Signify Academy: Light that connects [podcasts]

Jonathan Weinert: 00:08

Hello, and welcome to Signify Lighting Talks. My name is Jonathan Weinert, editor for the global brand and marketing team at Signify. This podcast series is our unbiased, unvarnished, and always engaging educational companion. It's an addition to what we bring to you via the Signify Academy, which you can find online at signify.com/academy. In this series of episodes, we cover the intriguing and thought provoking world of connected lighting.

Jonathan Weinert: 00:45

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Signify podcast series Light that Connects, everything you need to know about connected lighting. My name is Jonathan Weinert of the global commercial and marketing excellence team at Signify, And I'm very excited today to welcome back Maurice Loosschilder, head of sustainability at Signify, to talk about Signify's latest sustainability program, Brighter Lives, Better World 2030. Welcome back, Maurice. Can you please introduce yourself and say a little about your role and responsibilities at Signify?

Maurice Loosschilder: 01:17

Yeah. Happy to do so. So thanks for having me today. In detail, my name is Maurice, and started working for Signify over twenty five years ago. And I started at Philips at that time as a student.

Maurice Loosschilder: 01:29

And then after my graduation, I decided to stay with the company. And and since then, I've had several roles. I've worked in IT. I've worked in a more commercial and customer pricing role. And after that, I moved to sustainability already thirteen years ago, and I did several roles in sustainability.

Maurice Loosschilder: 01:44

And now since five year, I'm actually the global head of sustainability, which means that I'm leading the sustainability efforts of the company as well as sustainability reporting. So that is shaping execution of the Brighter Lives Better World sustainability program as well as the the responsibility for transparency for reporting both internally and externally and assuring that we stay compliant with all the increasing regulations that we see and that we report the progress on our journey with our ambitious sustainability targets. So that's my current role.

Jonathan Weinert: 02:18

Well, we'll get into some of those details in a minute, but let's sort of start at the beginning, which was Light and Building in Frankfurt, Germany in March of this year when, Brighter Lives, Better World 2030 was introduced. It's the latest in the series of Brighter Lives, Better World programs. And like I said, we'll talk about the specifics in a minute, but let's just step back a little and talk about the brighter lives, better world program in general.

Maurice Loosschilder: 02:43

If we look back at at at our sustainability journey, then then Signify has always been really at the forefront of sustainable lighting innovations for decades already. Right? So we we first let the industry and the transformation of the lighting industry to LED lighting from conventional to LED, then towards more efficient connected LED lighting, and then now to circular lighting. And then since the start of our sustainability journey, we've always used the United Nations sustainable development goals are as our as our strategic compass for defining our direction, for defining our ambitions, our actions. And in 2016, we actually launched our first Brighter Lives Better World sustainability program, which was basically representing brighter life, social social sustainability with better world, the environmental side of sustainability.

Maurice Loosschilder: 03:30

And this this first program was fully focused on our own operations. How can we operate more sustainably ourselves and how do we embed sustainability to the core of our business strategy? And at the end of the program, we did achieve quite some ambitious things. We we achieved 100% renewable electricity globally. We achieved zero waste to landfill in all our manufacturing sites globally.

Maurice Loosschilder: 03:51

And then came our 2025 program, and and we've just completed that last year. And that program really expanded our focus beyond our own walls. And with these programs, we really proved that sustainable business is like a business reality, that it can drive impact. It can drive progress. And early this year, as you said, we launched the the latest program, Brighter Lives Better World 2030.

Maurice Loosschilder: 04:12

And with that program, we want to show that impact and opportunity actually go hand in hand, that we can create value for society while also building a stronger and more resilient company.

Jonathan Weinert: 04:23

Well, let's talk about Brighter Lives Better World 2025 for a minute. How did Signify do? Did we achieve all of our goals? What were the biggest successes in your mind, and where did the program fall short?

Maurice Loosschilder: 04:36

Well, the program did achieve most of its targets, I would say. When we look at the four doubling commitments that were part of the program, then we have achieved 60%, 60% of absolute reduction in our scope one, two, and three greenhouse gas emissions. And that is across our full value chain. And that was actually outperforming our our own own target of doubling the pace of the Paris Agreement's 1.5 degree scenario. So I would say that was a very successful program where we did achieve a massive carbon reduction without the use of any offset.

