Sustainability Data as a Strategic Driver: How Embedded Intelligence Transforms Business Value

The Strategic Importance of Sustainability Data in Business

Across global boardrooms, a clear insight is emerging: integrating sustainability data into decision-making is one of the most strategic moves a business can make today. Recent innovations are changing how companies operate by embedding sustainability directly into core business applications, unifying fragmented data, and enhancing human expertise with AI.

Leaders in the C-suite face increasing pressure to fulfill sustainability commitments while ensuring these efforts add real value to their business units. COOs aim to maintain resilient supply chains while incorporating sustainability metrics to better predict risks. CFOs seek clear visibility into both financial and non-financial data for reporting and growth. CPOs need transparency around suppliers’ sustainability footprints, CHROs are focused on engaging talent through authentic sustainability performance, CROs require verified data to build brand trust and enable premium pricing, and CIOs manage the complexity of integrating sustainability data with governance and innovation.

What many lack is actionable, decision-grade sustainability data that stands alongside financial and operational metrics. Embedding sustainability into business applications generates relevant data at the source of activity, overcoming constraints caused by outdated financial systems and inconsistent data. This data becomes an integral part of the organization's overall information ecosystem, driving core processes rather than being siloed.

Sustainability is no longer a side concern—it intersects every critical business function. Organizing and applying sustainability data within business processes prepares organizations for a future where sustainability metrics contribute to broader business intelligence tools, such as margin optimization, instead of remaining isolated. In this context, SAP positions itself as a strategic partner, integrating sustainability data with business processes to enable meaningful change.

Using SAP Business AI and SAP Business Data Cloud, complex sustainability challenges are translated into clear, actionable strategies. Recent solution updates go beyond software enhancements to bridge the gap between ambition and measurable outcomes. These tools help businesses manage risk, ensure compliance, and unlock enterprise-wide value, forming a framework for sustainable business innovation powered by scalable AI.

AI for Sustainability at Scale: New Innovations for EHS and Product Compliance

Starting August 2025, SAP will offer new Business AI features in beta within key sustainability applications. These AI-driven tools help organizations prepare data, automate workflows, and enhance expertise. They streamline operations in environmental, health and safety (EHS), and product compliance areas, delivering measurable impact. Key upcoming features include:

• AI-assisted permit management in SAP S/4HANA for EHS environment management automates permit handling by extracting essential data and proposing follow-up tasks to maintain compliance.
• AI-assisted safety observation reporting with Joule, SAP’s AI copilot, enables intuitive incident reporting via conversational interfaces, simplifying shop floor safety documentation.
• AI-assisted safety instruction generation suggests safety guidelines based on risk assessments and job hazard analyses, supporting proactive prevention.
• AI-assisted compliance information processing automates extraction and mapping of critical data from declarations and safety sheets, improving accuracy and reducing manual effort.

These features will be part of the new SCM premium package, reflecting SAP’s commitment to embedded, business-ready AI solutions that deliver real outcomes.

AI That’s Already Delivering Value

SAP customers are already using Business AI to boost their sustainability efforts. Examples include:

• SAP Sustainability Control Tower: AI accelerates ESG report generation with editable templates, generative text, and visualizations, freeing teams to focus on execution rather than formatting.
• SAP Sustainability Footprint Management: AI automates emission factor mapping by matching products to lifecycle assessment databases with confidence scoring.
• SAP Green Token: AI validates and extracts data from supplier sustainability declarations, reducing errors and speeding up processes.

These capabilities help reduce costs, mitigate risks, and improve performance across reporting, carbon management, circularity, and compliance.

What’s Next: Unlocking Enterprise-wide Sustainability Insights

In the latter half of 2025, SAP will introduce SAP Sustainability Control Tower as an Intelligent Application within SAP Business Data Cloud. This will unify sustainability data and business operations on a single platform, enabling consistent reporting, deeper insights, and smarter decisions throughout the enterprise. A technology preview will be available to select customers before general release.

One Sustainability Data Model: From Complexity to Clarity

Throughout 2025, SAP will launch new sustainability data products as part of an initiative to provide hundreds of curated, governed datasets across the SAP Business Suite. Accessible via SAP Business Data Cloud, these datasets will include:

• Structured emissions data (air, water, wastewater) from SAP EHS Management and SAP S/4HANA for product compliance
• Additional data from SAP Sustainability Footprint Management

This unified data model will help organizations strengthen compliance, simplify analytics, and scale sustainability programs with confidence.

Process Intelligence Meets Sustainability Intelligence

Improved data alone isn’t enough—better processes matter. Starting autumn 2025, SAP will embed sustainability impact metrics into the SAP Signavio Process Transformation Suite. New features include:

• SAP Signavio Value Accelerators: Pre-built process models and best practices for regulatory use cases
• SAP Signavio Process Intelligence: Analytics tools to identify opportunities to optimize business processes and embed sustainability at scale

These additions help businesses align process transformation with environmental goals, closing the gap between strategy and execution.

Your Best, Made Real

SAP helps turn sustainability from a compliance checklist into a catalyst for innovation, resilience, and growth. By embedding sustainability into applications, unifying data, and enabling intelligent automation with AI, organizations can improve sustainability while accelerating performance. From frontline safety to carbon reporting and from real-time data to boardroom insights, this represents a new era of sustainable enterprise management.