Our purpose and strategy
Connectivity and communication are the pillars on which our society and economy rest. However, connection goes further than connections between networks or the technologies with which we make contact. People’s lives ultimately revolve around the feeling of connection; with each other and with the things around us that are important, so that people, businesses and society can all move forward. Our purpose ties in with this: Enjoyment and progress with every connection.
Enjoyment, anytime, anyplace
At VodafoneZiggo, we build valuable connections, between people and for people. We do this in a society that never stands still, where appointments are less and less dependent on a specific time or place, and where communication, media and entertainment are available around the clock. Working, learning and relaxing: it’s all at your fingertips, anytime and anywhere.
We provide consumers with entertainment, such as television, sports, series and films. We help entrepreneurs on their way with impactful business operations, so that they can get more out of their business, work in a more customer-oriented way and invest their valuable time in their favourite activity: running a business. We offer our employees a pleasant working environment with a healthy, safe and inclusive culture.
Progress: investing in the digital future
The pace of innovation is rapid. New technological developments, such as artificial intelligence and robotisation, are taking off. This requires new ways of working and thinking, new techniques and the constant fine-tuning of our strategy.
In order to respond to these developments, a fast, reliable and future-proof network is necessary, as the Netherlands’ data needs are still growing exponentially. This is why we are always working on ways to improve our network to make it even more robust and smarter, with Internet speeds of up to 1 gigabit per second.
Connection: strengthening people and society
Since we are connecting so many people at so many different levels, we are happy to be responsible for making a beneficial contribution too. We utilise the power of technology to help people and to make society stronger.
At VodafoneZiggo, we create new chances and opportunities for people and companies. And where necessary, we help people to improve their digital skills, so that all social groups can reap the benefits of our current digital transformation.
Our strategy
We deliver added value to our customers by focusing on our purpose: enjoyment and progress with every connection. To fulfil that promise, our actions are based on four strategic pillars:
Live up to the customer promise
Putting the customer at the heart of everything we do. This is the promise that we make to our customers and that we want to fulfil anew each day. It means that we listen closely to our customers and work with them, in order to improve our existing products and services and to develop new ones. We want to meet – and preferably exceed – their expectations. This is true for all our consumers and business customers, from small to large. To ensure this, we launched a number of initiatives including‘The customer in our DNA’, in which we already place the customer centre stage with the recruitment and training of our employees. We also have the project ‘Existing customers first’, in which we respond to the needs of our loyal customers. We let them benefit from our bundled products and services in order to bind them to us longer.
Go digital
For VodafoneZiggo, digitisation is the most effective way of achieving further growth and remaining successful. This is why we adjusted our strategy in 2019 to make digitisation one of our four strategic pillars. We invest a lot of capital, energy and manpower to transform VodafoneZiggo into a digital company. Digitisation also means changing the mentality and way of working in our organisation. We distinguish four basic principles:
Customer-oriented approach: The customer experience is central to everything we do. Insight into customer needs is a condition for good and relevant products and services.
Choosing digital solutions: We opt - wherever possible - for digital solutions in everything we do and develop.
Better performance thanks to data: We use all available data to make the best choices and decisions.
Agile working: We work according to agile methods, which makes us more flexible and enables us to achieve results faster. We work in teams with colleagues from different disciplines and organisation units, i.e. ‘cross-functionally'.
Claim hero proposition
We do everything in our power to tailor our products and services to the demands of our customers. We focus on what our customers need, not on what we want to sell them. We deliver complete, innovative IoT solutions with which customers can achieve better operating results. Irrespective of their size, companies need dependable partners to guide them through their digital transformation process. In 2020, we started collaborating with IOT.nxt. This subsidiary of Vodafone Group helps us to meet the needs of our customers on a much larger scale. We also introduced the Mediabox Next set-top box and launched the TV channel Ziggo Sport Tennis. Before we launch new products onto the market, we test and discuss them extensively with our customers.
Invest for the future
We are constantly trying to improve our networks and expand our content strategy. We will continue to invest in the coming years to ensure that our networks are faster, more reliable and future-proof. In addition to investing in our networks, we also recognise that we must invest in a more sustainable future. This is why we launched our new Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) strategy in 2020, in which we set out our social and sustainable ambitions for 2025.
Our People, Planet, Progress strategy and results
VodafoneZiggo is a daily presence in the lives of millions of people and we are proud of the positive influence that our products and services have on society. However, our ambitions and responsibilities go beyond this. In addition to offering added value via our technology, we also want it to make our day-to-day work even more social and sustainable. This is why earlier this year, we introduced our new CSR strategy under the title ‘People, Planet, Progress’. This sets out our ambitions for 2025: to halve our environmental impact and to help two million people move forward in society.
We do not view CSR as a separate project, but as an integral part of our entire strategy and business operations, as something that is high on the agenda with all our people. We devote attention to urgent social issues, such as climate change, waste and inclusion. We do this based on five strategic pillars:
In order to gain a better grip on our impact, we measure that on the basis of various indicators and in relation to our ambitions for 2025. We use the insights to increase our positive impact on society and to reduce our negative impact on the environment. In 2020, we achieved 8% of our ambition to help two million people move forward in the period 2020-2025. In addition, in 2020 we were able to reduce our environmental impact by 29% compared to our baseline measurement. The accompanying illustration shows the most important CSR results and activities in 2020 for each strategic pillar.
Sustainable Development Goals
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are the 17 goals that were created by the United Nations in 2015 in order to make the world a better place by 2030. The SDGs were agreed by all the countries that are members of the United Nations (UN), including the Netherlands. The goals were created using input from organisations and individuals all over the world and are seen as a global compass for such challenges as poverty, education and the climate crisis. They are the successors to the Millennium Development Goals, which were in force from 2000 to 2015.
We are very aware that our business activities affect both the environment and society. This is why we take our share of the responsibility for achieving a sustainable, circular economy and a fair chain. In 2018, we selected a number of SDGs for the first time to which we wanted to make an active contribution. In 2019, we expanded this to eight SDGs, which are linked to our People, Planet, Progress strategy. Our CSR Committee took this step in consultation with our parent companies.
We not only want to gain insight into the impact that we achieve with our own operations, but also into the impact we achieve via our customers and employees. Therefore, we have also linked our activities and results to the Sustainable Development Goals. In addition, the SDGs are part of our Green Bond Framework.