Maurice Loosschilder: 05:08

So this is real absolute carbon reduction. Then the second commitment was all around our circular economy. So circular revenues were reaching 37% in 2025 versus the target set of 32% in 2025. Because the baseline was in 2019 was 16%, and we set a doubling target. So we outperformed that really with 5%, and that was demonstrating that circularity is not like a a future ideal, but that it is really a business reality already today.

Maurice Loosschilder: 05:37

The biggest driver here was our transformation towards more serviceable luminaires. Then the third area was all around Brighter Life revenues. And Brighter Life revenues are the social part of the portfolio, and we generated 35% of revenues from products and solutions that were contributing to Brighter Life. Think about safer cities, workplaces supporting well-being, food production. So here, we also outperformed our target of 32%, which was also a doubling target.

Maurice Loosschilder: 06:04

Looking at the fourth target, which is women in leadership position, our diversity equity and inclusion program, the organization really has come a long way since since the baseline year 2019, and we increased women representation in leadership roles from 17% in the baseline to 27%. So although we did not reach our doubling target of 34%, we still increased the women in leadership positions by 10 in the in the course of the program. And we do remain committed to accelerating the progress on an equitable and inclusive workforce also beyond 2025. So I would say three programs really outperformed at a fourth one. We made a good jump, but just slightly are below target.

Jonathan Weinert: 06:44

Well, that's not a bad percentage. It was kind of impressive results, but there's still work to be done, obviously, which we'll talk about in a minute. But, if you'll allow me to take a slight detour and ask you about something that is of particular interest to me, and that that's in regarding to the scope three emissions that you mentioned a moment ago. So as I understand it, a lot of the emissions from the scope in the scope three area come from product use. How does Signify deal with that when once the products are out of our hands and in the hands of our of our customers and end users?

Maurice Loosschilder: 07:18

It's true that over 95%, close to close to a 100% of our full emissions carbon emissions of the company sits in 3.11 category 3.11, which is the use of our sole products. That is indeed the energy that is used by our customers to use our lighting products. And you can imagine that there is two things that we can do to improve that. First of all is how can we make sure that we transform the lighting which is in the field, the installed base from conventional lighting to LED with that we avoid a lot of energy use in the world. And what we put on the markets should become more energy efficient.

Maurice Loosschilder: 07:58

Think about connected LED lighting. Think about ultra efficient LED lighting, which is so much more energy efficient than first generation LED. So that is about half of the equation. The other half, of course, comes from the fact that we want the world to transition quicker to greener electricity so that the grids becomes greener in the coming years. There, we have our advocacy program in place where we really want to advocate proactively for acceleration of the energy transition to happen because that will also drive down the carbon emissions in that 3.11 emissions from the use phase of our sole products.

Jonathan Weinert: 08:36

Great. Well, thank you for those details. So I I know that our ultra efficient products, I think we're reaching somewhere around 220 lumens per watt efficacy for some products

Maurice Loosschilder: 08:46

Yep.

Jonathan Weinert: 08:46

As compared to an incandescent light bulb, which is what? Like, 12 or 13 lumens per watt, something like that. It's kind of a no brainer then, isn't it, to make

Maurice Loosschilder: 08:55

that Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. So with with we always say when you switch to to LED lighting, you can already save 50%. If you switch to connected lighting, you can save up to 80% versus conventional lighting.

Maurice Loosschilder: 09:07

And and if you then compare an ultra efficient LED bulb, well, that is fifty, sixty, 70% more energy efficient than a standard LED bulb, first generation LED bulb. So the savings are are enormous.

Jonathan Weinert: 09:20

So let's talk about Brighter Lives, Better World twenty thirty now. How did the goals of this new program differ from or extend the goals of the last program? And how did what you learned from your experience with Brighter Lives Better World 2025 inform the details of the new program?

Maurice Loosschilder: 09:39

So the Brighter Lives Better World let let's zoom out a little bit. So the Brighter Lives Better World 2030 program is really building on the momentum of the previous programs. And and it's improving lives, saving energy, preserving resources. And what we've learned is that with this program, we should focus much more on what are the challenges that our customers are facing. So it is really focused on how can we enable our customers to become more sustainable.

Maurice Loosschilder: 10:03

So we are addressing the growing customer demand for efficient, connected, electrified solutions. And this is, of course, driven by a lot of the the situations that are in the world. So increasing electricity demand, volatile energy pricing, resource scarcity, the need for healthier, safer, more resilient environments. And that really shows that impacts and opportunity go hand in hand. And if we then zoom into the program, then the program has three main pillars.

