LONDON, 12 October 2022 - Sage, the leader in accounting, financial, HR and payroll technology for small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs), today announces that it has completed the acquisition of Spherics, a carbon accounting solution to help businesses easily understand and reduce their environmental impact.
The acquisition reinforces Sage’s commitment to sustainability, in line with its purpose of knocking down barriers so everyone can thrive. Sage has pledged to fight climate change and help protect the planet, by halving its own emissions by 2030 and becoming net zero by 2040, by supporting SMBs to get to net zero, and by advocating for policy and regulatory frameworks to support the transition to a low carbon economy.
Spherics automates the process of calculating emissions by ingesting data from a customer’s accounting software and matching transactions to emission factors to create an initial estimate of their carbon footprint. The software then guides the customer to refine this estimate by submitting further data for a more accurate calculation - supporting SMBs on their journey to net zero.
Spherics also helps SMBs apply carbon emission factors to procurement categories (such as delivery, accommodation, electricity and travel) to estimate the associated carbon footprint of a transaction. This approach supports customers with spend-based analysis and aligns with the Greenhouse Gas Protocol, the globally agreed standard for measuring carbon emissions.
“We know that SMBs care about the impact they have on the environment, and our research shows that they want to work with suppliers and partners that can help them understand and address it,” said Amaya Souarez, EVP Cloud Operations, Sage. “The acquisition of Spherics represents an important milestone in our sustainability strategy. By combining Spherics’ innovative software with Sage's digital network, we are connecting businesses with their customer and supplier emissions data, enabling easy and collaborative climate action across value chains which helps to reduce carbon.”
“Our vision and mission align very much with Sage’s core values, and we are excited to embark on this new journey to help SMBs knock down barriers to a more sustainable future. Global emissions are still rising fast, and we need immediate and meaningful climate action across the world,” said George Sandilands, CEO & Co-founder, Spherics. “Together with Sage we can help make a global impact on greenhouse gas emissions by supporting SMBs on their journey to net zero.”
“A company’s ability to integrate sustainability metrics into its growth strategy and to demonstrate its sustainability credentials transparently is becoming a strong differentiator globally,” said Mickey North Rizza, Group Vice President, Enterprise Software, IDC. “We see companies moving towards more integrated, outcome-driven ways of incorporating sustainability into every step of the business life cycle, and our studies show that organisations are investing in many application areas directly related to sustainability and ESG initiatives. In particular, the applications of supply chain, finance, and ERP are at the top of this investment with some of the largest benefits of elevated productivity, increased profitability, and decreased costs."
Headquartered in Bristol, United Kingdom, Spherics will continue to be available as a market solution that integrates with Sage and other accounting software providers in the UK.
David Ginivan, Corporate PR
James Sandford, Investor Relations
Telephone: +44 (0) 7807 702 113
Conor McClafferty
Sophia Johnston
Telephone:+44 (0) 20 7251 3801
Sage exists to knock down barriers so everyone can thrive, starting with the millions of small- and mid-sized businesses served by us, our partners and accountants. Customers trust our finance, HR and payroll software to make work and money flow. By digitising business processes and relationships with customers, suppliers, employees, banks and governments, our digital network connects SMBs, removing friction and delivering insights. Knocking down barriers also means we use our time, technology, and experience to tackle digital inequality, economic inequality and the climate crisis. Learn more at www.sage.com/en-gb/
Spherics, based in Bristol, UK, has built and owns a software platform that quickly and clearly measures an organisation's carbon emissions, including those of its suppliers, using analysis of existing data held in the client organisation’s accounting software. Using this method provides highly reliable data streams, minimises the need for consultancy teams and allows more resource to be focused on managing and mitigating emissions. With Spherics, organisations can meet science-based emissions targets more effectively by integrating them into day-to-day business processes. Spherics launched in 2020 and was awarded grant funding through Innovate UK’s Sustainable Innovation Fund in 2020, the same year Spherics was recognised as the best in early-stage UK-based climate tech business winning Tech Nation’s “Net Zero” award. Committed to advancing the interests of shareholders, alongside the wider need of society and the environment, it became B Corp Certified in 2022 and is a signatory of the Better Business Act. Learn more at www.spherics.io
Give Feedback