The Connection between Virtual Twin Technology and Business Sustainability
This article will explore the connection between Virtual Twin Technology and Business Sustainability and how organizations can enhance their net zero efforts.
It’s widely accepted today that we must take urgent action to prevent irreversible damage from climate change. In recent years there has been a shift in responsibilities.
No longer is this seen as simply the responsibility of a single individual or various governments, but businesses are now expected to do their part. This shift has happened quickly, and it’s made a real impact on consumer behaviors. More and more individuals and businesses only want to be associated with businesses and products that are doing their bit for a sustainable future. So, how can businesses look to be more sustainable, and how can virtual twin technology support them?
What is Business Sustainability?
According to TechTarget, business sustainability is described as “the management and coordination of environmental, social and financial demands and concerns to ensure responsible, ethical and ongoing success.”
For a long time, many business leaders have seen this as sourcing ethical materials or planting trees to offset their carbon footprint, but really, it goes deeper than this. In our recent interview with Colin Clemson, Customer Process Manager at Dassault Systèmes, he states that there are three key pillars to business sustainability; people, processes, and technology. He discusses how companies should be looking inward, as well as at their wider supply chain, and offsetting activities.
“How do we turn sustainability from a risk to an opportunity? In three domains from my perspective. First, in the way that our clients innovate the products and services that they deliver to the market. Secondly, in the way that they work with more agile organizations and broader networks of people, skills, and knowledge, creating the workforce of the future. And finally, how do they create value while at the same time reinventing their business models? “
— Colin Clemson, Customer Process Manager at Dassault Systèmes
How do Virtual Twins fit into the Business Sustainability discussion?
Virtual Twin Technology is a cutting-edge breakthrough that enables companies to build digital, real-time, virtual representations of a product, platform or even an ecosystem as complex as a city. This technology offers a variety of advantages to businesses and can support their sustainability objectives in several ways.
“These [Virtual Twins] enable our customers to have a real-time virtual representation of their product, the platform, or ecosystem, that they use to model, visualize, predict as well as provide feedback. We can help with the virtual twin technology to provide more sustainable operations and a transition towards a more circular economy as well.” Explains Colin. “Our customers understand that if we can help them reinvent, reimagine the world of tomorrow and at the same time, drive their own resilience in the marketplace and drive their sustainability agenda then there will be a true partnership moving forward.”
Virtual Twins & Defining Sustainable Business Processes
One of the primary benefits of virtual twin technology is that it enables companies to model and optimize their operations in a digital environment before adopting them in the physical world. This technology can assist businesses in identifying inefficiencies and making the required adjustments to enhance their operations. By doing so, organizations can lessen their environmental impact and conserve resources, such as energy, to meet their sustainability goals.
The world needs new business models. We’ve got to drive the transition to a 21st-century economy aligned with ethical, social, and environmental concerns” Explains Colin. “The majority of companies now consider that business models are a source of future competitive advantage. We can help those clients now define what those business models are in a more sustainable way on the 3DEXPERIENCE Platform and power collaboration between suppliers, customers, and internal stakeholders.”
Virtual Twins & Sustainable Operations
In addition to supporting better business processes, virtual twin technology enables organizations to monitor their assets in real-time and identify possible difficulties before they become major ones. This technology can aid businesses in preventing equipment breakdowns, downtime, and other interruptions that can hinder their operations and sustainability initiatives. Organizations can detect and avoid possible problems by utilizing virtual twin technology, ensuring their assets operate at peak performance and lowering their environmental effect.
In Summary
Virtual twin technology is driving business sustainability through the ability to drive efficiency across people, processes, and technology. It enables organizations to mimic and test new technologies and processes in a virtual environment before deploying them in the real world.
For businesses to achieve their sustainability goals and align with the new expectations put upon them, they need to look within as well as across their wider value network.
