■ESG Initiatives

Pacific Net ＜3021＞ has the characteristic that each business directly leads to ESG and SDGs (environmental recycling type/CO2 reduction/DX) support. The IT subscription business contributes to improving the “environment (E:Environment)” by renting and reusing it after it ends, aims to enrich “society (S: Social)” through support for work style reforms and DX support, and plays a role in “corporate governance (G: governance)” by strengthening information leakage prevention. In the ITAD business, reuse and recycling contribute to the “environment (E)” and prevention of information leakage contributes to “corporate governance (G)” through proper disposal of used equipment. The communication device business contributed to “society (S)” in the form of providing three-secret avoidance tools during the COVID-19 pandemic, but now it is contributing through educational trips, etc. In particular, it can be said that the sharing economy (sharing economy) of the IT subscription business and the circular economy (circular economy) of the ITAD business cooperate to benefit the “environment (E)”.

The company's business is directly linked to the realization of SDGs such as a recycling-oriented society, CO2 reduction, and DX, and it can be said that progress in corporate ESG support will lead to the expansion of the company's business scale. The details of the company's support for the issues faced by many companies in ESG initiatives are as follows.

(1) E (Environment)

There is an urgent need to promote carbon neutrality. In the Tokyo Stock Exchange Prime Market, disclosure of CO2 emissions and reduction targets is required, and if it is deemed that management is not environmentally friendly, there is a risk that corporate value will decline due to investor turnover and competitiveness will decline. In response to these issues, the company is currently reducing CO2 emissions by approximately 5,000 tons per year through proper treatment in the reuse and recycling of IT equipment. Specifically, in addition to reducing CO2 generated during manufacturing and disposal by reusing PCs, all PCs that cannot be resold are disassembled into parts and 100% reused domestically. In addition, a CO2 reduction effect report visualizing these series of results is also provided. Additionally, we are working to reduce plastic materials. Plastic packaging materials used for transportation of PCs etc. were changed to recycled paper with a low environmental impact, and optimal packaging was realized, resulting in a reduction of about 75% in plastic usage fees and a reduction of about 20% in cardboard capacity compared to the past, which also contributed to an improvement in transportation efficiency. As a side effect of this, in addition to being able to reduce the cost of packaging materials, it has been well received by customers for being easier to take out the contents than cushioning materials up until now.

(2) S (Social)

There are many companies that face the issue of a chronic shortage of in-house IT human resources. There is an urgent need for DX due to changes in behavior patterns, and furthermore, the workload of IT personnel is rapidly increasing due to changes in work styles and response to security threats. Meanwhile, there is a shortage of IT human resources in Japan, making it difficult to expand human resources and increasing costs. By using the company's PC subscription or LCM service, companies can outsource everything from PC introduction to operation management and proper disposal, and internal IT human resources can be shifted to core operations such as DX. They also provide support for the socially disadvantaged. A partnership has been concluded with the certified NPO CLACK, and a “PC donation project” is being promoted for high school students with financial difficulties. In learning support such as free programming courses conducted by the same NPO corporation for high school students, it supports everything from picking up used PCs donated by companies to erasing data and installing regular OS for necessary PCs, and supports projects by providing reuse PCs. In 2024/3, it was announced that the number of donated PCs had exceeded 1,000 units. Recently, in addition to donations, necessary IT equipment was also provided as disaster relief for the Noto Peninsula Earthquake that occurred on 2024/1/1.

(3) G (Governance)

From the viewpoint of corporate governance, there is an urgent need to strengthen information security. Used PCs and servers require proper processing such as data erasing, etc., and there is a high risk of information leakage if neglected. Also, due to revisions to the Personal Information Protection Law, etc., business risks when an information leak accident occurs are increasing. In response to these issues, the company provides services that minimize the risk of information leakage by performing strict proper processing. The integrity of data erasure is ensured by a security environment where high safety is guaranteed and digitalization, and employees and outsiders can also be prevented from taking it out. It complies with NIST SP 800-88 Rev.1 (document number proposed by NIST (US National Institute of Standards and Technology) as a standard for “media data erasure”), and data erasure work certified as completely impossible to restore is being carried out.

(Author: FISCO Analyst Tomokazu Murase)