Walking the Talk on Innovating for Good

Earlier today, I was honored to participate in the opening of our new VMware Discovery Center, a state-of-the-art facility on our Palo Alto campus where our customers, partners and VMware employees from all over the world can collaborate on innovations that matter. We had the pleasure of hosting several leaders from the Silicon Valley community, including Congresswoman Anna Eshoo and other representatives.

At VMware, we believe business leaders have a responsibility to both engage in dialogue and “walk the talk” when it comes to innovating for good. I was both proud and excited to announce today two significant milestones for our company: first, we’ve achieved carbon neutrality across our global operations two years ahead of our goal, and, second, today we’re announcing our intent to collaborate with the City of Palo Alto to develop a first-of-its-kind, solar-powered community microgrid. We also took the opportunity this morning to convene a global discussion on the critical role that the tech industry must play in shaping policy to improve the quality of life for all 7+ billion on the planet.

Time for action is now. It is never too late to do something.  - Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Silicon Valley’s First Community Microgrid

We are thrilled to be working with the City of Palo Alto on a proof-of-concept for a community microgrid on our headquarters campus. This microgrid will be designed to integrate renewable sources like solar, and combine that clean energy with battery storage and smart-grid software controls.

You might ask, “What do you mean by ‘community’ microgrid?” What makes this project a first is the collaboration with the City to explore and test new solutions that improve community resiliency, all while running on renewable energy. 

Why are we so focused on community resiliency? I often describe resilency as sustainablity’s twin sister. It’s no secret that natural disasters are increasing these days in both frequency and severity. It’s absolutely imperative that we innovate not just in carbon reduction, but also in new technologies that empower communities to be more resilient. To that end, we’re looking forward to working with the City to explore howour community microgrid can help with emergency response systems and provide critical backup resources.

We view this community microgrid as “exponential technology” – in other words, a prototype for smart cities and smart grids everywhere. We want to help answer the essential question: “How can we de-carbonize the electric grid while still providing reliable, secure, resilient power to our businesses and communities?"

Innovating for Zero Emissions: Achieving Carbon Neutrality

Warren Buffett once said, ‘Someone’s sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.” As we mark the milestone of carbon neutrality for VMware two years ahead of schedule, we’re honored to become a certified CarbonNeutral Company. We accomplished this through an aggressive combination of energy-efficiency initiatives, renewable energy development and investments in low-carbon, sustainable development projects. 

Across the company, we’ve been executing on this trajectory for some time. We’re acutely aware that data centers now account for a growing percentage of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. It’s gratifying to know that our virtualization technologies have dramatically reduced our customers’ energy consumption over the past two decades, making IT infrastructure significantly more efficient on a global basis. Yet we still needed to fulfill our commitment to reduce our own footprint down to zero carbon impact. That’s now something our employees around the world can take pride in accomplishing.

Convening the Conversation: UN Sustainable Development Goals

One thing is clear: the challenges we face as a global community are complex and deeply entrenched. In order to make substantive progress in areas such as healthcare access, financial inclusion and environmental sustainability, we must work together with deep collaboration across the private and public sectors. That’s where the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) come in. The SDGs are a blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for everyone, laying out detailed strategies to address issues as diverse as extreme poverty, inequality, climate, environmental degradation, prosperity and peace and justice. 

As part of our Discovery Center opening this morning, we hosted a global conversation on UN SDG #9, which is “to build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation.” It was a lively and fascinating discussion, in large part because we were joined by some of the most creative and forward-thinking minds within tech, academia, government and the non-profit community.

A couple of insights really stood out for me. Debra Dunn, faculty member at Stanford University's d.school and co-founder of the school’s FEED (Food Entrepreneurship, Education and Design) Collaborative, said, “The most challenging aspect of the UN SDGs might just be partnership. You can’t just sit here in Palo Alto and solve extreme poverty in rural Africa. We need to walk in the shoes of the people we’re collaborating with.”

Victoria Lee, who leads the World Economic Forum's work at the Center for the Fourth Industrial Revolution, took that a step further by saying, “Individuals can have massive global impact.The Apollo missions were the genesis of so many tech innovations and really gave birth to the concept of tech for good. It’s the human element that made the difference.” 

My mind is buzzing with the events of today and the provocative perspectives that we heard. I firmly believe we have an opportunity to use tech innovation as a rising tide that lifts all boats. I invite you to join us in planting your own seeds for the future.