"Sustainability is Central to Our Innovation": Indrajit Belgundi on Dell Technologies' Green Initiatives

In an era where environmental consciousness and sustainability are paramount, Dell Technologies stands at the forefront of change. Indrajit Belgundi, Sr. Director & GM of the Client Solutions Group at Dell Technologies India, sheds light on the company's resolute commitment to reducing its environmental footprint. This feature delves into Dell's innovative green initiatives, responsible e-waste management strategies, product lifespan extension efforts, success stories, partnerships, and the rigorous approach to sourcing materials sustainably.

DQ: What specific green initiatives or programs has your company implemented to reduce its environmental impact?

Indrajit Belgundi: At Dell Technologies, we put sustainability at the core of everything we do. We’ve set ambitious targets and are taking the right actions to address climate change, minimize negative environmental impact and drive positive outcomes for business and society. Our commitment to sustainability is centered around three critical areas:

We're taking action on climate change for business, people and the planet: We are creating innovative, sustainable technology and solutions to help our customers improve business outcomes and reduce emissions, while we take action on ambitious climate targets that benefit society and the planet. By 2050, we aim to deliver on our commitment to achieve net zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions across scopes 1, 2 and 3.

We're accelerating the circular economy: We are driving circular innovation in design, manufacturing, sustainable materials and services, and partnering with others to dramatically reduce global waste and environmental impact on our planet and society. We are harnessing our unique size, scale and reach to redesign, reuse and recycle our end-to-end technology, aiming for a future where nothing goes to waste. 

DQ: How does your company approach responsible e-waste management, including recycling and proper disposal of electronic devices?

Indrajit Belgundi: Climate change and the growing problem of e-waste are two of the biggest challenges that our planet is currently facing. A recent report by KPMG and Assocham brought attention to the fact that India is the third largest producer of e-waste in the world, right after China and the USA. To tackle this issue on a large scale, the focus should be on recovering and reusing as much e-waste is generated. This requires not only providing convenient services but also changing the behaviour of businesses, partners, and consumers.

· Dell is investing in the right partnerships and driving innovation in materials, products and recovery services to accelerate the circular economy.

· Designing devices that are easier to repair, upgrade, reuse and recycle is essential to the circular economy and supports our efforts to minimize the damaging impact of e-waste on our environment.

We provide a variety of secure recovery and recycling solutions for consumers and business customers around the world to help us and them, keep products and materials in circulation as long as possible. With more than 25 years of recovery and recycling experience, Dell helps customers retire IT equipment in a secure and sustainable manner and unlock value that can be put toward future innovation.

Increasing the use of sustainable materials requires identifying, testing and designing for use of these materials at scale. We’re constantly evaluating our current takeback programs and exploring new initiatives to increase return streams to support our 1:1 goal. In FY23, we used 155.5 million kilograms (equal to 343.3 million pounds) of sustainable materials in the production of our products and packaging. 94.5% of our packaging across our entire product portfolio is made with recycled or renewable materials.

DQ: What strategies or measures has your company taken to extend the life of its products and reduce electronic waste?

Indrajit Belgundi:  PCs are essential to keeping our customers’ business successful and running, whether it is now or in the foreseeable future. With customers using a sizeable number of PCs, it’s critical that we design our products to be not only intelligent, powerful and secure, but also sustainable. The central idea of our approach to circular economy is, reducing waste, and we aim to take back as much as we produce for reuse and recycling. Our goal now not only includes products we take back via our own recovery and recycling services, but also extends to products recovered by Dell partners. This change helps us align more closely with the sustainability ambitions of our channel and alliance partners and scale our impact on product take back. We take back out-of-use technology and recycle the materials to make parts for new devices. For example, our OptiPlex portfolio features plastics, aluminum and rare earth magnets from technology Dell has recovered through our recovery and recycling programs.

Concept Luna, first launched in 2022 is a step in the direction of extending the life of our product. A breakthrough prototype, Concept Luna is the future of sustainable PC design. It allows us to explore revolutionary ideas to reduce waste and emissions, reuse materials and achieve next-level innovation. In 2023, we continued work on the concept to further refine the modular design. Our evolved Concept Luna design eliminates the need for adhesives and cables and nearly eliminates the use of screws, reducing disassembly time to mere minutes.

DQ: Could you share any success stories or case studies that highlight your company's efforts in promoting environmental sustainability in the tech industry?

Indrajit Belgundi: As we navigate the future of work, sustainability must be at the core of product design. I will share the example of our Latitude series of commercial notebooks. The amount of renewable and recycled plastics in the Latitude 5000 series increased by 64% this year (by weight) over our previous generation of Latitude 5000 series. The series is designed with the most innovative use of sustainable materials, featuring components made with reclaimed carbon fibre, renewable materials and ocean-bound plastics.

Furthermore, the Latitude 9440 that was launched in India earlier this year, is the world’s first PC designed with low carbon and recycled aluminium, including 75% recycled aluminium in the chassis. The Latitude 9440 keyboard has keycaps made from 75% recycled plastic and has renewable plastic components made from a byproduct of agricultural and food waste. And, for the first time, we have introduced recycled copper in the Latitude 9440, Precision 5680 and Precision 3000 Series power adapters.

Going beyond laptops, Dell introduced the EcoLoop™ carrying cases that are made with 100% ocean-bound plastic from up to 11 recycled plastic bottles. The dyeing process of the bags generates 90% less wastewater, up to 62% less CO2 emissions, and uses up to 29% less energy.

DQ: What collaborations or partnerships has your company engaged in to address environmental challenges and promote sustainability?

Indrajit Belgundi: Globally, Dell is investing in the right partnerships and driving innovation in materials, products and recovery services to accelerate the circular economy. This translates to increasing the use of sustainable materials that requires identifying, testing and designing for use of these materials at scale. We also proposed and supported the initiation of a recycled steel project with the Circular Electronics Partnership (CEP). Through workshops with industry peers and suppliers, Dell aims to drive industry support, identify barriers and actions, and scale the use of recycled steel in IT products. Using recycled steel at scale is a critical step in meeting our circular economy goals and essential to the reduction of carbon emissions from manufacturing. Our participation in the CEP will help us identify the right actions and collaborate effectively across the industry. While addressing climate action, we are driving efforts towards net zero GHG emissions by 2050. This requires global cooperation across many aspects of our business and our broader value chain, a science-based approach and consistently meeting our time-bound interim goals.

DQ: How does your company ensure the traceability and responsible sourcing of materials used in its products to minimise environmental impact?

Indrajit Belgundi: Dell uses a specific four-element approach in our SER audit program. This continuous improvement model is a framework for advancing supplier performance that includes risk assessment, supplier audits, corrective action plans and capability building.