Well, hello and thank you all for tuning into another episode
of the Professional Pricing Society podcast.
My name is Terrence and we have a great guest speaker with us
today who was speaking ahead of their speaking engagement at our
Amsterdam conference. We have Akbar, Samurai Akbar,
How you doing today? I'm good.
Thank you. Hi, Terrence.
How are you? Doing well, doing very well.
I'm glad to have you with us today.
You're going to be speaking with us on pricing sustainability as
a service, correct? Correct.
Yeah. All right.
So I won't waste too much time, but I will say we are very
excited to have you at our upcoming conference and this
speaking engagement is going to be serving as a teaser for
what's to come. You know, as far as you going to
actually in depth with this topic at the conference, but for
the time being, you can kind of give us a little taste of what
to expect. Now, can you provide an overview
of the concept of pricing sustainability as a service for
autonomous urban mobility and how it envisions reshaping our
cities? First of all, I'm so glad I'm
here and I'm excited and looking forward.
Thanks for having me. So answering your your question,
it's a great question. So sustainability as a service
is something that is going to come.
In the near future whether we are prepared for it or not.
So being proactive is that from a pricing perspective I think
that this is very important and I chose autonomous urban
mobility as an example of sustainability as a service
because I see that coming sooner than later.
The fundamental shift, I think it will value the mobility
because in our cities we find that very important,
specifically of from an economy cost from a traditional economy
cost and. Finding and giving that
approach, that aim to encourage the use of sustainable
resources. And by doing that we are kind of
like reshaping our cities, reducing congestion, air
pollution, noise greenery and community hubs and creativity.
And also, you know, investing in your time that you have in
between. Now there are different aspects
to this concept. You know what are some of the
key sustainability benefits that can be achieved by adopting
autonomous vehicles and implement implementing pricing
strategies that reflect environmental stewardship.
OK. So from a pricing perspective,
you have to take in you know you we always try to be impartial,
staying away from advocacy and tell people what they should and
shouldn't. However, when it comes to
sustainability, you have to like just specifically on that
example, you're kind of like coupling the pricing strategy to
align on the environmental stewardship where you can have
key several key sustainability benefits such as you know,
significant reduction in greenhouse and gas, gas emission
and whether we can, you know, measure that or not, that's
where. We as a pricing come into the
picture and we can add into that by putting a number towards that
and making that visible. And secondly, it can also
elevate the traffic congestion and reducing the travel time and
also gives like affordable mobility.
And that all can be also translated into numbers where we
can measure that and give it like a value where it can.
Help people to make those decisions and look at those
numbers of the before and after. Something similar to the
sustainability reports that a lot of companies that they are
now doing where we can have that framework built in advance, OK,
essentially creating something to basically track this
information. Exactly, exactly, exactly that.
Exactly that. OK, now how do frameworks like
TCFD come into play when discussing sustainability as a
service? Or how can they guide decision
making in this specific context? I've been listening to a recent
podcast called Sustainability Defined and we were it was
talking about transparency, transparency and important that
is. And if you look at the
frameworks that. Now it is so essential which is
the as science based targets, SBTI, the TCFD, the Task Force
and climate. You also have to mention the
Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive which is the
CSRD that is now being implemented in Europe and
majority of the companies that are registered in Europe have to
have a mandatory reporting on that.
So with that being said. Ensuring that we have a proper
pricing strategy. It would help, you know, reduce
that ambiguity when it comes to measuring the impact.
Because a lot of times there are a lot of companies that would
claim that this is a green, you know, solution for example.
And there is now a terminology that called green wash and it's
basically saying that I would just put it there and there's no
accountability now with certain pricing.
Strategies in place that's with eliminate that kind of like
ambiguity and gives accountability to companies and
also help with those reporting mandatories that it's going to
be kind of like mandatory actually in in certain places.
I know it's not in North America, I know my country,
Canada, they are like doing that now.
So I'm just saying that if it's not now, it's later for sure.
OK. So you're kind of giving a
foreshadowing of what to expect in the future regarding this
topic in, in particular. Now in relation to this, are you
able to give some information about the historical parallels
and pricing strategies like like essential services, like
electricity? And are you able to elaborate
and explain the historical shifts that can inform our
approach to sustain Urban Development?
So I would, I would just maybe ask you a question.
Would you think that like as of now if we look at electricity
and we think about the model of how do, how do we price
electricity, it went through stages, right?
But I would ask you now if say 100 years ago, would if somebody
comes to you and say we're going to price electricity, would you
be able to give that a measurement?
And my answer to that, and I'm waiting for your answer here,
but well, 100 years ago, I don't think we would be able to track
it as well as we can today. So I'm not quite sure how
successful they would be in tracking electricity electric
usage 100 years ago like they would be today.
