From waste to worth: building apps that tap into the circular economy

​The circular economy is becoming a real opportunity for businesses, not just something to tick a box on your sustainability report. Apps are playing a surprisingly big role in this shift, from marketplaces for second-hand goods to platforms that help people repair things instead of binning them.

The challenge is that building an app in this space means you’re asking people to change their habits, and that’s never easy. The convenient option is almost always to buy something new, so your app needs to make the sustainable choice feel just as easy, if not easier.

We’ll look at what’s actually working out there in the circular economy app world, covering the different angles you can take, whether that’s reuse, repair, sharing or recycling. We’ll talk through real examples of apps that have found their footing, and more importantly, we’ll discuss what it takes to build something people will genuinely use rather than download once and forget about.

If you’re in manufacturing, retail, local government, or you’re just thinking about whether there’s a business opportunity in sustainability tech, this session should give you a clearer picture of whether this could work for your organisation and what you’d actually need to think about when building it.