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On June 4, 2025, the CSR, EHS and responsible finance ecosystem came together at the Tennaxia Connect event. Customers, experts, partners and sustainable development managers from major groups and ETIs shared their feedback, convictions and ambitions around the sustainable transformation of companies. This year's event was marked by a growing demand for coherence between extra-financial performance and global strategy, with a common watchword: take the time to act concretely and over the long term.
Through conferences, round tables and workshops, discussions converged on a clear message: sustainability cannot be decreed, it must be piloted with method, data and convictions.
Sustainable finance: extra-financial information becomes one of the pillars of risk analysis
The event opened with a round-table discussion highlighting the growing role of sustainable finance. Regulations such as the European taxonomy, the SFDR and the CSRD have brought about normative pressure, but above all a strong expectation of cultural transformation within companies.
Financial players are thus massively reorienting their assessment tools. Henceforth, it is no longer a question of "ticking boxes", but of understanding whether the company is capable of steering its sustainability trajectory.
"Extra-financial risk has become financial risk", insisted Xavier Leroy, Head of Advisory and Solutions at Ethifinance. He pointed out that companies with the best ESG ratings achieve up to 10% additional stock market performance.
Extra-financial data is therefore becoming a criterion for access to financing: without credible ESG reporting, there can be no preferential terms. As Anthony Sinna, Head of Sustainable Finance at LCL, points out, banks have understood this, and are introducing climate and ESG scores in their credit committees. It's not an option: it's a criterion of resilience, a signal of strategic maturity.
A consensus has emerged: non-financial data is as essential to decision-making as financial data. Reliability, comparability and meaning are the pillars of a system that must serve as a strategic compass. But above all, this data must initiate action.
But beware of side effects. As Philippe Kunter, Director of Sustainable Development at Bpifrance, pointed out, VSEs and SMEs sometimes struggle to keep up. He therefore emphasized the need to adapt analysis grids, to enable smaller companies to embark on their sustainable transformation without abandoning their high standards. The real challenge is cultural: to make CSR a lever for internal transformation, at the service of long-term strategy.
Circular economy: from waste treatment to resource creation
"Waste is no longer a constraint, it's an industrial opportunity".
In recent years, waste management has been repositioned at the heart of companies' industrial and environmental strategies. The circular economy is no longer an ecological fad, but a lever for value creation. This transformation has been achieved thanks to the determination of companies and the innovation of players in the waste industry. Using concrete examples, Silvia Bonilla, International Sustainable Development Manager at Séché Environnement, Jihan Mansouri, QHSE Director at Veolia Propreté Industries et Services and Céline Ratanavanh, Head of the Circular Economy Division at Groupement Les Mousquetaires, demonstrated that the circular economy is accelerating at an unprecedented rate.
A particularly eloquent figure illustrates this trend: today, 50% of waste is recovered, compared with just 10% 40 years ago.
Our speakers were able to highlight the importance oftechnological innovation in meeting increasingly specific needs, as well as the growing importance of reuse. To ensure the development of this sector, they insisted on the role of traceability, which is becoming key, as well as that of eco-design of products, thought out from their creation to anticipate their second life. An argument that reinforces the idea of integrated, comprehensive management of the corporate value chain.
In conclusion, our speakers reminded us that the logistical and industrial effort required to improve waste sorting and recovery should not be underestimated, as it ultimately translates into a gain for the environment as well as for the company.
Piloting decarbonation: from data to localized action
Successful decarbonization is based on three stages: measurement, modeling and action.
Using concrete examples, Melissa Dahdouh, Climate Project Manager at Sodexo, illustrated the importance of territorialized governance, with country representatives responsible for adapting action plans to local realities. To involve top management more closely in the implementation of these plans, one of the methods raised was to incentivize them according to the results obtained.
Sébastien Mandron, CSR Director at Worldline, also identified life cycle assessment (LCA) as a key element in measuring the GHG emissions generated by their activity, enabling them to better understand the uses of their products and the emissions generated throughout the value chain.
