Earth Day was founded in 1970, and is an annual reminder to shift our focus to protecting the beautiful planet that we call home. It is a day to focus on educating others about environmental issues, to help raise awareness of pollution, renewable energy, and ways that people can take steps to be greener.

Earth Day – Invest in Our Planet: Positive-Sum Growth

This year, the theme of Earth Day is ‘Invest in our Planet’, and at Esker, we believe in doing just that. In fact, our aim is also to enable other organisations to do the same. Our customers, employees and partners share our convictions: a company’s development must have a beneficial impact on its entire ecosystem, society and the environment. That’s what we call positive-sum growth.

We believe that future business growth depends on environmental sustainability. Esker provides organisations with the tools to achieve real environmental results, such as:

• Less paper used in day-to-day activities, helping to save trees and reduce wasteful practices
• Less equipment needed to support manual operations, promoting long-term sustainability
• Less carbon by using cloud computing, which has shown to reduce emissions by up to 93%¹

“Esker builds innovative and responsible solutions that have a positive impact on society and the people within it, and enable our customers to improve their own ESG performance.”

Jean-Michel Bérard, CEO | Esker

Reducing Esker’s Environmental Footprint

Esker is also strongly committed to reducing the environmental footprint our own business activities.
In 2018 in France, where our Lyon Head Office is based, Esker has established processes for determining its carbon emissions, and has since extended these to all of its worldwide subsidiaries.

You can read more about this in our Impact Report

Furthermore, in 2022, Esker was recognised by both EcoVadis and Gaïa Index for its CSR leadership.

Globally, we have many initiatives to reduce our environmental footprint.

• Replanting: a wide variety of tree species is one of the pillars of the strategy to remove carbon emissions from Earth’s atmosphere and protect biodiversity. With Esker’s support, Reforest’Action, a non-profit organisation engaging in a unique approach they call “crowdplanting”, more than 19,250 trees have been planted in India, Haiti and Tanzania since 2019.
• Data Centres & Energy Efficiency: Esker chooses environmentally responsible vendors whenever possible. For example, all new Esker customers are hosted by default on Microsoft Azure, which uses energy from renewable resources for a significant portion of its data centres, and bases its billing model on server resource usage, thereby encouraging moderation.
• Responsible Product Development: Esker ensures that its R&D teams are attentive to the digital footprint of software operations by building optimised services and energy efficiency into its solutions. Esker also conducts regular internal conferences on the challenges of digital sobriety, led by the founder of GreenIT.fr.
• Life Cycle of IT Equipment: Esker strives to extend the lifecycle of company-owned IT equipment and electronic devices as much as possible, through in-house maintenance, vendor support, or employee buy-back programmes in exchange for donations to charities of their choosing.
• Waste Recycling: We have waste recycling at our mail production facilities, and within all subsidiary offices. In addition, 100% of Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) in recycled.
• Mobility & Business Travel: To encourage the use of low-carbon modes of transport, Esker offers a variety of incentives: electric car fleets, bike and scooter parking, mileage reimbursement for bicycle use, and public transport compensation.

You can read more about our environmental efforts on our website.

Locally, here in the UK, one of our current focuses is on our Esker goodies. We are trying to source sustainable giveaway items, such as our metal water bottles, recycled cork pens, compostable and all natural ingredient jellybean pouches, recycled paper notebooks and sustainable cotton canvas bags. We also have recycling points around our offices, and electric car charging points on-site.

We can, and must, all play our part to protect our beautiful world. It’s the only one we have. For us, and for future generations.

¹ The carbon benefits of cloud computing: A study on the Microsoft Cloud in partnership with WSP. 2020. Microsoft.

Amy Rees

As Digital Marketing Administrator at Esker Northern Europe, Amy spends her time working on the website, writing and publishing blogs and social media content, and publishing collateral. She has been part of the Esker family since 2014.

Read more insights from Amy Rees

Pursuing a positive ESG performance is a key element of all of Esker’s activities. Driven by the belief that technology creates positive-sum growth, the company’s focus is on offering automation solutions that can give more meaning to the workplace by reducing repetitive tasks and improving customer and supplier relationships, especially for Finance and Customer Service functions.

The success of this approach is reflected in the good results Esker received from multiple ESG rating organisations:

EcoVadis, a leading business sustainability rating platform, awarded Esker a score of 74/100 for its ESG performance. This constitutes an increase of 26 points since 2017 and places Esker in the top 5% of evaluated companies across all industries.

