I struggle increasingly with individual energy organizations’ pledges to move their solutions towards a carbon-neutral future. The mixture of reports, initiatives, and viewpoints all move towards the transformation of the energy system, but they all admit or fail to address TWO crucial aspects.
Firstly the limited time we have to make such a transition in their offerings of new and different imaginative ways to change the current dynamics within our energy systems. Secondly, how each organization alone cannot achieve it with limited or no alternative suggestions to overcome this “constraint”. Well, this post is about one alternative, well worth considering.
One area of potential to bridge is the collaborations at the multiple firm levels. There is a weakness that deprives the ecosystem of a greater “collective action and innovation” to achieve a more accelerated pathway to the Energy Transition.
The Energy Transition has a rich network of complimentary ecosystems, all keeping the change moving at a ‘certain’ level of momentum, but is it good enough? I don’t think so.
The sheer number of Energy companies working on solutions within the Energy Transition is vast, varied and geographically spread. Each is struggling to get out of their (self-made) islands of knowledge to grow their business value through mostly individual innovation solutions.
We then have an Ecosystem of Governments and intergovernmental organizations providing policy suggestions and directions, offering sources of analysis, central data collection and interpretation along with proving reference and exchange points and forums. Then you have general and highly specialised Consulting firms, and investing institutions that are all constantly providing insights and supporting solutions.
We need to find new ways of collaborating and that means applying ecosystem thinking and platform solutions.
I believe we need to expand the carbon-neutral future into a greater common appeal and that is far more the working together. When you look at individual organizations’ activity there is significant overlap, duplication and limitation. Their internal R&D resourcing is constrained, often specific projects are extended into selective partnerships to complement their efforts and allow them to bring innovative solutions to the market more quickly.
My question is how can we bring together a number of organizations to work in a broader, more ambitious innovation ecosystem of collaborations?
I decided to have a very extended conversation with my new colleague, ChatGPT in a very structured way on building an inspiring energy narrative that looks for higher firm levels of innovation ecosystem collaboration.
I decided to bring Schneider Electric, Siemens (both AG and Energy separate entities) and Enel together for this conversation.
None of these actually held a conversation with me on this concept, I draw on my knowledge and research of them and engaged my colleague (ChatGPT) to rapidly investigate, interrogate and assess. So here is the result:
Each of these companies has made real strides in their sustainability profiles and innovation capabilities for the Energy Transition.
With the help of my *colleague” I built up individual profiles of each of these companies, what steps they have taken in building up their credentials, their implementation records of how they delivered, checking these against stated or inferred business models and market positioning. I also looked at how they in broad terms undertake the designing, developing and delivering of new concepts and their reliance on both internal processes and external tools and collaborations that complement their R&D efforts.
Taking a further deeper look at their encourage challenges to solutions through the many various means of contests, accelerator programmes and open innovation platforms that help drive innovation bringing in other companies, start-ups, entrepreneurs, and universities to develop solutions to real-world challenges
Established were some measures of success that are often complex, time-consuming and have multiple factors influencing outcomes. The financial performance, reputation, stakeholder engagement and sustainability impact were considered as well as customer satisfaction and employee engagement
A further investigation was made of the (limited) cooperation between the organizations (Schneider Electric, Siemens and Enel) and you begin to think of the beneficial aspects of addressing global challenges of energy transition and sustainability and consider the mechanisms for collaboration.
At this point of the investigation, the concept of a neutral platform was considered.
Different examples were identified that could provide this helpful, knowledgeable and higher levels of neutrality. In this exploring different options you raise the natural boundaries of what a collaboration like this might need to overcome. These can be competing priorities, intellectual property rights, organizational structures and cultures. Also, regulatory and legal barriers, communication and coordination issues and the funding and resources of any combined initiative need to consider.
The question then looped back to what broad areas require greater collaboration that can be considered that might bring together Schneider Electric, Siemens and Enel together.
