CEO Letter
LWSA’s ESG agenda is intrinsically connected to the positive impact of its actions on both the Company’s performance and on its employees and customers, as well as on society. We are currently inserted in an environment in which sustainability is pursued on several fronts, which requires us, as a group, to cultivate an essential cultural trait of strategic clarity and to remain focused on achieving solid corporate management. With this bias, we believe to be able to create beneficial and lasting impacts on the environmental, social and governance pillars.
We have a comprehensive ESG vision, which is grounded on the United Nations (UN) 2030 Agenda, a global sustainability benchmark for people, companies and governments. We have set several goals to our Company: in the environmental pillar, our goal is to be a carbon neutral company; in the social pillar, our goals include to achieve equal pay and f ight disparities through quality education; while, in the governance pillar, our goal is to map 100% of our supply chain. All our actions are aligned with these goals and are detailed in this annual report.
In addition to moving forward and seeking improvements in all areas, our current challenge is to standardize ESG practices for the entire group, after an intense and careful process to integrate dozens of companies acquired since 2020. This process has led to our brand repositioning in 2023, when we dropped the Locaweb Company name and became LWSA.
Our efforts on the ESG agenda start with the commitment of the Company’s senior management, which defines and implements guidelines; are coordinated by the ESG Executive Office and cascaded down to all our employees. These are initiatives designed to encourage those who are involved in LWSA’s daily operations to think about and truly engage in sustainable practices in favor of the group and society. Just like innovation, which is fundamental to the dynamism of our technology market, ESG principles must be practiced by the entire group, at all levels, in order to be effective.
The year 2023 was marked by great progress in the environmental pillar, towards our ambitious goal of being a carbon neutral company. We have mapped scope 3 in our greenhouse gas (GHG) inventory for the first time. The inventoried emissions from 2022 were offset through the purchase of carbon credits. This path is relevant for our sector, in which achieving net zero emissions of certain types of greenhouse gases is a challenge due to the nature of our operations.
Meanwhile, in 2023, we were able to purchase 100% of the energy to supply our headquarters and data center from renewable sources. This is an essential step, considering that our greatest environmental impact lies in the high consumption of electricity, especially due to constant need for and use of cooling for our own data center.
People are the greatest asset in the technology sector. This premise was crucial when integrating the acquired companies, protecting and developing the greatest asset we brought to our company. Moreover, it is a guideline so that, at the end of each working day, LWSA’s more than 3,800 employees feel part of our business and happy to work focused on offering the best technological solutions for the development of companies of different sizes and branches.
Our people management involves innovative procedures for attracting and retaining talent, as well as promoting professional and leadership development, all of which are detailed throughout this report. Mindful of the inherent characteristic of the technology industry, which faces a shortage of labor, we have been working more and more, including by entering into external partnerships, on robust training programs. This turns LWSA into a real school, creating internal impacts in terms of productivity, efficiency and innovation, as well as social and economic impacts.
After five years of implementation, our Inclusion and Diversity (I&D) strategy is advanced in the sector and has received relevant external recognition. This drives us to continue monitoring and improving processes through the I&D Census, which has been taken since 2019. We must highlight the progress made in the Women and LGBTQIAPN+ pillars. Between 2022 and 2023, female representation in our workforce increased by 0.7 p.p. and 3.2 p.p. of leadership positions are held by women, reaching 39.1% of the total workforce, according to HR’s active employee data base. In the 2023 Census, 20% of our staff self-reported as LGBTQIAPN+.
In order to direct our investments effectively, we launched the 2023 Private Social Investment Guidelines and Assumptions.
After the publication of this document, incentives have been directed towards projects aligned with the 2030 goals set by the Company, guaranteeing strategic social investments that link our business model to our purposes.
Since the IPO, we have been listed on B3’s Novo Mercado, the highest corporate governance segment in Brazil, which, combined with periodic internal and external audits, and practices carried out from even before we became public, allows us to conduct reliable risk management and tax control processes as well as follow ethical and integrity procedures.
With an extensive ESG agenda, driven by our senior management’s full commitment and accelerated by demands from the market and our employees, we believe we are well positioned to respond to the immense challenge of creating significant impacts for environmental sustainability and social and economic development, through solid, long-term management.