Yeah. And and that's a fair answer,
right. And think about it as of now,
with the sustainability as a service.
Where we actually do not know, we can't measure, how can you
price something that you cannot measure it.
So that's the biggest question if we go in history and that's
why I wanted to give that parallel like comparison between
now and then before, you know, actually came to the way that we
know it, it was a luxurious, you know, very like to a certain
people. It wasn't given to everybody.
And then it became a necessity. So shifting that dynamic and
shifting that like price and putting an economy, you know
kind of like utilizing on the economic value of it, it went
through like at least 100 years where we can now take it for
granted. But what I'm trying to say,
well, why I kind of like put those in in parallel because I
feel with them sustainability as a service, we're kind of
advanced in the sense of how we can track it and how we can
measure it really. And that comes with you know an
open mindset of what that saving mean and think about it
multiplied by years ahead. So whatever infrastructure that
would be put. It would be years ahead and that
would measure and put a proper framework to the pricing
strategy that we would put Now that's interesting and that
makes a lot of sense. You know in your presentation
you're going to be talking about the Co creation of a future of
sustainable and vibrant cities. Now, how can industry leaders,
policy makers, and, you know, even citizens, collaborate to
make this vision a reality? And what kind of role does
pricing play in this collaboration?
I think pricing play a vital role in that and the reason why
I say that people would go to the source like how would you
make something so appealing if it is not again goes back to the
measurements and accounting that we how can we make that
appealing to people if it's not paying their bills for example
so. When you track it, you have a
value to that service. And then when you make something
that is going to give you all of that, you know, sustainability
and sustainability models, you know the policy makers and the
citizen will will really want to look at the benefit in it.
And I'll give you an example, I I lived in Alberta.
I'm from Alberta, Canada. And it's known for oil and gas
and for the longest time there were huge and mind you that
Canada's has like the cleanest oil and gas industry in the
sense that I mean from an environmental point of view.
However, that being said, there was always a pressure of looking
at different side of of like energy sources in going away
from oil and gas. With that being said, I've
always thought that if we have some sort of like a report or a
way that we can tell people, you know, that would be measured and
that's how much will be the saving.
I assure you everyone would be pro sustainability, pro economic
value, pro that, because that would mean that I'm going to be
able to shift my mindset from the traditional way.
So the bottom line is that you have to make that appealing and
by making it appealing, it has to be more tuned with the
citizen, with the citizen's needs, more tuned with the
policy makers and those all together.
It's kind of like an aligned, cohesive, you know, Symphony of
people are singing the same song basically.
So OK, so trying to find a way that appeals at least for the
citizen aspect, because that would be me trying to find a way
to where in which it appeal, you know, it appeals to me and what
I what I either like or need. Does that make sense?
Exactly. Because if I tell you now, for
example, if I tell you now there's like an and and and like
in in you know an electric cars for example, let's take electric
cars and I would say like, hey, you know, like what do you think
about cars like we would shift everything to electric cars and
everything. The first question you would
think is that how much I would be saving if I make that
investment? That's your first question.
Because why would I go from this to that if I don't have anything
tangible in my hand, a value, a tangible value in my hand that
would make it appealing to people.
And I would think that to be honest and to be fair, all of us
are seeking that. And again, that goes back to
transparency. And a lot of issues, actually,
when it comes to achieving sustainability goals globally
has to do with transparency, because.
It goes back to pricing and being impartial because when we
give those decisions, it's based on data and if those data are
not available or a little bit exactly that would make all of
our decisions inaccurate. OK.
Now hey, can you share some examples of, and you probably
already started alluding to this in the 1st place, but can you
share some examples of pioneering pricing strategies
that mirror the value of environment stewardship in the
context of autonomous urban mobility?
Well, there are a couple like I would say, you know the, the
basic ones is that you know the incentivize of peak travel, the
incentivize ride sharing or using autonomous electric
vehicles. I mean, it is kind of like
mirroring the value, the value of environmental stewardship by
making sustainable choices more financially.
Appealing back to the same to the first to the last question
that we just answered. So when you make it financially
appealing, then people would kind of like, yeah, I want to go
with that option because that's the option that I want to help.
And and especially when it comes with a social goal behind it, it
would definitely make people more happy to adopt that and go
with it. And that's a good point.
When you mention the value of an electric car compared to a
traditional car, you know you're that's a good point.
