Designing Your Circular Business Model

To accomplish this transformation, corporate leaders rely on four circular business strategies: using less material per product (narrowing resource loops), extending product life (slowing resource loops), reusing materials (closing resource loops), and reviving natural resources used in production processes (regenerating resource loops).1 These strategies enable corporations to cut costs, enhance their reputation, and spur new product and market development.2 Many, however, have experienced a host of managerial challenges in their transition to a circular business model.3 Drawing on more than a decade of our experience researching sustainable and circular business model innovation and more than 200 interviews with managers of corporations leading on sustainability, we have found that corporations in the process of designing a circular business model face questions around market desirability, technical feasibility, and business viability. [...]far, the company has reduced its emissions by 49 percent in comparison to its 1990 level. [...]they need to determine whether these strategies are technically and operationally achievable. [...]they must weigh whether these strategies make financial sense.