Faced with the severe challenge of global climate change, the sustainable transformation of industries is accelerating, and the process manufacturing industry is making carbon reduction a core task. However, in the fiercely competitive consumer goods industry, many companies have to focus their primary efforts on improving profitability and shareholder returns, thus to some extent neglecting investment in sustainable development.
So, is promoting sustainable development and improving financial performance really like having fish and bear's paw at the same time? The fact is not so. By relying on reasonable planning and measures, enterprises can fully advance these two goals in parallel and achieve positive results without the need for difficult "either or" decisions.
Especially today, thanks to the continuous advancement of technology, the three transformative trends of electrification, digitization, and circular economy are bringing new opportunities for the reshaping of the industry. These trends will not only have a profound and long-term impact on the transformation of the industry, but also create more possibilities for the consumer goods industry to enhance its sustainability and profitability.
Electrification: Throwing an Olive Branch towards Clean Energy
Under the goal of carbon neutrality, more and more industries are shifting towards clean energy, and the electrification transformation of production processes is imperative. Electricity is the most efficient form of energy, with an efficiency 3-5 times higher than other energy sources. As a typical consumer goods industry, the energy consumption of the food and beverage industry accounts for about 30% of the world's total, and its greenhouse gas emissions account for 20% of the world's total. Electrification undoubtedly can become an important path to improve sustainability.
However, for processes such as boiling and baking that require high energy consumption in food production, achieving this transformation still presents numerous challenges, which inevitably brings more concerns to enterprises. For example, before food companies attempt to replace gas stoves with electric stoves, managers must carefully consider a series of key issues - whether the existing power distribution system can safely and reliably meet the increased load demand? What upgrades are needed? Can it be combined with the enterprise's equipment upgrade plan? Is it necessary to adjust the operation process or control circuit to adapt to changes in demand? Will replacing equipment have an impact on product quality? For enterprises, if they cannot have a clear understanding of these issues, it is difficult to make up their minds to promote transformation measures.
As a global leader in industrial technology, Schneider Electric believes that electrification transformation is a systematic project that requires strategic planning to mitigate risks. To deeply implement this transformation, enterprises should first develop top-level strategic planning and increase the application of renewable energy through microgrid technology or green power procurement agreements, thereby providing stronger controllability and stability, and providing stronger guarantees for the efficiency and continuity of enterprise production.
In response to these needs, Schneider Electric can fully utilize innovative software and microgrid solutions to promote the steady progress of electrification and low-carbon transformation in the consumer goods industry. For example, Schneider Electric's EcoStruxure Microgrid Advisor (EMA) can use AI based unique optimization control algorithms to fully meet the comprehensive energy scheduling needs of enterprises in consumer goods and other fields in terms of grid access, photovoltaic energy, energy storage, and energy consumption equipment. Based on real-time electricity prices, weather data, photovoltaic power generation, and load electricity data, it can accurately complete energy economy scheduling in real time, enabling the factory and park to achieve a perfect balance from new energy generation to energy storage and load electricity demand, thereby reducing carbon footprint and achieving considerable economic benefits.
Digitization: Empowering the Journey of Excellence with Wisdom
If the electrification transformation of an enterprise is compared to "building a strong backbone", then digital transformation is no different from creating a powerful "brain" for the enterprise. Nowadays, with technological innovation, intelligent sensors that can collect real-time data provide a solid foundation for digitization. On this basis, enterprises need to collaborate and operate step by step at various stages and levels, and achieve comprehensive digital transformation from production line level, factory level to group level through end-to-end systematic planning. In this process, only by truly understanding the interaction between processes, personnel, and information flow can enterprises deploy the correct digital solutions, thereby achieving improvements and optimizations in various aspects such as process automation, asset management, resource allocation, and even food quality assurance.
In this regard, companies with outstanding performance invest almost four times more in processes and personnel than in technology itself. Thanks to the optimization of processes and personnel configuration, consumer goods manufacturers can accelerate the technology application of frontline employees, achieve scale expansion, and encourage employees to actively explore innovative digital use cases.
For example, one of Germany's largest dairy processing companies, Hochwald Foods, has achieved end-to-end digital system integration through Schneider Electric's ProLeiT process control solution, bridging the data gap between workshop operations and management, and achieving seamless monitoring of the entire process from access control security to product quality. This not only transforms the operational appearance of the enterprise, but also enables it to more confidently face future challenges. In the horizontal dimension, ProLeiT can cover the entire product process from raw material warehousing, biological processing to finished product outbound, while in the vertical dimension, ProLeiT achieves interconnectivity from workshop control to MES to enterprise level ERP at various levels. The end-to-end integration capability of ProLeiT runs through both horizontal and vertical processes, and now all links from entry checkpoints to finished product pallets can achieve full traceability of compliance and quantity
It is worth noting that the integration of Schneider Electric's ProLeiT process control solution with EcoStruxure Open Automation Platform (EAE) and AI technology can help users create open, modular, and scalable process control systems. This system can run on any general automation hardware platform, supporting modular and flexible manufacturing. This means that the factory's production line can be quickly and efficiently reorganized.