A level of commonality in market focus or need to provide/ serve and some legal framework that might reduce legal or regulatory issues. I see each of these organizations “rooted” in the European Union as having greater synergies
The bigger issues are the Smart Grid development, Energy Storage, Grid Modernization and automation, Electricity of transport and Cybersecurity and Data collaborations as good examples where competition is transcended by energy solution needs that have common standards, potential to scale, collaborations with multiple stakeholders and policy regulators that having this level of collaboration would command with attention and respect.
My final area of thinking through with my tireless colleague questioning and framing in more structured ways took me into potential steps to consider to support this ecosystem concept.
So we got to that point to build a concise narrative to consider the commercial arguments, the social well-being and the greater environmental impacts. Mitigation, Sustainable practices and behaviours all were flagged as needed considerations. Technical advancements, combining expertise and resources accelerate the transition, speed up the common (global) adoption of solutions, provide different business opportunities, individually and collectively and the combined “weight” of market leverage to enter new markets, extend existing and expand the customer base.
Building out a narrative around this collaborative approach took several tries.
It had to consider all the questioning, probing, exploring, and answers raised and then consolidate this. I have three so far but I wanted to share this one. It draws in all the factors and this was where my ‘colleague’ was far more effective in its intelligence and capability to bring this into a concise view.
“Climate change is a pressing global issue that affects the environment, people’s health, livelihoods, and social well-being. There is a need for collective action towards a carbon-neutral future to mitigate its impact. Schneider Electric, Siemens, and Enel are three organizations that have the expertise, resources, and capabilities to drive this transition.
Collaboration among Schneider Electric, Siemens, and Enel towards a carbon-neutral future can have several benefits.
Firstly, it can help mitigate the impact of climate change on communities and the most vulnerable populations.
Secondly, it can facilitate a societal shift towards more sustainable practices and behaviours. By sharing knowledge and collaborating, these organizations can help raise awareness and create a more sustainable culture that goes beyond their individual operations.
Thirdly, collaboration can help drive policy changes and regulatory frameworks that support sustainability. This would require the three organizations to work together to drive policy changes and create a more supportive environment for sustainable practices and technologies.
Fourthly, collaboration can lead to technological advancements and innovations that could help accelerate the transition towards a carbon-neutral future. By combining their expertise and resources, they could develop new and improved sustainable technologies that industries and communities around the world can adopt.
Fifthly, collaboration can create economies of scale that could reduce costs associated with the transition towards a carbon-neutral future. They could optimise their operations by sharing resources and knowledge and developing more efficient and cost-effective solutions.
Lastly, collaboration towards a carbon-neutral future could create new business opportunities and revenue streams for Schneider Electric, Siemens, and Enel. As the demand for sustainable solutions increases, the three organizations could leverage their collaboration to enter new markets and expand their customer base.
In summary, a collaboration between Schneider Electric, Siemens, and Enel towards a carbon-neutral future can bring significant societal, economic, and environmental benefits. By working together, these organizations can drive the societal and policy changes necessary for a more sustainable future, develop technological advancements and innovations, create economies of scale, and create new business opportunities.
This collaboration is not only important for mitigating the impacts of climate change but also for creating a more sustainable and prosperous future for all.“
We need a System of Systems (SOS) of independent systems to form larger, more complex ones
So how can we raise the attention of a Sustainable Energy Transition opportunity, thinking in an innovation ecosystem collaboration framework? Would Schneider Electric, Siemens (AG & Energy entities) and Enel combine forces? Can they not look beyond a possible narrower interest and see the only real way to achieve any lasting Energy Transition is to think on broader ecosystem ways?
I can equally look at other major Energy players, but we need this Systems of Systems approach for the Energy Transition and build out this thinking in approach; otherwise, we remain with a fragmented approach of multiple voices all wanting change, intense on their areas missing the more significant needs and values of innovation ecosystem collaborations.
*Researched and developed, including separate validations and exploration from chat.openai.com, my new colleague in the office, giving me greater value and structure at a faster return.