How much money would I save in fuel if I were to pursue an
electric car that still looks great and it's still popular
amongst culture and you know across different cities compared
to a traditional car. So when you when you use the the
vehicle perspective that helps me to kind of connect these dots
in particular. Well, it's also back to the
question like when we said that when electricity, if you compare
it to electricity, you know, electricity used to be a luxury
option to people. And then all of a sudden we
just, you know, that's why it wasn't for everyone.
And then all of a sudden we moved to like having that
available to everyone and then. OK.
How would you make sustainable solutions available to everyone
if those if those doesn't come with a value or financial
appealing to people, Yeah, $1,000,000 question.
Yeah. So what are some of the key
challenges and opportunities that lie ahead in the journey
towards sustainable, equitable and vibrant cities through
pricing sustainability as a service?
The biggest one is infrastructure.
How would you put that infrastructure?
So in in the model that I I came up with, let's assume that you
would wake up one day and there are no cars in the streets and
you would just dial in on your phone.
It's not even dialing on your phone and click on an app and
that you know car would come to you.
I live in Dubai by the way and we have an app that we just
click and we have you know, fuel comes to our house and we just,
you know everything is like automated.
But imagine that, imagine that that you have that app and you
don't need cars anymore. And with that being said then
you need an infrastructure where you would need those to park
those idle cars. You need to have a proper
designs for all the roads to have.
A systematic way to detect each other's cars and then in that
way you would you would have electric you know autonomous
electric cars to be available and then also you know it can it
can also be job like they are like kind of like the challenge
can also present opportunities it's just like with with
everything you know like for example.
If we say that, yeah, like there are like a lot of like
technology adoption regularity that we need to put in.
This means that you have to add a lot of expertise to the table.
And that goes back to my first point when I said the CSRD, the
corporate sustainability reporting and reporting
requirements by the euro is now creating a lot of emphasis on.
You know starting to put certifications towards
understanding what that means how can I like make it.
How can I actually embrace that pricing sustainability as a
service and lead to reduce like that traffic congestion to lower
emission to improve air quality and do more urban environmental
solutions. So that like kind of like it's a
it's a flip side I get the the the hurdles there.
But if you think about it from an opportunity point of view,
it's also something that we should be at least investing in
right now. Mm hmm.
That also makes a lot of sense because from this can come a lot
of challenges but also opportunities from those
challenges that can help us to evolve in the pricing industry,
evolve in you know different ways regarding our society at
large when thinking about the future.
And so not all challenges are bad essentially is what what
you're saying pricing and? Then also you have to, you have
to also consider that it it it comes with a great price,
meaning that it would come with a price that we would have a
really a clean environment where we would be able to invest our
time properly and we would be able to invest our resources
properly. I mean, for the longest time, to
be fair, we were not living sustainably and that's why we
are having all of those problems that are now coming up to the
surface where we become like a society where.
You know, all of the diseases, all of the issues, all of the
society issues, all of the, you know, even the mental, you know,
issues that we're facing. Imagine if we have like kind of
like if we would be in tune with nature.
And yeah, that might sound like very romantic, but when you
think about it, it's just about like just tuning your.
You know tuning in with the with nature really and finding
solutions that would be more suitable to to everyone and we
can live sustainably in this, in this on this planet.
A lot of our efforts were not sustainable in a lot of regards
and so it's short lived and so we can find some ways to come
together and bring forth some solutions to live more
sustainable life. We're talking about pricing.
A lot of doors can open. A lot of opportunities can come
to surface as a result. I mean from a pricing
perspective, if you look at the pricing, we are like a function
that serves other functions, right.
So our customers are the business, the business owners,
our customers are the, the, the people who makes those decisions
of the business. So when we do that, we're kind
of like enabling, we are enabling function basically.
Imagine that you have an enabling function that knows the
in and out of what the future should be and have like a sense
of what. How do we measure that in a
financial value and give you that perspective and make you
make you more informative to make decisions and make proper
decisions that would help the environment basically.
And that goes. That can go a very long way.
I can. Go exactly.
OK, exactly. Pricing sustainability as a
service for autonomous urban mobility.
Miss Othba, it's been a pleasure to speak with you today.
Now she is going to be with us again at our Amsterdam
conference November 29th through December 1st.
I keep wanting this October for some reason and we're very
excited to have you with us. Before we leave, is there any
type of resource or website or place any of our listeners can
learn more about you and your services and what you stand for?
Well, I have my LinkedIn profile, it's available and I
have some and my biography is also available on our on the
website as well. So you can you can reach me
there and you know, I'm happy to answer any questions and I'll.
I'm happy to see everyone, and I'm excited to see everyone in
Amsterdam next month. OK, good, good.
Very excited to have you. Thank you again for your time
today. And so next time we'll see you
guys later. Bye, bye.
Thank you. Bye, bye.