The 17 U.N. SDGs are an urgent call to action by all U.N. Member States. Adopted in 2015, they provide a blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet. Businesses must play their part in achieving these goals. Avnet is proud of our contributions toward the U.N. SDGs. To expand on the framework we created in FY20, Avnet took the following actions to continue contributing toward these goals.
Avnet’s FY21 Actions to Advance the U.N. SDGs
No poverty – End poverty in all its forms everywhere
Avnet believes that providing good jobs with fair wages is an effective step to end poverty. We ensure that employees in low- and middle-income countries are paid above local minimum wages or industry standards. This includes employees in India, Malaysia, Mexico and Serbia.Good Health and Well-Being – Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages
Ensuring healthy lives includes ensuring good mental health. In FY21, we expanded mental health support for employees as part of our Employee Assistance Program and THRIVE program. Our THRIVE program supports the whole person and offers employees resources, information, benefits and assistance in these interconnected areas to support overall health.
Looking to support healthy lives more broadly and globally, Avnet partnered with the U.N. Development Program, customers, and our extensive Hackster.io and element14 communities to leverage our design-to-supply chain capabilities and expertise to accelerate development, production and distribution of critical COVID-19 diagnostic, treatment and tracking applications.
The Hackster.io community partnered with the United Nations Development Program to launch the COVID-19 Detect & Protect Challenge. The initiative inspired nearly 2,500 engineers to build over 400 low-cost, easily replicable, open-source solutions to help fight the pandemic in the world’s most vulnerable communities. Hackster.io then connected with their ambassadors in Egypt, Ghana, Kenya, Sri Lanka, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda to deliver hardware, tools and fabrication machines to build and test the contest’s winning solutions. Each ambassador hosted hackathons, local maker events or small-scale production hubs to empower local businesses, health centers, and universities in the fight.
In FY21, element14 finished the Fighting Germs design challenge, aimed at engaging designers and engineers within its 800,000+-member community to slow the spread of COVID-19. The challenge netted a range of projects to fight COVID-19 and protect vulnerable populations, including touchless virtual buttons, authorized entry using face mask detection and a contact-free temperature checker.
Kamrul Hussain from Dhaka, Bangladesh, created a handheld device that enables continuous vital monitoring for COVID-19 survivors. Using Co2 and temperature sensors, the device sends vital health data to the cloud to facilitate telemedicine monitoring. This innovation eases the post-recovery process and makes homecare more manageable.
Hackster.io launched and ran a contest with Micron in FY20-21 in which participants developed all-autonomous robots that use different types of UV light sanitation methods. Fifty-eight projects were submitted, advancing better sanitization in offices, grocery stores, homes and more – autonomously. Each project submission listed the ultraviolet radiation dose and threshold limit value calculations, UV-C dose calculations, full spec sheet, safety feature breakdowns and more.
Over 630 participants from more than 60 countries entered the NXP HoverGames Challenge 2: Help Drones, Help Others During Pandemics. Participants were asked to build drone projects focused on a handful of recommended themes like surface sanitation, medication delivery, temperature checks and more. Their projects were required to use NXP’s official HoverGames drone kit and each design was to be fully documented and open source. Announced at the end of FY20, the competition ran during the first quarter of FY21 and was hosted on the Hackster.io HoverGames Challenge 2 page.
The Advanced Wearables contest challenged participants to build open-source wearable devices using Nordic Semiconductor’s ultra-low power nRF5340 DK board. The goal was to create solutions around one of two categories: smart wearables that encourage an active lifestyle or medical remote patient monitoring devices. The grand prize winner developed an Affordable Remote Baby Vitals Alert System which will alert caregivers in real-time to changes in a baby’s vitals while sleeping such as body temperature, breath and heart rate. The first prize winner for wearables for active lifestyle developed a Posture Watchdog to inform the wearer when they are exhibiting poor posture or they have been inactive for too long, and the first prize winner for remote patient monitoring devices innovated the EHM: Electrocardiography Holter Monitor which uses dry electrodes to monitor a patient's vitals from the comfort of their own home.
Gender Equality – Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls
We proudly celebrate and support women across all of Avnet’s regions and job functions since Avnet’s total workforce is 45% female. Employees around the world celebrated International Women’s Day by holding panel discussions and open conversations in the U.S., Mexico and Singapore.
The importance of gender equality in the electronics industry was discussed on an episode of Distributing Wisdom, a podcast series launched in conjunction with Avnet’s centennial celebration. The episode featured Avnet board member Brenda Freeman among other industry experts. Avnet is a company that recognizes the importance of diversity and the key role women play in business and society today.
