As part of its ongoing commitment to drive more sustainable practices, UBS, the world’s leading wealth manager, has joined the Green Software Foundation as a steering member. The move is part of UBS’s push towards achieving net zero greenhouse gas emissions across all its operations by 2050.
UBS has teamed up with the Green Software Foundation to explore ways in which it can reduce the emissions associated with its large technology estate.
A company with 160 years of history and over 70,000 employees around the world, UBS is constantly evolving, and technology and digital culture are at the heart of this evolution. With thousands of applications running across its global businesses, UBS knows that one of the next big steps in their evolution is not just accelerating their digital transformation, but to use greener development principles as an integral part of their approach going forward.
Over the years, UBS has made advances in reducing its carbon emissions either by moving from on-premise data centers to the cloud or in systematically reducing or removing idle, power-hungry resources. One current project is the exploration of carbon-aware applications, which allow users to select computing options with the lowest emissions. Partnering with the Green Software Foundation to share these best practices and knowledge with other members is the next step in the journey to keep cutting carbon emissions.
“We are delighted to join the Green Software Foundation as a steering member. At UBS, we believe that reducing carbon emissions can be tackled on many fronts and our technology estate is one area in which we can proactively reduce our footprint by changing some of our day-to-day practices and behaviors,” says Mike Dargan, Group Chief Digital and Information Officer.
Building greener, more sustainable software is as much a business decision as it is a cultural one. UBS and the Green Software Foundation both recognize that everyone has a role to play when it comes to reducing our environmental footprint. Through this partnership, we hope to find more ways to partner together on how the choices we make when we build and design software, can have a widespread impact on the environment around us.
The relationship with the Green Software Foundation will be driven by UBS’s Sustainable Technology Guild, formed in 2021 to help deliver on the firm’s ‘Net Zero by 2050’ commitment. The guild focuses on knowledge-sharing and innovation and aims to play a leading role in promoting technology-focused activities to reduce the firm’s environmental impact.
As a steering member, UBS will also share learnings and best practices with its peers in the financial services industry, aiming to have as wide a reach as possible.
