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A new global survey revealing explosive growth in business software that supports environment, energy, carbon, corporate responsibility and sustainability processes warns that only a handful of today’s vendors will survive inevitable consolidation in the sector.

“Heads of Sustainability, Energy and Environment must ensure that they don’t pick a loser in 2010 and face a rip-and-replace nightmare in 2012,” says Verdantix Director, David Metcalfe.

The Verdantix report, titled The Buyer’s Guide To Sustainable Business Software, is based on an analysis of 65 software firms and includes data on product launches since 2005, customer wins by industry and the job titles of individuals who have purchased sustainable business software.

Companies looking to license or buy sustainable business software today face a multitude of providers offering a staggering array of applications, according to David Solsky, CEO of CarbonSystems.

“The Verdantix survey reveals a boom in business interest in energy and sustainability measurement and reporting in the past three years. However, the number of successful software providers will shrink as the market weighs the best from the rest, so buyers need to do careful due diligence. Buyers need to ask themselves whether their preferred software provider will be here in three years’ time.”

The report’s key findings include the following:

• Rapid growth in the number of applications that support sustainabilty, energy and carbon accountng - up from 31 in 2005 to 126 in 2010. This growth is expected to increase buyer awareness and education.
• Explosive growth in the number of applications. From 2005 to 2010 the number of sustainable business software applications grew from 31 to 126 – an increase of 406%. In 2009, software vendors launched 32 new applications and 2010 has already seen 15 additional product launches.
• Sustainability leaders dominate software purchase decisions. Ninety-three per cent of firms supplying sustainable business software predominantly sell to managers with job titles like VP Sustainability and Chief Sustainability Officer. Sixty-four per cent of the suppliers have sold to individuals in environment, EH&S or CSR roles and just 18 per cent have sold into the IT organization.
• The dominant deployment model offered by sustainable business software suppliers is Software-as-a-Service (SaaS). SaaS enables buyers to implement software without recourse to their own IT function and facilitates global scalability.
• A forecast that today’s four niche categories of software applications – carbon management, sustainability reporting, energy management and environmental compliance – will be swept away by a new era of integrated sustainable business software platforms.
• In the last 3 years energy costs, sustainability brand risks, and looming climate change regulations have transformed sustainability from a CSR issue into a strategic challenge.

CarbonSystems is one of 65 companies surveyed in the new Verdantix report. The Australian company is a global provider of energy and carbon accounting software that helps clients manage their environmental performance and operate more efficiently by driving cost savings in their use of energy, fuel, gas, water, waste, and other environmental metrics.

CarbonSystems has clients in diverse sectors, including corporate property management, education, electricity and gas, government, food services, fast moving goods distribution, information technology, managed services, mining, logistics, and professional services. Clients include AGL Energy, Canon, Colliers International, CSIRO, Domino’s, Deloitte, Elders, Investec, Metcash, Macquarie University, Microsoft, Novartis, Spotless and Village Roadshow. CarbonSystems is a privately owned and funded Australian company with offices in Sydney, New York and London.

Media contacts
Dan Gaffney +61 411 15 60 15
David Solsky +61 411 37 33 33