Driving Sustainability: Lenovo Innovates With Bamboo Fiber and Ocean-Bound Plastic To Revolutionize Packaging

Originally published in Lenovo's 2023/24 ESG Report

Packaging

Packaging has been identified as a significant environmental aspect under Lenovo’s EMS. Its packaging priorities focus on reducing packaging consumption and waste by:

• Increasing the use of recycled and renewable materials in packaging
• Increasing the use of bio-based materials
• Reducing the size of product packaging
• Expanding the use of bulk and reusable packaging solutions

In FY 2023/24, Lenovo’s packaging objective was to minimize the material consumption of packaging while driving the use of more environmentally sustainable materials. Lenovo is intent on reducing the size of its packaging to minimize the materials used while maintaining adequate protection for its products.

Lenovo supports the above objective with a target to transition packaging to recycled materials or renewable materials, especially plant-based bamboo or sugar cane fibers. The use of bamboo or sugar cane fibers in select products marked the launch of a new era of packaging offerings for Lenovo, while also enhancing customer experience. Bamboo fiber has many favorable features, including:

• Sleek and robust design
• Lightweight
• 100 percent renewable

Lenovo’s packaging program requires all corrugated container packaging supplied to be a minimum of 70 percent post-consumer fiber content and requires suppliers to use the maximum available PCC where adequate supplies exist without compromising required packaging performance characteristics, while the printing on boxes is done via flexography with water-based, non-toxic, RoHS-compliant inks. In addition, Lenovo’s packaging program requires the use of Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified fibers in liners for all PC products when virgin fibers are used.

Since 2008, Lenovo has eliminated7 4,809 metric tons of packaging consumption by weight. In FY 2023/24 alone, Lenovo reduced⁷ packaging consumption by 672 metric tons.

_{⁷ These numbers reflect packaging innovations that resulted in reduced packaging weight for individual products. See Section 7.0 for additional metrics about total packaging use by year.}

In its operations, Lenovo uses reusable bulk packaging for the transportation of chassis to manufacturing locations.

Leading the way in innovative packaging

At Lenovo, packaging isn’t just a way to get finished devices from the manufacturing facility safely into the customers’ hands. It is an opportunity for the innovative packaging engineers and designers to consider innovations that could help reduce the environmental impact of packaging and logistics.

Bamboo fiber

Lenovo began using bamboo fiber in 2012 as packaging cushions. In 2022, a brand-new bamboo gift box was introduced to ThinkPad X1 and Z series. In 2023, the bamboo fiber packaging was expanded to all ThinkPad series (except the E series). It is made from 100 percent renewable bamboo fiber and the box weight is effectively reduced by 30 percent compared to the previous gift box.

All PC boxes contain at least 70 percent old corrugated containers⁸ (OCC) recycled content.

_{⁸ OCC contains both PCC and PIC contents}

Ocean bound plastic

Plastic pollution has negatively affected the ocean’s ecosystems and the marine animals who reside there. In 2019, the packaging team began researching the possibility of using ocean bound plastic (OBP) in product packaging. Based on repeated test results, the packaging team determined a mix of 30 percent OBP with 70 percent other recycled plastic had the best performance. Lenovo launched the first packaging cushion containing OBP (30 percent OBP and 70 percent other recycled plastics) in ThinkPad L14 packaging. In FY 2023/24, Lenovo expanded the use of OBP as thermoformed cushions or system bags for select desktop/AIO, consumer notebook, and server products. Lenovo estimates these new applications will use 165 metric tons of ocean bound plastic per year.

Plastic-free packaging

Lenovo aims to eliminate plastic materials from product packaging. By combining bamboo fiber technology, self-locking boxes, and other innovative technologies, the packaging team accomplished plastic-free primary packaging on ThinkPad X1 and Z series in FY 2022/23. In FY 2023/24, plastic-free primary packaging was expanded to all ThinkPad series (except the E series) and select smartphones. As a result, Lenovo eliminated 548 metric tons of plastic in packaging.

Results of Lenovo’s progress against its packaging targets are available in Section 8.0. Lenovo’s ESG KPIs include packaging KPIs, for more information see Section 9.0.

Read more