At present, the digital transformation of the consumer goods industry is accelerating, and the model of enterprise projects from construction, delivery to operation and maintenance is facing new changes. The digital era of "physical factories" and "virtual factories" is within reach. In this regard, Schneider Electric's asset information management system can help companies build centralized engineering project centers during project construction and delivery phases. Based on data from multiple information sources and systems, it can help companies optimize project progress, operational performance, and security, laying the foundation for building digital twin factories. On this basis, Schneider Electric's innovative EcoStruxure Predictive Maintenance Solution (PMA) can help users take timely action before faults occur, helping businesses achieve operational excellence. As a "system above the system", Schneider Electric AVEVA UOC Integrated Operations Center can collect and summarize data from various levels within the factory, from enterprise level, factory level to workshop level, providing information support and decision support for enterprise level management personnel.
Circular Economy: Redefining Sustainable Competitiveness
Against the backdrop of accelerating the comprehensive green transformation of China's economy and society, the circular economy has ushered in new development opportunities. Due to the systemic transformation of the circular economy, which involves comprehensive transformation at all levels of consumption and production, this also means a new track for redefining sustainable competitiveness for the consumer goods industry.
The Ellen MacArthur Foundation, which is committed to promoting the global circular economy transformation, has pointed out in a report that the consumer goods industry can save $700 billion in materials by simply implementing a circular economy; At the same time, consumers' preference for sustainability is also increasing. McKinsey research shows that over 60% of respondents are willing to pay a premium for environmentally friendly packaging products.
Schneider Electric believes that enterprises need to use design and innovation as the cornerstone, and form a closed-loop circular economy through a series of measures of "optimization, long-term use, and reuse". For the consumer goods industry, following the new approach of circular economy can create considerable commercial value and social benefits through multiple measures such as water resource management, raw material optimization, and packaging innovation.
For example, in the water management process, enterprises can reduce overall water consumption by recycling boiled wastewater, reusing reclaimed water, etc; Schneider Electric has implemented advanced water recovery and purification technologies to significantly reduce water consumption and waste for enterprise users in dairy and other fields. This method not only saves water resources, but also helps users maintain sustainability and business resilience in areas with scarce water resources. In addition to irrigation management, Schneider Electric also provides industrial water services to optimize on-site water use, such as using CIP Optimize online cleaning consultants to help companies achieve energy savings of up to 30%, water and chemical savings of 5%, and productivity increases of 15% in the CIP process.
In the process of optimizing raw materials, enterprises can minimize waste to the greatest extent possible through precise weighing and the reuse of by-products. After the completion of the project construction and delivery phase, the long-term challenge for enterprises to recover costs and create benefits has just begun. The Schneider Electric MOM production and operation management system covers four aspects: production, quality, warehousing, and operation and maintenance. It can achieve a globally observable, measurable, controllable, and optimizable closed-loop management of production and operation activities, helping enterprises achieve shorter product innovation cycles, higher product quality and safety, more standardized formula and process control, and more transparent full process lean management, while improving efficiency and reducing waste.
In terms of packaging innovation, companies can shape their differentiated competitive advantages by using sustainable designs such as recycled paper, recycled plastic, and streamlined packaging sizes. Currently, 80% of the world's top 25 consumer goods companies have committed to achieving fully recyclable packaging by 2030. In this regard, Schneider Electric can provide comprehensive support for consumer goods companies to practice the circular economy, helping them reduce waste throughout the entire lifecycle by optimizing resource utilization, improving customer satisfaction, and promoting long-term sustainable development.
How to take the lead in shaping sustainable competitiveness
By analyzing the three transformative trends of electrification, digitization, and circular economy, it can be found that in the current era of intensified competition in the consumer goods industry, these trends are not only industry indicators, but also strategic priorities for enterprises to achieve differentiation and long-term success. Data shows that in the consumer goods industry, although sustainable products only account for 18.5% of the market share, they contribute about one-third of the growth, demonstrating the enormous potential of "sustainable competitiveness".
For the vast number of consumer goods enterprises, finding the right partners and industry experts, developing strategies and solutions that meet their needs, and taking the lead in building their own sustainable competitiveness has become an urgent task that cannot be avoided. At the 2025 Hanover Industrial Fair, Schneider Electric showcased a digital and sustainable food and beverage industry park, aiming to help consumer goods enterprise users intuitively understand the future trends of industrial automation and obtain the best practices for accelerating digital transformation and sustainable development.