As part of the implementation of a decarbonization plan within the company, the two speakers agreed on the need to prioritize actions according to a multi-criteria matrix combining costs, feasibility and GHG impact.
They also pointed out thata decarbonization strategy depends in particular on the uses and needs expressed by end-users, as technology alone cannot bring about transformation. For example, in the payments sector, user choices (paper ticket, plastic card, terminal, etc.) account for up to 90% of emissions. We therefore need to educate users so that they are fully aware not only of the impact generated by their consumption patterns, but also of the alternatives available to them to reduce this impact.
To go further, download the replay of our webinar on decarbonation trajectories 👇
Responsible purchasing: thinking beyond rank 1
Sabine Jean-Dubourg, consultant at The A Lab, led a participative workshop with Mélanie Deal, ESG Project Director at Tennaxia, on the theme of "Responsible purchasing at the heart of CSR strategy".
The workshop provided an opportunity to redefine the very notion ofresponsible purchasing, and to reiterate the need to extend risk analysis beyond direct suppliers, to include critical links in the value chain.
Sabine Jean-Dubourg pointed out that 70% of environmental risks are now hidden in the indirect supply chain. Regulations (CSRD, CSDDD) encourage suppliers to map their environmental risks... but not always at the right level.
"Outsourcing does not mean outsourcing risk," she reminded us.
Buyers must therefore become resilience players, able to co-construct with their suppliers, to assess vulnerabilities in order to anticipate risks, whether environmental, social or economic.
Among the solutions mentioned, multi-sourcing, evaluating suppliers according to their environmental vulnerability, and understanding the cost of inaction are priorities for securing a company's sustainable performance.
Embedded CSR: governance, culture and mobilization
Air France Industries, Bosch and many of Tennaxia's customers share a common challenge: how to implement a global CSR strategy in a complex, matrix-based organization?
Jessie Delbe, Program Manager Sustainability at Air France Industries, and Nicolas Hamm, EHS Coordinator - CSR France and Benelux at Bosch France, highlighted the complexity of deploying a Group CSR strategy at local level. Setting up networks of ambassadors, local leadership, training and empowering management are the keys to anchoring issues in employees' daily lives.
Strategy is not enough: it has to be made desirable and actionable. This requires internal relays, incentives, sustainability committees and alignment with the operational realities of the sites.
The result is a better understanding of the issues at stake, as well as smoother feedback of weak signals and best practices.
AI & CSR: between potential and vigilance
To conclude the day, Patrick Nollet, CPTO at Tennaxia, explored the advantages and disadvantages of using artificial intelligence in CSR initiatives.
At the crossroads of technological fascination and ethical caution, the presentation reminded us that, despite its promises, the uses of artificial intelligence need to be refocused on real utility and concrete impact in organizations.
AI, it's not news, requires a huge amount of resources to operate. A single query can generate up to 50 g of CO₂eq. Yet these resources (investment, surface area, energy, water, low-carbon electricity) compete directly with those needed for ecological transition.
We must be careful not to fall into the seductive traps that AI seems to allow (reports generated without reliable data, gimmicky chatbots, or AI "over-labeled" for basic functions). And while certain use cases are promising (creation of dashboards, regulatory analysis, consolidation of narratives), major questions still remain: AI's carbon footprint, bias in the answers provided, data security, technological divide...
To conclude, AI can certainly be a gas pedal, but it will never replace human discernment or strategic alignment. It must remain a tool, not an end in itself.
Conclusion
Tennaxia Connect 2025 reaffirmed a strong conviction: it's time to align strategy, finance, data and action in a sustainable way. Non-financial performance can no longer be dissociated from a company's overall performance. It is its reflection, and increasingly, its driving force. We would like to extend our warmest thanks to all our speakers for the richness of their testimonials, the quality of their discussions and the authenticity of their commitment. Many thanks also to all the participants for their active presence, their pertinent questions and their contribution to this collective dynamic.