Edinburgh-based Codbod taps £700m green data market

By SCOTT REID
Published on 01/07/2012 00:00

A PAIR of entrepreneurs will this month push the button on a “cloud” computing-based venture that aims to help smaller companies improve their green credentials and cut costs.

Codbod – the brainchild of Dr Michael Groves, a 20-year veteran of the “eco” sector – is also looking to tap into the growing market for environmental data management and software, estimated to be worth some £700 million in the UK alone this year.

Edinburgh-based Groves, who is being joined by co-founder and web developer Gordon Cowtan, said companies were waking up to the need for careful monitoring of their waste, water, energy and recycling requirements, amid a backdrop of sharply rising costs. However, many firms, particularly at the SME end of the size scale, lacked the internal resources to address those issues, he added.

The new web-based service aims to offer an effective “one-stop shop” for the management of environmental data. It promises “transparent” pricing with the service able to be scaled up for larger companies.

Groves, who is also a co-founder of Totseat, a baby product company that manufactures in China and exports to more than 40 countries, is confident the venture can push beyond Scotland.

The commercial launch follows a pilot with seven Scottish companies during the past year, as well as some support from Zero Waste Scotland. Those firms included Macsween, the haggis maker.

“There is greater scrutiny on all companies in terms of their environmental performance,” Groves said.

“Smaller companies can often lack the resources to manage this stuff as they don’t tend to have full-time environmental or sustainability people.

“They can sometimes struggle to pull together the data which can end up in several different places.

“We have created something cloud-based where they can input all of this data and can see it all. It’s as real-time as you can make it.”

Groves added: “The strategy is to grow this out internationally and acquire and develop specialist applications for the likes of waste/water management, auditing and resource management.”

The venture is focused on a core market of companies already committed to environmental management but which are operating in sectors and supply chains where there is greater pressure to disclose performance.

Those industries include the likes of food and drink, oil and gas, and chemical production, noted Groves, who also lectures on environmental sustainability.

“Uniquely, we treat the data as ‘spatial’ so that all of the environmental assets and impacts are mapped, which offers great insight into what is going on in the business and across its supply chain,” he said.

“When a sustainability report is published it becomes a historic document but with this they can keep the narrative up to date.”