The platform increases circularity of the industry, while allowing users to drive new revenue from decommissioned equipment and save costs on network upgrades
8 October 2024, MWC Las Vegas 2024: CommScope, through its Outdoor Wireless Networks business segment, is the latest partner to sign up to the GSMA Equipment Marketplace, a cloud-based platform that allows companies to buy, reuse, resell, and recycle their network assets, while helping them achieve their net zero environmental targets and ensure financial sustainability.
With the addition of CommScope’s Outdoor Wireless Networks business, this brings the total number of partners using the service to 41, including ProLabs and Vodafone. This signals the commitment within the telecoms industry towards reaching net zero by 2050 at the latest. There are now four million pieces of equipment registered in GSMA Equipment Marketplace that can be reused by other operators, with 350,000 pieces of equipment already sold over the past year.
Launched earlier this year in partnership with Shields Environmental Group, the GSMA Equipment Marketplace aims to transform the way networks – fixed, mobile and private – are procured and decommissioned; in turn, this will minimise the extraction of environmentally damaging raw materials used to make network equipment and support operators in meeting their environmental sustainability targets.
The platform provides a global view of assets and equipment, including real-time visibility of stock. Buyers can search for individual parts, identify the most efficient and cost-effective source for the required products, and then submit their order. The portal can also be used to sell decommissioned equipment to a global customer base or to recycle equipment which has reached the end of its lifecycle.
The GSMA’s Head of Climate Action, Steven Moore, said: “CommScope’s Outdoor Wireless Networks business and others signing up to use the GSMA Equipment Marketplace is a promising sign of the mobile industry’s desire to embrace circular business models. We welcome more operators and equipment manufacturers joining to help the industry cut carbon emissions and reduce the reliance on virgin materials in the coming years.”
Michael Wolfe, VP and CTO, CommScope, said: “Equipment manufacturers have a responsibility to lead by example and design products with adaptability and recyclability in mind, but even the most well-planned and engineered components eventually need upgrading. This does not mean they no longer have value; the GSMA Equipment Marketplace is a win-win-win, allowing us to extend solution lifecycles, maximise resource efficiency and minimise our environmental impact.”
The mobile industry’s path to net zero
In 2019, the GSMA Board set an ambition for the mobile sector to reach net zero carbon emissions by 2050. Achieving this target is reliant on the industry cutting its emissions to 45% below 2020 levels by 2030; this means overall emissions – including Scopes 1, 2 and 3 – need to fall by around 7% per year up to 2030.
While progress has been made – operators across Europe, North America, Latin America, the Middle East and North Africa reduced their Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 20-50% between 2019-22 – there remains a long way to go, particularly with regard to the industry’s Scope 3 supply chain emissions.
Increasing the circularity of network equipment and mobile devices is critical to reducing Scope 3 emissions, which represent three-quarters of the mobile industry’s overall carbon output. The GSMA estimates manufacturing network equipment and constructing network sites and mobile masts account for 30 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent per year; the GSMA Equipment Marketplace can help to reduce these figures by extending the life of network equipment through reuse and recycle.
In addition to the GSMA Equipment Marketplace, the GSMA announced two circularity targets last year focussed on extending the life of mobile phones. An estimated 85% of phones are not formally recycled, with the GSMA estimating over five billion mobile devices are currently sitting unused around the globe. The two targets aim to increase the number of devices collected through operator take-back schemes and prevent devices going to landfill or incineration; as of September 2024, 16 leading operators – including BT Group, Deutsche Telekom, NTT Docomo, Orange, Singtel, Telefónica and more – have signed up to the targets.
The GSMA will be hosting a fireside chat at MWC Las Vegas on Thursday 10th October, titled: “Circularity is the answer to your sustainability challenges.” During the session, Jason Smith and Shamit Bhat from GSMA will join speakers including Rebekah Griffiths from Assurant, Seth Heine from PrologMobile and Outdoor Wireless Networks’ Martin Zimmerman, to discuss where we stand on circularity and how their respective organisations are contributing towards this goal.
Learn more about the mobile industry’s climate action and circularity initiatives here.
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The GSMA is a global organisation unifying the mobile ecosystem to discover, develop and deliver innovation foundational to positive business environments and societal change. Our vision is to unlock the full power of connectivity so that people, industry, and society thrive. Representing mobile operators and organisations across the mobile ecosystem and adjacent industries, the GSMA delivers for its members across three broad pillars: Connectivity for Good, Industry Services and Solutions, and Outreach. This activity includes advancing policy, tackling today’s biggest societal challenges, underpinning the technology and interoperability that make mobile work, and providing the world’s largest platform to convene the mobile ecosystem at the MWC and M360 series of events.
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