Gaïa Research, the ESG-ratings arm of sustainable finance and development advisory company EthiFinance, has awarded Esker a score of 68/100 in the evaluation of the company’s non-financial data. Esker has steadily increased this ranking since 2019, placing Esker well above the industry average of 54/100.

Esker also received the following rankings in 2022:

• Vigeo Eiris: Score of 53/100 (up 20 points from 2021)  
• MSCI ESG Ratings¹: “A” rating (on a scale from AAA to CCC)
• Sustainalytics: Score of 20.1 (medium risk level)

Esker is strongly committed to reducing its environmental footprint and has implemented a proactive approach to analysing its greenhouse gas emissions. In order to do so, the company has established processes for determining its carbon footprint for all its locations worldwide. All French locations renewed their ISO 14001² certifications in 2022. The impact of digital technology and the energy efficiency of data centres hosting Esker’s cloud platform is continuously monitored to assist in reducing its carbon footprint.

This approach also applies to Esker’s supply chain management. The company has established a sustainable procurement policy based on fair treatment and transparent selection of suppliers. Social and environmental criteria are also taken into consideration for vendor selection. All of Esker’s vendors are asked to fill out a survey focused on ESG criteria to further encourage the adoption of ESG best practices.

Esker employees are also encouraged to participate in community events with a social or environmental purpose. To do so, they receive paid time off (France, U.S. and UK) to volunteer at a non-profit organisation of their choice.

Esker places a high value on pursuing and maintaining ethical and transparent governance. Promoting a diverse and inclusive corporate culture includes, among other things, working groups organised by employees on a volunteer basis and the development and execution of strategies aimed at increasing the number of women in the IT profession.

To learn more about Esker’s ESG strategy, visit: www.esker.co.uk/company/environmental-social-governance/

Read full press release here.

1. Disclaimer: Esker’s use of any data from MSCI ESG Research LLC or its affiliates (“MSCI”), and use of MSCI’s logos, trademarks, service marks or index names herein, does not constitute sponsorship, endorsement, recommendation or promotion of Esker by MSCI. MSCI Services and Data are the property of MSCI or its information providers, and are provided “As Is” and without warranty. MSCI names and logos are trademarks or service marks of MSCI.

2. Environmental management standard

Esker UK

Unlocking Positive-Sum Growth with AI-Driven Business Solutions for P2P & O2C Cycles

Read more insights from Esker UK

Businesses too need to step up to the mark. Many of us may be making more effort to help the planet whilst at home, but the workplace also needs to be a place where environment saving measures are implemented, and where employees are encouraged to support global corporate efforts.

If we are going to support the rescue of our planet for future generations, everyone needs to play their part; personally, and corporately.

Esker is no exception. The three pillars of Esker’s Corporate Social Responsibility policy include Environmental Dedication, Education & Training and Community & Development.

“We are deeply committed to business transformation at Esker. Our goal is to provide innovative and responsible solutions that have a positive impact on the company and its employees. Environmental protection, education and local territory development are just some of the key issues that Eskerians truly care about.”
Jean-Michel Bérard | CEO | Esker

Esker has been awarded a silver medal by Ecovadis for its CSR rating, and is continually striving to improve further.

Esker’s plan to help protect the environment covers three core areas:

First, waste recovery.

Esker’s cloud platform has helped businesses around the world to automate nearly 3 billion sheets of paper. Our offices around the world recycle everything possible including paper/cardboard, batteries, plastics. We promote reusables, for example, cups, shipping supplies and printer cartridges.

Second, promotion of renewable energy

100% of Esker’s new customer environments are hosted in the Microsoft Azure Public Cloud in order to use a minimum of 60% renewable energy in accordance with the objectives announced by Microsoft.

Third, reduction of CO2 emissions

To encourage employees to cycle to work we provide bike parks on our premises, as well as offering government bike discount schemes. Our fleet of company vehicles is gradually being replaced by hybrid or electric vehicles with charging points on-site.

Other local examples include moving to environmentally friendly cleaning products, going retro by using glass beakers and ditching plastics cups.

Only if we act immediately, decisively, globally and individually, can we pull our planet back from the brink. We need to make changes now. We have everything to gain and everything to lose.

Esker UK

Unlocking Positive-Sum Growth with AI-Driven Business Solutions for P2P & O2C Cycles

Read more insights from Esker UK