13th September 2021 – PwC China released Air Trace, an innovative digital solution (hereinafter referred to as “Air Trace”) at 2021 CIFTIS (China International Fair for Trade in Services) in Beijing on 3 September 2021.
Air Trace is PwC’s first innovative solution built on PwC’s Digital Maker, a low-code development platform, powered by blockchain technology, which ensures security and transparency of data logged in an encrypted and immutable ledger.
Digital Maker, developed by PwC China, deploys enterprise-grade applications up to ten times faster than traditional development methods. The platform creates agile blockchain-powered applications, in partnership with VeChain, an Enterprise-Grade Blockchain solution provider.
Air Trace tracks supply chain data in a secure, trusted and transparent way. It provides enterprises, business partners, customers and stakeholders a high degree of trust and transparency to meet the increasing demands of compliance and governance responsibility. The solution is designed to alleviate management pain points with platform benefits of faster deployment and higher interoperability.
Air Trace also traces and reports ESG data, enabling management to address green and sustainable challenges, thereby contributing to Mainland China’s 2060 Net Zero target. Air Trace can also be used to tackle key sustainability issues relating to food and product safety.
On 4 September 2021, Air Trace won the China International Fair for Trade in Services’ (CIFTIS) award in the “Demonstration Case: Business Format Innovation” category, based on the independent assessment by CIFTIS organisation committee. This demonstrates Air Trace’s unique value in addressing business challenges across various industries, and enabling management to build new sustainable operating model that disrupts the traditional value chain.
Elton Yeung, PwC China Vice Chairman commented: “The digital economy is creating new and exciting business models empowered by emerging technologies and driving strategic digital transformation of traditional industries. PwC is doubling down on harnessing our digital capabilities and differentiating our value by applying emerging technologies to solve important problems. We focus on developing enterprise grade Digital Products (including business software, digital tools and technology applications) that can effectively support a wide spectrum of business scenarios”.
Mr. Yeung further highlighted PwC China’s new strategy for the digital future: “PwC will continue to drive its strategy of delivering sustained outcomes with powerful digital products which integrates technology with professional advisory expertise. This includes our commitment to expand the use of cloud, artificial intelligence, virtual reality, blockchain and other emerging technologies.
Reinforcing PwC’s commitment to help businesses digitally transform and drive sustained outcomes, Jim Woods, PwC China Chief Digital Officer said: “To help clients thrive and shift gears in a fast changing environment, it is imperative for them to quickly build digital capabilities and workforce skills. PwC China Digital Products and Solutions strives to help companies capture the full value from data, and enable strategic decisions for companies to stay relevant and resilient to rapid market changes.
PwC China’s Digital Products and Solutions will continue to develop and launch new business software and digital transformation solutions for use by our clients. We will continue to harness the collective insights of our people, process and technology across industries to help enterprises raise their digital competitiveness and empower data-driven decisions to meet growing demands for transparency and trust of the product journey. Through our Digital Products, we will continue contributing to the development of Mainland China’s digital economy and new infrastructure plans.”
Currently, Air Trace offers an end-to-end solution for a global giant retailer client. They use Air Trace to integrate supply chain data and provide efficient and transparent traceability information that builds consumer trust.
Aside from the food industry, Air Trace can be applied in a wide spectrum of business scenarios across various industries including logistics and transportation, trade, automobile industry, energy and medical and health industries.
In June 2021, Air Trace was shortlisted in the G20 TechSprint competition. PwC China is the only Chinese team among the 21 shortlisted teams. The G20 TechSprint initiative is an online competition programme launched by the BIS Innovation Hub and the Bank of Italy. The competition focuses on three operational problems in the field of green and sustainable finance : (1) Data Collection, Verification & Sharing, (2) Analysis & Assessment of Transition and Physical Climate related Risks, (3) Better connecting projects and investors. The shortlist entry affirms the distinctive value and impact of Air Trace in supporting a sustainability strategy, and helping companies achieve China’s Net Zero carbon emission goals.
