Credit: SES

Luxembourg satellite company SES today announced that it has joined the United Nations (UN) Global Compact, the world’s largest corporate sustainability initiative, underscoring the company's purpose-led Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) programme.

By committing to the UN Global Compact framework, SES is now firmly aligning its long-standing societal and environmental impact efforts to the company’s purpose (doing the extraordinary in space to deliver amazing experiences everywhere on earth) and delivering on its ambitions to provide cloud-enabled, satellite-based intelligent connectivity and to make a difference worldwide.

The UN Global Compact is a corporate initiative that encourages both business and non-business organisations to establish and define strategies, policies and procedures aligned with the ten principles of the Global Compact. SES is well aligned with these principles and will report on their execution.

Since SES’s establishment in Luxembourg in 1985, it has tried to make a difference to people’s lives worldwide by:

  • delivering content, especially breaking news and sports event, over satellite TV;
  • enabling people and businesses in remote areas to stay connected through high-performance data services that directly affect health, education and economic outcomes;
  • allowing crews and passengers at sea and in the skies to be connected at all times no matter where they are;
  • providing governments with robust, resilient and secure networks for their operations and missions;
  • restoring communications networks in disaster-stricken areas.   

Under this new commitment, SES will evaluate its existing ESG activities while aligning them with the company’s purpose and ambitions, as well as with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), to ensure that SES is making the necessary positive social and environmental impact on the world.

SES will also develop a formal impact strategy that will determine how to adopt best-in-class ESG policies while delivering services to its customers. It will produce ESG reports that adhere to international standards to highlight the extent of SES’s impact.

Steve Collar, CEO of SES, commented: “Whether through supporting education, remote health, disaster response, connecting populations or simply delivering entertainment, we are driven to leverage the best innovation in space to make life better for people here on the ground. Our team’s passion for making a positive difference in the world makes joining the UN Global Compact Initiative a straight-forward choice for SES and underscores our commitment to operating in the most sustainable and responsible way across our entire business".