Streamlining sustainability reporting for a leading mining corporation

The client had long been collecting data using a variety of legacy systems without any common interface, while data entry was still undertaken manually for the various metrics being evaluated. Furthermore, the data came from a number of different sources, with no overall visibility of the complete picture.

This was an untenable position for such an important metric; studies claim up to 70% of a business’s EBITDA may be at risk because of challenges related to sustainability. This meant the client had a strong imperative to update processes and find a better way to measure their KPIs.

NTT DATA proposed a proof of concept using SAP Sustainability Control Tower that would monitor metrics for four key areas:

• Governance
• Environment
• Social
• Economics

Proof of concept transforms business

Having acknowledged the importance of sustainability to its long-term value, the client was keen to develop a proof of concept using SAP Sustainability Control Tower (SCT). NTT DATA’s proposal initially involved understanding the potential of this what is still a relatively new SAP solution. In conjunction with the client, decisions were made about which of the 39 default metrics offered by SCT would then be implemented.

The proof of concept helped the client make significant progress in the measurement and analysis of their objectives. First and foremost, the applied integrations represent a step forward in streamlining the collection, management and processing of the sustainability data that’s so critical to their business model.

Gathering the right data

A tool first had to be configured that could gather data against all of the metrics that were relevant to the client, managing that data and presenting it in a single user interface. Once the appropriate metrics had been selected, the information was loaded into the system according to the structure established by the tool, before appropriate data mosaics were activated to permit user queries and visualization. A roadmap was drawn up to understand and direct the longer-term goals of this PoC and establish prioritization moving forward.

The proof of concept developed by NTT DATA was implemented using the following architecture:

• SAP BTP
• SAP Sustainability Control Tower
• CSV files
• SAP Cloud Platform Extension

As SAP SCT runs on Fiori, a user-friendly interface would now be possible that provided a single source for queries against any metric, from any device.

Pioneering new tools for a new tomorrow

Implementation of the proposed architecture would see the client become a pioneer in the use of these kinds of tools in their country, benefitting from one of the latest solutions launched by SAP in order to both gather and evaluate sustainability data in a far more efficient manner.

The ability to track crucial KPIs in this regard aligns both with their own corporate objectives, and their commercial, legal and social governance obligations.