Wärtsilä creates optimal paths towards 100% renewable energy systems. Our objective is for customers to recognise the company as the leading energy systems integrator, providing all the essential technologies, services, and solutions for sustainable and reliable power systems.

The energy market landscape is in transition and is moving towards more flexible energy systems with a rapidly increasing share of renewable energy, declining inflexible baseload generation, and wider applications of storage technology. The declining cost of renewables has begun to reduce new investments in coal and other inflexible baseload technologies, and this transition will eventually enable renewables to become the new baseload, which will require flexibility and storage to ensure reliable generation.

Our solutions are at the very core of the energy systems of the future. We understand the role that different technologies play in our customers’ power systems, and enhance the assets of the customer through software, Engineering, Procurement, Construction

EPC offerings, and global service capabilities. Wärtsilä’s engine power plants act as a stepping stone for the ongoing energy industry transition, and provide a unique combination of energy efficiency, and fuel and operational flexibility throughout all its phases. Our energy storage and integration solutions handle second and daily level variations in supply, which is the key for renewables penetration.

Wärtsilä provides asset and lifecycle management services that optimise the performance of our customers’ installations through upgrades, modernisations, fuel conversions, and safety solutions. Asset Management targets energy supply reliability and optimisation. With connectivity, we optimise asset performance throughout the lifecycle and provide strategic input to customers in order to enhance their business growth through smart technologies. Asset management will drive future growth in lifecycle solutions and enable new "as-a-service" business models. To secure future growth and profitability, the main focus will be on optimising the current business and building a solid foundation for developing future business models.

Wärtsilä’s aim is to lead the industry’s transformation towards a Smart Marine Ecosystem. Building on the sound foundation of being a leading provider of innovative products, integrated solutions, and lifecycle services to the marine and oil & gas industries, we aim to unlock new customer values through connectivity, digitalisation, and smart technology.

The marine industry is moving towards a future that is increasingly connected. The opportunities offered through smart technology will foster a new era of collaboration and knowledge sharing with customers, suppliers, and partners. Industry players are faced with major sources of inefficiency that impose a significantly negative impact on business operations and profitability, the three most notable of these being overcapacity, inadequate port-to-port fuel efficiency, and time wasted waiting when entering ports and other high traffic areas. Eliminating these inefficiencies forms the basis of Wärtsilä’s marine strategy towards ecosystem thinking. We have identified four primary forces that will re-shape the industry. Shared capacity will improve fill rates and reduce unit costs; big data analytics will optimise both operations and energy management; intelligent vessels will enable automated and optimised processes; and smart ports will result in smoother and faster port operations.

Wärtsilä is ideally positioned, together with its customers and partners, for positive disruptive development and to lead the transformation into a new era of shipping. Building on our extensive offering portfolio, and our vast installed base and industry know-how, we will continue to develop the smart technologies, business models, and competences needed to create a Smart Marine Ecosystem.

By applying smart technology and performance optimisation services, Wärtsilä aims to deliver greater efficiencies, minimised climate impact, and a higher level of safety to the shipping industry. This will result in more sustainable, safe, and profitable operations for ship owners and operators around the world. The ultimate goal is to enable sustainable societies with smart technologies.

Economic
Wärtsilä aims to meet shareholder expectations and contribute towards the well-being of society. This requires efficient, profitable, and competitive company operations. Good economic performance establishes a platform for the other aspects of sustainability – environmental and social responsibility.

Environment
Wärtsilä's aim is to be a forerunner in sustainable innovation and furthermore reduce emissions in our customer’s operations and in societies overall. Wärtsilä supplies smart technologies and services that help to mitigate climate change and protect our oceans and seas. We continuously work on achieving high environmental standards in our operations, and improving the environmental performance and efficiency of our products and solutions through R&D, collaboration, partnerships, and active engagement in ecosystems. In doing this, we help our customers and society at large to meet the goals of the tightening global environmental regulations and guidelines.

Social
We have high ethical standards and we care about the communities in which we operate. Our business operations and relations with our stakeholders are governed by our Code of Conduct. Wärtsilä is a responsible employer, and we seek to offer our employees an interesting and exciting workplace where openness, respect, trust, equal opportunities, and scope for personal development prevail. A further aim is to offer a hazard-free working environment to our employees and contractors, and to minimise the health and safety risks associated with the use of our products and services. Through effective supply chain management and continuous development we strive to ensure that our values expressed in the Code of Conduct are promoted in our whole value chain.

Wärtsilä introduced several new concepts and solutions during 2018 to support the realisation of its strategy. The launch of the Smart Energy vision, which emphasises leading the industry’s transformation towards a future that utilises 100% renewable energy with flexible capacity as the enabler, was followed up by the introduction of new solutions for the integration of renewables and storage. The expansion of renewable energy was evidenced with major contracts awarded to Wärtsilä from Australia and the USA. In the marine industry, the acquisition of Transas was a key step in further strengthening Wärtsilä’s offering of smart solutions. Significant advances made in intelligent shipping included the successful testing of an automated dock-to-dock concept, and a project launched for developing a harbour tug with autonomous navigation.

Collaboration and knowledge sharing, both within the Group and externally with partners, suppliers and customers, is central for developing the smart technologies needed to meet the changing market requirements. In this context, the decision to build a new centre for research, development and production in Vaasa, Finland was a key milestone of the year.

The focus on digitalising Wärtsilä’s operations and customer offering continued. During the year, Wärtsilä opened an Acceleration Centre in Singapore with the aim of promoting innovation and collaboration with industry, academia, and local partners to strengthen and develop Singapore’s maritime ecosystem. Wärtsilä also announced a partnership with the cyber security company Templar Executives to establish a cyber academy offering courses designed to support and enhance the collective cyber maturity of the wider shipping community. The partnership introduced MCERT, an international cyber intelligence and incident support platform that enhances cyber resilience for the maritime ecosystem.

To promote a high performance culture, Wärtsilä has continued its leadership development programmes in many areas. Since the launch of the Operational Excellence Academy in 2016, nearly 2,000 managers and employees have participated in operational excellence learning modules. The academy was established to ensure that continuous improvement becomes an integrated part of the company culture and way of working. During the year Wärtsilä launched the company culture initiative Leap and the WeLeap app to accelerate the developments of digital competencies throughout the company. Since its introduction in June, the online learning portal has had over 3,300 users. Furthermore, with particular attention to the ongoing digital transformation, a new recruitment system was taken into use with the aim of attracting new talent, improving the candidates’ experience, and promoting Wärtsilä’s employer brand. MyVoice, Wärtsilä’s employee engagement survey, was also updated to better meet the company’s needs. The renewed survey emphasises engagement and motivation, and is completely online and available on mobile devices.

The health and safety of personnel is a priority for Wärtsilä, and zero lost-time injuries continues to be the company’s global target. After successive years of improvement in this area, the lost-time injury frequency for the year 2018 increased slightly to 2.50 (2.48). Further strengthening safety leadership within the company has been an area of focus, and by the end of the year 3,200 Wärtsilä leaders had completed a full day safety leadership workshop. The fourth global Safety Day was arranged under the theme ‘On the Road’, with the aim of raising awareness of risks and supporting employees in making safer choices when travelling.