Maurice Loosschilder: 10:30

And within those pillars, we have four commitments. The first pillar is called benefits beyond illumination. So with benefits beyond illumination, we continue to expand the role of lighting beyond illumination, which is designed to improve quality of life, supporting more welcoming productive indoor environments, and enhancing safety and security in cities and communities, as well as enabling more efficient food production and increasing access to solar lighting. So this is purely the social benefits that our program and our portfolio brings. And the commitment is that by the end of 2030, 41% of Signify's revenues will come from solutions that support benefits beyond illumination, which is increasing from 31% in the baseline year 2024.

Maurice Loosschilder: 11:14

So that's the first pillar, benefits beyond illumination. Second pillar is all around energy efficiency. So energy efficiency is, of course, one of the most powerful enablers of electrification and the energy transition. Because if you look at the innovations in LED and connected lighting, we can really help our customers to reduce energy demand, manage their cost, lower their carbon emissions, reach their sustainability targets. And the commitments that we have in the energy efficiency space is that by the end of twenty thirty, we commit to cumulatively saving 60 terawatt of hours of energy for our customers.

Maurice Loosschilder: 11:47

So that is avoided energy use, while at the same time, we will be achieving a 35 production in the portfolio c o two emission intensity, which is annualized. And these two commitments really reinforce our 2014 net zero commitment. So that doesn't change. So that's the second pillar, energy efficiency. And then if we look at the third pillar, resource efficiency.

Maurice Loosschilder: 12:08

To advance to a circular economy, we will need to scale durable lighting, upgradable, repairable, recyclable products, circular services. So that's all part of of our resource efficiency pillar. And these solutions are all designed for circularity. And there we follow a very clear framework called use less, use longer, use again. And that framework aims to reduce the consumption of virgin materials, the reduction of energy use, but also delivering long term customer value.

Maurice Loosschilder: 12:36

And with that, we are introducing Signify Circle, which is a new initiative for professional customers, which is delivering products, services, business models, which are all aligned to pretty stringent circular standards by transparent labeling, customer education, etcetera. And if we look at Signify Circle, then there's four categories that we include in Signify Circle. It is Signify Circle products. It is light as a service. Third category is remanufacturing, and the fourth category is spare parts and upgrade kits.

Maurice Loosschilder: 13:08

And if you look at the commitments, then by the end of twenty thirty, we commit to starting in Europe. We aim to grow circular products and services revenues in our professional business from 10% to 27 and a half percent by the end of twenty thirty. So those were the three main pillars of the program, benefits beyond illumination, energy efficiency, and resource efficiency. And then the program is also underpinned by our continued commitment to four areas, inclusive workplaces, fair working conditions in our value chain, low nature impact manufacturing, and access to light for underserved communities. So that is the whole Brighter Lives Better Worlds 2030 program.

Jonathan Weinert: 13:48

Great. Thank you for that, Maurice. But, at the top of our conversation, you mentioned reporting and accountability. Let's drill down on that a little bit. I'm I'm sure that it's more than just a matter of stating a set of ambitions.

Jonathan Weinert: 14:00

So what do you do to quantify and validate, the progress and results of the program, and what kind of reporting are we required to do as a company?

Maurice Loosschilder: 14:10

So if you look at Brighter Life Better World, then every quarter, we report the results of the four commitments in three main pillars of the program. We report progress on them both internally and externally. And this is important. So internally, it is also to keep everybody in the company aware of where are we in terms of our in our journey. Externally, do present it to the outside world.

Maurice Loosschilder: 14:32

So to in to investors, to journalists, to the general public to also show where we are with our ambitions. When we look at what we need to report, then every year we need to report as a stock listed company in the EU. We need to re we we need to create an annual report that is compliant with the CSRD, the corporate sustainability reporting directive. And within that CSRD report, we have to report on all material sustainability topics, and we have to have assurance from an accountant on it. We have prepared several years already a CSRD compliant annual report.

Maurice Loosschilder: 15:09

Next to that, also the Brighter Life Better World commitments and all the results are for 25% determining the vesting of our long term incentive bonus of our executives. So we've also included that as a as a criteria for the long term bonuses. And when you look at accountability and the definition of accountability, then for me, that doesn't stop at setting a target and then simply measuring progress and reporting on it. It's also about having a concrete plan on how to reach your ambitions. In 2024, we launched ourselves.

