Sustainability
Sustainability
We believe that being a sustainable business is about striking the balance between stakeholder expectations and the needs and concerns of our employees, the workers in our supply chain and the environment. Achieving a balance between these aspects is essential to meet the needs of the present without compromising future generations.
Sustainable company
For many years we have been working towards improving our sustainability footprint.
We furthered our ambition in 2016 by designing and implementing a social environmental management system (SEMS) which is in compliance with ISO14001 standard and Responsible Business Alliance (RBA) requirements, formerly the Electronic Industry Citizenship Coalition (EICC). TomTom SEMS aims to support the business by meeting legal requirements, industry standards, customer/stakeholder requirements and expectations, by minimizing our environmental impact and maximizing our positive contribution to the community we work and live in.
As of 2017, TomTom has been granted the ISO 14001:2015 certificate for the ‘Development, production management, delivery and sales of digital maps, traffic & navigation software, hardware products and services’.
The ISO 14001:2015 certification stands testament to our green practices, embedded in the way we operate and our products and services across the company. Furthermore, we will be continuing our efforts towards maintaining the certification.
TomTom has been a member of the RBA since 2012. We are committed to upholding the standards as set out in the RBA Code of Conduct and have also adopted the code as part of our sustainability strategy.
Environmental compliance
TomTom recognises that climate change is one of the biggest challenges facing the world today. We believe that making smarter decisions to address this challenge requires combined efforts on the part of governments, businesses, and consumers.
Our products and services are designed to help people get where they want to be faster. They help save time, and help improve the environment by reducing carbon dioxide emissions. We also make every effort to minimise the effects of our business activities and operations on the environment.
Our environmental policy guides our management of the various environmental and workplace activities that comprise our business, as well as guiding our employees’, suppliers’, customers’ and stakeholders’ understanding of TomTom’s environmental expectations.
Our products
We design and develop innovative products that make it easy for people to keep moving towards their goals. Best known for being a global leader in navigation and mapping products (such as portable navigation devices), TomTom also creates GPS sports watches, as well as state-of-the-art fleet management solutions and industry-leading location-based products.
Chemical substances management
TomTom products may contain up to 400 individual components and an average of 15 plastic parts that are made of a variety of materials and chemical substances. Over 100 million plastic parts are purchased annually for assembly into our products.
As part of our Corporate Environmental Product Compliance (EPC) programme, we proactively monitor the legislative and regulatory developments that apply to our products, accessories and packaging in order to establish our corporate and supplier requirements. Product environmental legislation on chemical substances is continually evolving; therefore we consistently monitor, evaluate and communicate these changes within our business and our suppliers to ensure we are current and compliant.
The quality management processes applicable for all of TomTom’s products includes policies and procedures to manage and verify compliance with the relevant legislation in the countries where our products are sold.
In this context we provide appropriate statements of compliance to our customers when requested.
The TomTom RBA Code of Conduct explicitly requires all our suppliers to provide products that comply with all the relevant legislation. We expect our suppliers to integrate environmental considerations into their supply chain management processes.
Waste take-back and recycling
TomTom is committed to a proactive global take-back strategy. As such, we are financially contributing to the collection and recycling of end-of-life TomTom products, batteries and packaging.
We assume full responsibility for our obligations under the relevant waste legislation in respect of consumer products and accessories, batteries and the packaging, while responsibility for in-dash navigation systems falls to our customers in the automotive industry under the EU End of Life Vehicles (ELV) Directive.
As an importer and producer in every country in which TomTom has a presence, we are a member of collective schemes. Depending on the individual scheme, we report weights and quantities of products, batteries and packaging sold into the market and based on this data we calculate the costs we pay towards take-back and recycling.
In order to facilitate safe recycling, all our products are marked with information on substances or components that require special treatment in recycling or disposal.
Recycling by the numbers
In 2018, we financed the collection and recycling of nearly 507 tonnes of waste from electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE), 35 tonnes of battery waste and 438 tonnes of packaging waste. In comparison to 2017, our waste output decreased on average by 31%. This reflects 100% of the waste from end-of-life TomTom electric and electronic products, batteries and packaging, in the countries and regions where recycling obligations apply. Because of our ongoing shift towards providing more data, content and services and a declining PND market, we expect to produce less waste in the coming years, resulting in a smaller environmental footprint.
TomTom statements of compliance
These are TomTom statements on specific pieces of environmental product legislation:
Our supply chain
Outsourcing is a key element of our business model – in fact, the assembly of personal navigation devices (PNDs), fitness products, accessories, logistics and reverse logistics is entirely outsourced. Customer care and content production are partly outsourced.
Our top 20 tier 1 suppliers operate in 13 countries and employ up to 4,000 workers to produce TomTom branded products, including content and services. We aim to forge stable, long-term relationships with our tier 1 suppliers, and indeed the majority have been our partners for more than 5 years.
Two tier 1 suppliers provide 100% of our PNDs, in dash system and fitness products. These suppliers assemble previously manufactured materials or components in their factories. They account for half (up to 50%) of the workers in our tier 1 supply chain.
Supply chain management
We maintain a high level of social responsibility towards our consumers, business customers, and suppliers. This includes setting targets to meet current industry standards for supply chain management, labor conditions, human rights, health, safety, and environment, according to the electronics industry.
We have deployed a global process based on the learnings from our first years as a member of the RBA. The TomTom RBA Code of Conduct establishes the basic principles and standards for business conduct with which we expect our suppliers to comply with. Our major suppliers are required to sign the TomTom RBA Code of Conduct. Moreover, they are expected to implement the code as part of their own operations, and to adopt the code for their suppliers as well.
Where applicable, we conduct audits of these suppliers in order to assess their compliance with the standards defined in the TomTom RBA Code of Conduct. This enables us to understand their management systems and processes and covers areas such as child labor, forced labor, discrimination, working hours and compensation, as well as health, safety and environmental performance.
We believe that a risk management approach enables us to spend our resources efficiently by identifying areas of high risk. The supplier risk profile, self-assessments and audits are all based on RBA industry-developed tools and practices, which we believe to be the most appropriate and relevant to our business and our supply chain. Using RBA tools is not only efficient for TomTom but it also sends a consistent message to our suppliers, and minimises the duplication of their effort between different customer requirements.
TomTom Slavery and Human Trafficking Statement
The TomTom Slavery and Human Trafficking Statement is made pursuant to Section 54 of the UK Modern Slavery Act 2015 and sets out how TomTom addresses the risk of slavery and human trafficking within its own operations and supply chain.
Get in touch
Have a question or comment about our sustainability strategy? Please contact sustainability@tomtom.com.