Editor’s note: There’s big business in sustainability. That’s the vision of Robert Bosch GmbH, a German company that makes a wide range of products, from home appliances and power tools to auto parts and vehicle technology. The company, with annual revenue of 90.5 billion Euros (more than $94 billion) has made mobility and home technology key priorities. Frank Meyer, who leads Bosch’s energy and building technology business, sat down with us to talk about sustainability as a business model. The interview has been edited for length, clarity, and style.
Tell us about Bosch.
Our core purpose is to improve people's lives with our technologies. We are in all the big areas: mobility, consumer goods, industrial automation and a sector which I'm personally leading, energy and building technology. So, everything about future sustainability, sustainability solutions, energy efficiency solutions, energy technologies, heating, cooling, home climate — all of these technologies.
Do you see climate change as a business opportunity?
For sure, we do. I think we need to make sustainability part of the business model and see it as a business opportunity. Otherwise, transformation will not work. There are two themes, which, for us, are very important. One is electrification: heating, cooling, energy technologies, and mobility. The energy transition will only work with electrification, and we are one of the big suppliers of all technologies around electrification, including hardware or software steering, and efficiency solutions. The second is digitization — now it's digitization and artificial intelligence. So, leveraging intelligent steering, intelligent efficiency solutions, these are the two big trends — megatrends — Bosch is investing in.
What are you hearing from building owners and landlords — are they looking for solutions?
They are. I would even say partially desperately, in the sense that there is a lot of complexity out there. It’s not easy to manage all these systems of producing energy, sharing energy, steering energy efficiently, PVS[photovoltaic cells], batteries, heat pumps, cars, when to load, when to charge, how to use flexibility, load management, maximum capacities and so forth. It's a complex system. We are there to help our customers to manage this complexity and find solutions in order to be ready for this sustainability transition. So, yes, we see a lot of demand and a lot of interest.
Can you give us an example or two from anywhere in the world that strikes you as very innovative?
We are working with many different customers from all types of industries. They’ve mandated us to take care of their energy management for thousands of buildings in and around Germany. We implement energy efficiency and energy management solutions that are both innovative and digital. What's new and innovative is that we enable our partners to get a full analysis of where buildings can be more efficient with respect to energy consumption and workspace usage. We have automotive customers. We have retailers as customers. We have, here in the United States, universities as big customers. We have energy companies as big customers. Many customers design a more energy efficient path for their buildings, the path toward automated and digitally managed buildings. And we are a fantastic partner to do that.
What are some of the key priorities that you've established around energy efficiency?
Since I joined Bosch, the first big priority — and it has to do with energy efficiency — was a big acquisition. We signed a deal to acquire … Johnson Controls for air conditioning and heating as well as a joint venture in Asia with Hitachi. This is part of our path toward being the front-runner for all solutions around full electrification. This acquisition — the largest in Bosch’s 138-year history —is so important for us. With this acquisition, we combine our strengths in Europe, with the strengths of Johnson Controls in North America and the strengths of Hitachi in Asia, to become a truly global player. You can compete in such converging technologies only on a global scale. That's necessary if we want to tackle global problems like climate change.
The second thing is to build our plan for how we, as Bosch, position around energy management. I personally believe that Bosch is extremely well-positioned because the energy transition happens in the mobility sector and the automotive sector. And it happens in the building sector.
The third is you need energy technologies for this. One of the big themes for us going forward will be: Can we use this to generate additional strength? That is all about positioning, since these fields are starting to converge — fields that have been completely separate for a long, long time.
What are your thoughts around collaboration. How do you consider working with other firms, working with governments, working with NGOs? Is this something that is a priority?
It is. And for this, it probably is important to understand first how it's structured. Many do not know that Bosch is foundation-owned. This company is one of the very few that is completely owned by a charity foundation. And the foundation has clear principles, which means two big priorities. The number-one priority is financial sustainability. We, as leadership, have the clear mandate and responsibility to make sure that this business continues to exist for the next 100 years and even more. The second priority is to do the right things to create a positiveimpact for our societies. And that's a very strong responsibility.
That does not mean our first priorityisprofit maximization. That's quite a different mindset. Everything that this business earns goes back into the business or into the foundation. The foundation does charity work. They work around four big areas: health, education, global issues and climate change. We look at it as both the work we do, and the work of the foundation.