In fact, for organizations all over the world, reducing their carbon footprint has become an ever-more strategic imperative. The telecommunications industry is no exception.

And, as service providers take on the challenge and endeavor to reduce their impact, there are three emissions categories of which they need to take heed:

• Scope 1 emissions: those from sources that the company owns or controls directly, e.g., from the fuel that is used by its fleet of cars (assuming they’re not all electric).
• Scope 2 emissions: those caused indirectly by the energy that the company purchases and uses, e.g., electricity that powers its factories, buildings, or other facilities.
• Scope 3 emissions: those for which the company is indirectly responsible, e.g., devices that are produced by a third party, but are used by customers to consume its services. Mobile phones anyone?

This last category is the tricky one because it’s the most difficult to measure and control. But no service provider can afford to ignore it, with Scope 3 emissions typically accounting for over 85% of a CSP’s carbon footprint.

Hacking a green idea

This is why at Amdocs, we set out a few months ago to inspire innovation around energy efficiency and emissions control. We wanted to help our customers overcome the critical Scope 3 emissions challenge.

So, we launched a hackathon with the goal of motivating our people to get creative in proposing a solution. This hackathon was championed by the company’s leadership, and it was very exciting to see how many talented developers stepped up to the plate.

In fact, one of them – the one who came in first place – brought a pioneering idea for an environmentally conscientious and commercially viable approach to controlling the CSP’s Scope 3 emissions.

The idea was to enrich the service provider’s product and services catalog with data and intelligence about the carbon profile of relevant devices and equipment.

With this information readily available and accessible, CSPs could influence their customers’ purchase decision for an option that is greener, and which, in turn, would accelerate net zero ambitions.

Not only did we love this idea, but so did Vodafone, who became our thought and design partner on the solution’s development.

The CO₂ Moonshot

Right around this time, the TM Forum launched the Moonshot Awards program, which recognizes “the efforts of teams who actively drive innovation, push boundaries, and contribute to positive change for society.”

One of the categories in the program is the Energy Challenge Moonshot Award  . It was clear that this was a challenge we wanted to take head on.

Together with Vodafone, we also engaged with:

• Carbon Footprint, a leading provider of online carbon footprint calculation tools and data, for real-time integration with external carbon datasets.
• AWS on the sustainable cloud infrastructure for our apps, data lakes, and AI/ML solutions.
• Snowflake, to serve as the integrated data store and data broker for internal and external carbon related data.

As for us, we have expanded the Amdocs Catalog to include many powerful capabilities that will make it easy for CSP customers to assume greater responsibility for their environmental impact, and for service providers to reduce Scope 3 emissions.

The new carbon-aware Amdocs Catalog

This new approach to a CSP’s product catalog entails displaying the CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent) attributes of devices, equipment, and other products.

The information presented is intuitive and clear, enabling CSPs to create, launch, and promote new offerings in alignment with their sustainability goals.

Product managers can search and replace products in the offering package as based on specific CO2e data. They can also leverage generative AI (genAI) embedded in the catalog as their co-pilot in searching optimum alternatives.

And the genAI co-pilot can make any change to the product catalog that is required for publishing the new carbon-friendly offering on the CSP’s ecommerce properties.

This type of information was never before available to CSPs nor to their customers. But now they have all the details they need to offer or select a product and service offering that would least impact the environment. For example, customers could opt for a refurbished or smaller mobile device that has a higher sustainability rating.