Sustainability, the Green digital rating from the University of Milan Bicocca arrives

A new sustainability rating that adds technology to the three traditional dimensions. This is the Green digital rating, developed by Brightseed, a spin-off of the Bicocca University of Milan. "It is not enough for a company to adopt new technologies if it does not know what its goals are. Tech in this case becomes just an extra cost and not a lever to create a competitive advantage. The same applies to sustainability, which is often perceived by companies as a mere compliance requirement. A change of approach is needed. We need a paradigm shift': presenting the Green digital rating was Alice Mazzucchelli, associate professor of economics and business management at Bicocca University and co-founder of Brightseed.

The rating is concretely translated into four areas of investigation: Profit, Proof, People, Purpose. In the Profit area, the governance of the company and its effectiveness are assessed above all, as well as its financial sustainability and balance sheet indicators. In the Proof area, data collection is measured in various areas: among other things, adherence to the European Gdpr regulation of digital channels, privacy compliance, and digital advertising tracking systems are assessed; in addition, the integration and effectiveness of the brand's digital channels is analysed. People, on the other hand, refers to the assessment of brand awareness and thus the brand's online reputation; in parallel, brand reputation is analysed. Finally, there is the Purpose investigation area, which studies and measures the social and environmental sustainability of the company.

The presentation of the Green digital rating took place as part of a series of meetings organised by the Inter-University Research Centre in Economics of the Territory (Criet) established in 2006 within the Bicocca University. The 2025-2027 Criet meetings aim to "promote research," reads a note, "that, from different points of observation and fields that are sometimes very different from each other, contributes to exploring how sustainability can be integrated into different business models to create value for companies and their markets.

This work is also important because the driving force of sustainability has come to a halt in Italy, as the experts emphasised during the meeting.

Ten years have passed since the sustainability boom. '2015 was the crucial year in Italy,' recalled Andrea Alemanno, head of public affairs and corporate reputation at Ipsos. 'There was the turning point in terms of the level of knowledge of the concept of sustainability. Then the growth stopped. Currently only one third of Italians know very well what sustainability means'.