Cisco will increase concentrate on lowering use of plastics

This submit was written by David Ashley, Senior Vice President, Product Operations at Cisco and Marco Croci, Senior Vice President, Engineering at Cisco.

In 2018, we introduced our first plastic-related aim: to scale back our use of virgin plastic by 20% by our fiscal 12 months 2025.* We exceeded this aim in our fiscal 12 months 2021. To construct on this momentum and to handle the well-documented challenges related to plastic, we need to share our technique to additional scale back our use of virgin plastic in our merchandise and packaging.

Reducing plastic in our merchandise

We have set a aim that by our fiscal 12 months 2025, 50% of the plastic utilized in our merchandise (by weight) will probably be manufactured from recycled content material.** Most plastic utilized in Cisco merchandise is present in a couple of product classes: Cisco IP telephones, Webex collaboration gadgets, entry factors, and Cisco Meraki merchandise. 

As a part of our journey to reduce using virgin plastic, our groups are sourcing extra recycled plastic components and designing plastic out of our merchandise. For instance, choose fashions of our 8800 Series IP telephones encompass 68% recycled plastic and a few merchandise in our Catalyst collection of community switches had been designed with out bezels, the plastic beauty floor on the skin of a tool. 

Reducing plastic in our packaging

We are rethinking product packaging and are sourcing various supplies to plastic. Our technique contains eliminating plastic luggage in our packaging wherever doable. In our fiscal 12 months 2022, the vast majority of equipment for Cisco Meraki merchandise shipped in paper-based packaging, which was manufactured from  70% recycled content material. And in sure different product traces, energy cords are labeled with scannable wraps as a substitute of plastic luggage. As a results of these modifications, we prevented transport an estimated ten million plastic luggage, representing 28 tonnes of plastic.

Furthermore, we’re persevering with to scale back foam packaging, one other materials made out of plastic. The packaging for the Catalyst IR8140 Heavy Duty Router is the primary answer at Cisco to make use of a fiber-flute materials instead of the froth cushioning that’s usually required for heavier merchandise. Opportunities to reduce using foam throughout our product portfolio will assist us attain our aim of lowering our use of froth packaging by 75% by our fiscal 12 months 2025.***

Embracing round design

Addressing plastic is only one a part of our holistic round design technique, which is concentrated on designing merchandise and packaging with reuse and useful resource effectivity in thoughts. We have set a aim of incorporating Circular Design Principles into the design of all new merchandise and packaging by fiscal 2025. To do that, we’re embedding round design necessities into our design instruments and product improvement processes, together with participating our suppliers on revolutionary, sustainable designs for our merchandise, parts, and packaging.

We are additionally working to keep away from transport undesirable equipment to clients by integrating accent choice into the ordering course of. In our fiscal 12 months 2022, over 8,500 buyer orders opted out of receiving an influence wire, avoiding the cargo of roughly 205,000 pointless energy cords, in addition to minimizing the packaging that will have wrapped them.

We are dedicated to designing merchandise and methods that assist to allow reuse, reduce environmental influence, and notice worth for our stakeholders. We sit up for persevering with to share our progress in direction of these objectives alongside the way in which.

Footnotes

* Compared to a fiscal 2018 base 12 months.

** The plastics included on this aim exclude these contained in commodity parts sourced from suppliers (e.g., plastic screws, followers, and cables).

*** Compared to a fiscal 2019 base 12 months; aim is measured by weight.

Forward Looking Statements: Readers are cautioned that this weblog submit could also be deemed to include forward-looking statements which can be topic to dangers, uncertainties, assumptions and different components which can be tough to foretell, together with these components recognized in our most up-to-date filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Form 10-Ok and Form 10-Q. Such info speaks solely as of the date of this weblog submit. For additional info, see Forward Looking Statements.

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