Visit Avnet’s DEI programs page for more information.
Sustainable Cities and Communities – Make cities and human settlements, inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable
Through element14’s design challenges, many community members created projects to improve our built environment and cities.
Enrique Albertos from Fullcarga, Spain, created an IoT device that monitors gas density and controls windows to increase natural ventilation and prevent the spread of COVID-19. The device is a fine example of practical engineering and was designed to spark interest in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) and to be easily implemented in any classroom by teachers and students. His project received the grand prize from the recent “Design for a Cause 21” challenge.
Community members were challenged to create a sustainable smart farm in just one square meter (around 10 sq ft) of space with the idea that it could be used in an urban area, during a disaster or even in space. The winner of the contest, Bruno Santos from Portugal, integrated Twitter, time-lapse videos, and the Raspberry Pi camera to create an effective hydroponic garden. View all challenge winners.
Climate Action – Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impact
Avnet announced its carbon emission reduction goals this year and seeks to further impact climate change by advancing technology. Avnet collaborates with select customers to advance emission-savings technology. We also engage our wider community in this global challenge and run competitions to accelerate technology development.
We combined our industry-leading design capabilities and distribution services with Infineon's advanced CoolSiC™ technology and launched a global demand creation growth program for Infineon Technologies' silicon carbide power products. CoolSic reduces energy losses by 50% in energy storage systems and reduces charging times for electric vehicles by 50%.
Hackster.io challenged community members to develop climate change solutions by creating a proof-of-concept of an intelligent IoT edge solution. The challenge required users to use the QuickLogic QuickFeather Development Kit & SensiML Analytics Toolkit in their proof of concept to create a smart, low-power design.
Winning contest projects were:
- Forest Guardian – A low-power solar-run device that detects illegal logging of wood using acoustic data.
- Protect Peatlands for people and planet with help of SensiML – A solar powered sensor built using SensiML, Ubidots and Helium helps conserve peatlands by predicting early signs of drying, drought or fire.
- Illegal Logging Detector – A sensor that can detect a chainsaw and human voice in the forest.
- Optimization of HVAC Performance – A tool that adjusts and monitors the performance of home HVAC systems to improve energy efficiency.
- Birdbuddy – A bird migration tracker that enables better allocation of conservation resources.
- Breeze – A battery and solar-powered smart environmental sensor hub with machine learning capabilities that supports a wide variety of sensors and communication modules.
Hackster.io launched its “Fight Fires with Flyers” competition at the end of FY20 with NXP. The contest ran in early FY21, with over 100 developers using an NXP HoverGrames drone kit to find creative ways to assist firefighting, either in forests or in cities.
Life on Land – Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss
Avnet recognizes the challenges of conserving life on land and the rich biodiversity of our planet. Together with our partners and communities, we support the development of smart technology to address U.N. SDG 15.
An elephant is killed by poachers every 15 minutes. At this rate, they face extinction within the next decade. Since 2019, Smart Parks has deployed high-tech, smart tracking collars on wildlife in parks around the globe. Trackers provide crucial data on movement patterns, migration patterns and location of the animals. This data helps park rangers keep animals from dangerous territories in addition to protecting the surrounding human populations. In FY21, Hackster.io and SmartParks further developed the program they launched in FY20 by encouraging developers to build advanced machine learning models using Edge Impulse Studio dashboards and Avnet’s IoTConnect Platform, powered by Microsoft Azure. These solutions could assist park rangers in analyzing the data coming from the elephant collars and determine if a course of action is needed.
With contributions from wildlife organizations, participants had free access to data sets, machine learning applications, and Avnet’s IoTConnect Platform that facilitates device communication and management, data storage, and app creation. In total, the contest had 31 well-documented, qualified projects. Projects are displayed on the ElephantEdge contest page, where community members can continue to admire winning projects, learn about the initiative, and share with their peers.
Partnerships for the Goals – Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development
Avnet works in partnership with customers, suppliers and community members to advance solutions for the SDGs.
Projects ranged from an accessible bike for those with multiple sclerosis, remote telemedicine devices, robotic hands and an open source EMDR machine to help with stress and anxiety.
The challenge provided solutions ranging from smart farming and indoor hydroponics to robotic garbage collection. More than 230 trees were planted in honor of the challenge.
This challenge inspired projects that reduce waste by upcycling old products into something new.
