Circular Economy
As one of the world’s leading ICT product solution providers, Wistron is committed to R&D, design, manufacturing, and services across various industries. When designing and developing sustainable products, we consider the product life cycle, which encompasses raw material acquisition, manufacturing, distribution, product use, and waste recycling. This approach aims to reduce the environmental impact of our products, create sustainable value, and promote the circular use of resources. Since 2013, Wistron’s Recycling Business Group has been offering green services that facilitate closed-loop recycling for our brand customers and maximize benefits to the circular economy.
Green resources business achievements
| 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 |
|---|
| Disposal of electronic waste(tons) | 10,000 | 7,300 | 4,660 | 4,360 |
| PCR plastic materials shipping volume(tons) | 16,930 | 26,288 | 21,577 | 18,035 |
| Reduction in usage of new plastic materials(tons) | 7,620 | 11,131 | 11,047 | 9,471 |
| Revenue (in million RMB) of Wistron Advanced Materials (Kunshan) Co., Ltd. | 921 | 1,680 | 1,380 | 1,165 |
Raw Materials and Technological Innovations
In the past ten years, Wistron’s Recycling Business Group has been dedicated to recycling and reusing electronic waste, collaborating with Wistron and our OEM customers to cultivate a circular economy, and delivering significant achievements and contributions. In 2023, they successfully expanded their customer base to include new OEM/ ODM clients in various electronic products such as servers, fans, network communications, laptops, televisions, uninterruptible power systems, point-of-sale machines, among others. New materials are largely applied to peripheral accessories, network communications, and industrial computers. Ocean-bound plastic has been successfully used to develop ABS/OBP, PBT+GF/OBP, and, recently, PC/OBP, which is applied to display case, key cap, fan, router and other components. In 2023, we shipped a total of 169t of OBP.
Green Product Performance
In product design and development stages, Wistron uses "Green Product Design Guidelines and Review Procedures" and other specifications to consider waste disposal, recycling, and reuse from the design stage as we seek to minimize the impact on people and the environment after the products are discarded. Wistron's Recycling Business Group focuses on the recycling electronics and refining recycled plastics, continuing to cooperate with customers on PCR plastics for various products. In 2023, Wistron's shipped products using PCR plastics accounted for 84.51% of our hardware revenue, representing an increase of 4.2% compared to the previous year. This proves that Wistron's green brand continues to be recognized by the international market.
Products using PCR plastic materials as percentage of hardware revenue (%)
- Note: Hardware products refer to laptops/desktop computers, and all-in-one (AIO) computers/display products /servers/Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP)
Key Performance Indicators of Green Products (%)
- Note: Data and examples of packaging designs using recycled materials before 2020 in Wistron Technology
Wistron's product packaging is also designed to be eco-friendly and recyclable. From cartons and cushioning to printing inks, recyclable and reusable materials are used wherever possible. Moreover, we comply with country laws and regulations, such as: China's Blue Sky Plan, France’s Mineral Oil Law, etc. We replace packaging materials with more eco-friendly ones to reduce our impact on the environment. In 2023, the products using Wistron's packaging design with recycled materials accounted for 99.3% of overall revenue. Among which, 96.5% of the external boxes were made from recycled pulp; 90.8% of the cushioning materials were made from recycled EPE; and 98.3% of the printed materials were printed with environmentally friendly water-based ink.
Recycled materials used in product packaging as percentage of hardware revenue in 2023 (%)
