Green IT goes much further than digital and cloud initiatives. Today, we share with you the experience of Rzilient whose mission is to limit the carbon footprint of the IT fleet with simple solutions to implement.

Green IT, the new major challenge of the ecological transition
 

IT generates many negative externalities on the environment, but also on employee productivity. Perhaps the most striking figure is the carbon footprint associated with the manufacture of computer hardware. It accounts for a little more than 3% of greenhouse gases.

In addition, Alexis identifies the difficulties related to the management of companies' stock of computing equipment. The tasks are time-consuming, redundant, sometimes complex but also very costly for the company. The effect is even more pronounced with the management of employees who are working from home. It is also a very fragmented market, composed of multiple stakeholders.

After making this observation, Alexis Valero (co-founder of Rzilient) decided, at the beginning of 2021, to embark on the adventure of responsible digital and the optimization of the profitability of IT fleets with 2 levers:

• An ecosystem of partners expert in reconditioned IT

• A customer interface via a Saas platform to make it easier to manage IT fleets and monitor its carbon impact.

Today there are more than 200 customers and a first round table at 1.3M€.

The team has also grown significantly throughout the process: 4 employees in early 2021, 16 in September and now 32, spread over the Paris and Barcelona offices.

THE BENEFITS OF THE SOLUTION CREATED BY RZILIENT  

Rzilient’s mission is to smooth out these negative externalities that are burdensome both for businesses and for the planet. The company carries out this mission by providing more eco-responsible equipment and deploying solutions to extend its lifespan.

The benefits are multiple: rationalization of costs, of the allocated time and obviously limitation of the carbon impact of the IT stock.

The SaaS IT management interface centralizes employee data, information about their workstations and all their procedures. This allows them to operate more efficiently, but also to simplify access to IT expertise for non-specialist profiles.
 

THE PERFORMANCE OF THE RECONDITIONED ON A DIGITAL FLEET

Clearly, the ecological footprint is much lower: “- 80% CO2 equivalent on reconditioned”. Indeed, most of the pollution goes through the manufacturing stage.

But there are also other motivations that push Rzilient customers to be part of the eco-responsible approach.

There is obviously a search for direct and indirect profitability for the company in the first place. For example, this initiative allows them to make it easier to manage the cost of carbon taxation and to optimize working time; according to Rzilient, an employee loses 109h/year on these IT topics. 
Reconditioned computer objects are also 30 to 70% cheaper than new computer equipment.

Finally, it is a lever to limit dependence on new components that come from abroad, in a difficult climate and a strong demand tension. 

A CONSTANTLY EVOLVING PLATFORM: AI AT THE SERVICE OF GREEN IT

On the platform side, development keeps accelerating and new features are regularly announced. The latest is the iT Room, an intelligent IT projection and management tool that allows anyone to anticipate the state of health of their fleet. It also determines the actions to take to optimize performance and reduce TCO, total cost of ownership of a computer that amounts to €6,000 for a device purchased €1,100. The iT Room also allows a visualization of the environmental impacts related to IT.

Technologically, the future SaaS platform from Rzilient, will be made of bricks - easily implementable and adaptable to various HR, accounting and other softwares already used in companies. 

Also, the idea of strengthening their IT Room to give it an AI dimension is obviously in their development plan. A process of predicting and automating actions and optimisations that will thus become the key tool for easier, cheaper and less carbon-intensive IT management.