As global e-waste continues to grow, businesses are under increasing pressure to manage technology more responsibly while balancing costs, performance and operational needs. In response, many may turn to new equipment, expensive initiatives or high-profile sustainability campaigns.
However, organizations can often make meaningful progress by improving how they manage the technology they already own. Below, members of Forbes Technology Council share practical ways companies can reduce e-waste—and reap business benefits—through smarter operational decisions and more intentional technology management.
Give Aging Hardware A Second Life
Instead of selling hardware to a third party or putting it up on the open market, we first offer aging hardware to our employees at deeply reduced prices. For personal use, or for a child, these devices can be more than sufficient. It reduces the number of new devices needed, reuses an existing device longer, and creates goodwill with employees. – Luke Wallace, Bottle Rocket
Reclaim Idle Devices Before Buying More
Make hardware utilization a budget metric. If a laptop, phone, monitor or test device sits unused for 60 days, it goes back to a shared pool before any team can buy new. E-waste often begins as hoarding, not disposal. Reclaiming idle assets cuts waste, spend and unnecessary procurement at the same time. – Pawan Anand, Persistent Systems
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Rethink Default Upgrade Cycles
Businesses should extend technology lifecycles instead of treating upgrades as a default operating model. In procurement, I’ve seen organizations replace usable hardware simply because support contracts or vendor incentives encourage it. Better repair policies, modular upgrades and longer vendor accountability can reduce e-waste far more effectively than sustainability branding alone. – Prajkta Waditwar, Box Inc.
Prioritize Repairability Over Depreciation
Standardize internal hardware refresh cycles around repairability and redeployment, not depreciation schedules. Most companies retire laptops and phones on a 24- to 36-month accounting clock, even though devices still have years of useful life. Extending lifecycles through certified repair and internal reissue cuts e-waste meaningfully without buying anything new. – Agung Dwi Sandi, rankpillar Group
Check Utilization Before Replacing Equipment
Monitor utilization before you replace anything. Most upgrades are reflexive, not needed. Track how laptops are actually used and upgrade only the components that are bottlenecked. Buy for upgradability, and run light operating systems like Linux to extend usable life. Follow the same logic in the data center: Right-size hardware to real load instead of throwing new servers at software inefficiency. Make what you own earn its keep. – Diptamay Sanyal
Audit Stored Assets Before Purchasing More
Audit what you actually need. Most companies have drawers full of cables, adapters and spare monitors nobody uses. Before buying anything, check what’s already sitting in storage. A simple internal inventory system saves money and keeps perfectly good equipment from ending up in a landfill because nobody knew it existed. – Marc Fischer, Dogtown Media LLC
Build Waste Reduction Into Procurement
Start at procurement, not disposal. Businesses that buy standardized, repairable hardware from vendors with documented parts availability generate less waste by default before any refurbishment program exists. The specification decision made at purchase determines whether a device can be extended or must be replaced. Most e-waste programs address the wrong end of the problem. – Dan Haiem, AppMakers USA
Shift To Condition-Based Replacement
Extend the life of what you already own. Most companies replace hardware on fixed cycles regardless of actual condition. Instead, shift to condition-based replacement—keep devices running with better maintenance, firmware updates and repairs until they truly can’t perform. This one change alone can cut device turnover by 30% to 40% without any new purchase or green marketing needed. – Nithin Sonti, BrowserOS
Resist Vendor-Driven Replacement Cycles
Stop letting tech vendors force you into rip-and-replace cycles. Companies routinely throw away perfectly good hardware just because a proprietary software upgrade demands it. Instead, use open-source middleware to extend the life of your existing servers. Wrapping an open layer around what you already own keeps tech out of landfills and protects your budget. That’s real sustainability. – Mahendran Chinnaiah
Delete Data You Don’t Need
Deleting all unnecessary data might be unexpectedly impactful. Organizations store lots of data they don’t use. Data requires storage, which requires hardware, which eventually creates e-waste. Simple data hygiene—from each employee reviewing and cleaning their work files to the removal of redundant, outdated or unneeded data in internal databases—will save resources and create less e-waste. – Julius Černiauskas, Oxylabs
Implement A Repair-First Policy
Create a “last seat sold” policy for hardware. No laptop retires until IT goes through a checklist: repair, redeploy, donate and then recycle. In travel, we don’t scrap a plane because the tray table squeaks. Treat devices the same way. Squeeze out all the useful life first, buy new last and track the avoided purchases. – Joel Frenette, TravelFun.ai
Manage Assets Across Their Full Lifecycle
Technology product manufacturers need to change the mindset regarding asset ownership up until the point of sale and move toward whole-life management. All devices will eventually become obsolete and be disposed of, but until such time, the connectivity models mean that almost all products are now IoT devices and require whole-life management. This change in approach will allow updates to capability and security to extend the lifespan of tech products. – Mark Brown, The Mark of Security Ltd.
Track Assets To Improve Reuse
One practical change is to improve asset tracking. Many businesses buy new laptops, phones, desktops, monitors and other equipment while usable devices sit forgotten in storage, with former employees or in unused office spaces. A clear inventory helps teams know what they own, where it is, what condition it is in, and whether it can be reused, repaired or reassigned. Reducing e-waste often starts with better visibility into existing assets. – Salice Thomas, Wipro Limited
Standardize And Modularize
Standardize device models and components across the enterprise. Fewer SKUs mean easier repairs, longer parts availability and simpler redeployment between users. Modular designs and repairable form factors extend useful life and reduce the volume of devices retired prematurely due to single-component failure. – Nitin Agarwal, Luminace
Extend Software Support To Preserve Hardware
Hardware is frequently discarded because software support ends, not because the device stops working. Extending software support and compatibility often does more to reduce e-waste than encouraging people to buy the next sustainable device. – Benedetto Biondi, Folks Finance
Open-Source Legacy Technology For Continued Use
When Bose decided to discontinue its old line of smart speakers, it open-sourced the code instead of turning them into e-waste. We should make this behavior the default and allow hobbyists to continue supporting working devices long after a company has stopped working on them. Better yet, make the firmware open source from the very start. – Kevin Korte, Univention
