and data analytics can help manage decentralized energy sources, direct excess electricity and flag potential grid weak points before they become significant issues, and help utilities redirect power to where it’s needed in real time.

4. There will be a major shift to software-defined EVs in the next decade

The automotive industry accounts for nearly a quarter of global greenhouse emissions and is a major cause of city air pollution. To address this, regulators in the U.S., Europe and elsewhere are reviewing policy and implementing laws to limit the sale of new gas and diesel cars. As a result, eighteen of the world’s largest automakers have switched or pledged to switch, either completely or significantly, to EV manufacturing in the coming years.

EVs will be software-defined vehicles (SDVs) with automated capabilities to manage the car more efficiently with particular attention to environmental sensitivities. SDVs feature smart routing and energy optimization that can mitigate issues related to charging capacity and range.

5. Finance systems will be re-engineered to consume less energy

Transitioning to more environmentally sustainable operations is a top priority for banks and financial services organizations. More sustainable software, more efficient algorithms and better data processing are key to these efforts. The global green finance market has thus grown from $5.2 billion in 2012 to more than $540 billion in 2021.

In addition to growing environmentally conscious portfolios, the financial services sector is significantly reducing its energy consumption by enabling efficiencies in data centers. Upgrades include data deduplications and compression which can improve data storage layout and storage efficiency while slashing energy usage. Beyond the traditional financial sector, new approaches are helping to increase the sustainability of the cryptocurrency-mining process.

“We can all look forward to the day when sustainability is the new standard and software will be at the heart of helping us create a climate-secure and competitive future,” added Henrik Hvid Jensen, Chief Technology Strategist, DXC.

Source: DXC 

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