Maurice Loosschilder: 15:40

Signify, we launched our climate transition plan. And that plan followed the four a's of climate leadership framework that we used from the We Mean Business Coalition, which is ambition, action, advocacy, and accountabilities. Also, here you see, you set an ambition, you define your actions, and then in the accountability part, you report on progress and you show to your stakeholders that you're actually progressing on your ambitions.

Jonathan Weinert: 16:03

I'm glad you mentioned the climate action plan. Is it fair to say that Brighter Lives Better World program is part of the climate action plan, but it has a larger umbrella for the company?

Maurice Loosschilder: 16:14

Well, it's it it basically has to do with different horizons where the climate transition plan has an ambition for 2040 and it's only focused on climate itself where Brighter Lives Better World is focused on both social and environmental sustainability and it has a five year horizon. But both live next to each other and both reinforce each other in certain areas. So they they work together.

Jonathan Weinert: 16:39

So you've anticipated my next question which was going to be about, you know, why a five year horizon for the brighter lives, better world program. So you often you see sustainability initiatives with a much longer time horizon, ten, twenty, even thirty years in the future. So why the five year horizon?

Maurice Loosschilder: 16:54

Well, setting sustainability targets for me is all about finding a right balance. It is about finding the balance between the need for action now versus an ambition to make a substantial impact in the future. It's about the balance between an effort to create a new program with its commitments and and its targets with having a target that is near enough to spark action and engagement right now. It is about the balance between having an ambition and realism versus pragmatism. And we, at Signify, we strongly believe that we need to have both.

Maurice Loosschilder: 17:25

So So we need to have a long term target that we have as a dot on the horizon, providing direction to all our actions. And at the same time, we also should need to have a near term target to drive action right now. And that is why we have the two living together. So we have the five year Brighter Lives Better Will programs, while in addition, we still have our net zero carbon emissions by 2040 commitment out there with the climate transition plan defining the actions how we will get there.

Jonathan Weinert: 17:51

With all of the experience that you've had and the activity that you've been involved in, has your understanding of sustainability changed in the past few years? And if so, how has it changed?

Maurice Loosschilder: 18:02

Absolutely. I've I've seen the role of sustainability really changing over the years from compliance, focusing on our own operations, becoming more sustainable ourselves to also enabling others to become more sustainable to how can sustainability be a commercial enabler and a business partner. And it is now if you look at sustainability, what it is nowadays, it's really enabling ways to grow the company responsibly, ways to decouple growth from increased impact of your company, increasing resilience for us as as a company at Signify, but also increasing the resilience for our customers. So that's one big change that I see. Another big change what I see is that that there is a change from company level impact to product level impact and transparency.

Maurice Loosschilder: 18:48

So if you look to give you a very practical example, not every customer will read our full annual report before a customer takes a purchasing decision. Although the annual report is really showing what we do on a company level and what the progress is on our sustainability journey, we also increased our efforts to create transparency on the impact of our solutions on product level so that every customer can make an informed decision about a specific product or solution that they buy from Signify. So that's also something which I've seen changing from being the good company to also showing that your products are the right products and the most sustainable products. So those are the two biggest changes I've seen over the past few years.

Jonathan Weinert: 19:26

So our audience for this podcast are mostly lighting professionals, specifiers, system integrators, and so on. What do you in your opinion, what is the single most important action that lighting professionals can take to further sustainability in their own work?

Maurice Loosschilder: 19:41

For me, it's all about acceleration. So acceleration of the transition to energy efficient lighting, phase out conventional lighting as soon as possible, and accelerate the demand for circular solutions. And whether that is demand for circular solution from alternative materials or enabling new circular business models, but I think the two goes hand in hand. So and accelerating transition to efficiency.

Jonathan Weinert: 20:06

Thank you, Maurice. It's a pleasure to have you talk with us again, here in the Light that Connects series. I've been speaking with, Maurice Loosschilder, who's the global head of sustainability at Signify. Again, thank you, Maurice, joining us, and thank you all for listening. If you wanna learn more about Brighter Lives, Better World to 2030, I invite you to click on the link in the podcast description.

Jonathan Weinert: 20:28

I also will put a link into the Signify Circle, program as well. Until next time, I'm Jonathan Weinert for Signify, the world leader in lighting. Signify Lighting Talks is a podcast series featuring the leading thinkers and speakers from the world of lighting. My name is Jonathan Weinert. On behalf of Signify, the global leader at lighting, I wish you a brighter life and a better world.