What’s most compelling about the entries on Fast Company’s list of Most Innovative Companies in corporate social responsibility this year isn’t just their scope—tackling everything from gender equity in AI to food waste, airline emissions, and sustainable energy—it’s how, time and again, companies’ ethical bets are reshaping their internal operations and driving real financial returns.
Take Land O’Lakes: By rolling out Spoiler Alert, a tech solution that’s already kept 5.7 million pounds of food out of landfills since 2023, the company was able to raise its Zero Hunger goal to 15 million pounds donated by 2030—and it also slashed over $150,000 in annual recycling and landfill fees. At Six Senses, the push to eliminate single-use plastics and publish a Plastics-Free Playbook not only enhanced the guest experience, it also solidified the luxury brand as a sustainability leader within parent company IHG and the broader hospitality sector.
In the gaming world, Catan’s “Catan: New Energies”—which builds climate challenges into its core mechanics—sold out its first run, proving that entertainment can be both engaging and deeply relevant. Meanwhile, Faith in Nature’s bold move to give nature a seat on its board (via a rotating group of scientists and lawyers) has led to smarter, lower-impact packaging and formulas—decisions that shrank its carbon footprint and drove an 11% jump in sales.
CSR jargon may come and go, but these stories underscore a larger truth: When businesses prioritize people and the planet, the benefits ripple outward—reshaping industries, strengthening brands, and reinforcing the elusive but essential idea that doing good is, in fact, good business.
1. Cisco
For creating a resilient system to keep the power on in Ukraine
In the wake of the 2022 Russian invasion, Ukraine faced a devastating crisis: Nearly half of its energy infrastructure lay in ruins, leaving millions without power. Compounding the challenge, Ukraine’s critical reliance on electronic warfare countermeasures to protect civilians and military assets inadvertently destabilized its own power grid. Jamming GPS signals—a tactic essential for defending against missiles and drones—created a ripple effect, undermining the precise timing synchronization the grid depended on.
Cisco, one of the world’s largest makers of computer networking equipment, convened technical experts from across its business to tackle this high-stakes problem. Dubbed Project PowerUp, the initiative sought a technological solution to restore stability to Ukraine’s embattled grid. The answer? Cisco’s Industrial Ethernet switch. Using the switch’s internal crystal oscillator, Cisco engineers retooled the device so it could maintain accurate time synchronization even in the absence of GPS signals.
After rigorous testing, Cisco’s innovation proved successful. The company fast-tracked production of the modified switches, which were then shipped to Ukrenergo, Ukraine’s state-owned electricity transmission system, for deployment. Between January and August 2024, Cisco kept the power on in Ukraine through 400-plus air raids for a duration of more than 300 hours (about two weeks).
Alerts for these raids lasted for an hour on average. Prior to Project PowerUp, this would have resulted in more than 16 days’ worth of disruptions to Ukraine’s power grid because of a lack of GPS and potential blackouts across the country. In a moment of unprecedented need, Project PowerUp not only addressed a technical challenge but also underscored the power of ingenuity in the face of crisis.
2. Land O’Lakes
For creating a system that automatically eliminates food waste by selling or donating soon-to-expire food.
While many large food makers donate surplus inventory, the process is often a slow, labor-intensive task, taking days or weeks to execute. This inefficiency frequently results in expired products that can’t be donated at all. To speed up the process, Land O’Lakes launched Spoiler Alert, a sales software platform designed to digitize and streamline the logistics of short-dated inventory. The farmer-owned cooperative has turned an old, manual process into a streamlined system that benefits communities across the country, reducing the time it takes to donate food to mere hours.
In 2024 alone, more than 2.1 million pounds of food were diverted from landfills and donated to Feeding America food banks near Land O’Lakes distribution centers. Since partnering with Spoiler Alert in January 2023, the cooperative has donated over 5.7 million pounds of food, surpassing its initial goal of 3 million pounds by 2030.
Encouraged by this success, Land O’Lakes has raised its Zero Hunger goal to 15 million pounds by the decade’s end. And Spoiler Alert is just one of the ways Land O’Lakes is fighting food waste and feeding those in need. It is also collaborating with the Pacific Coast Food Waste Commitment (PCFWC) to pilot a food waste tracking tool that’s currently used in grocery stores—a first for the manufacturing industry.
Beyond the societal benefits, the company has also realized financial gains, saving nearly $150,000 in recycling and landfill fees in 2024.
3. Delta Air Lines
For helping develop the infrastructure for a future of flying with clean fuels
Delta Air Lines has set a course toward decarbonizing aviation, focusing on sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) as the most promising solution. The stakes are high: Jet fuel accounts for around 90% of the airline’s carbon emissions, and scaling SAF production is critical. But there is a supply problem, Currently, there isn’t enough SAF to fuel global commercial airlines for even a week, which is why the airline is championing state and federal policies to ramp up production.
Delta is a founding member of two major coalitions—Americans for Clean Aviation Fuel (ACAF) and the Minnesota SAF Hub—both dedicated to creating a robust SAF market. In September 2024, the Minnesota SAF Hub, Delta, and Greater MSP Partnership announced groundbreaking milestones: Minnesota’s first SAF delivery to Minneapolis–Saint Paul International Airport (MSP); the state’s first SAF blending facility set to produce 30 million gallons annually by end of 2025; and, once operational, advancements in winter camelina seed research, a promising SAF feedstock.
In January, Airbus joined the Minnesota SAF Hub and a partnership with Delta’s Sustainable Skies Lab. The two companies plan to explore wing performance, fuel efficiency, superconductivity, advanced aircraft assistance, and other technologies that may be needed for future aircraft. Beyond SAF, Delta and Airbus are exploring hydrogen-powered aviation, including feasibility studies at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.
SAF’s economic potential is immense, with projections estimating a $25 billion market by 2030 and the creation of 14 million global jobs. This includes opportunities (though they may be limited in the near future due to Trump administration policies) for American farmers to grow and sell feedstocks, integrating agriculture into the future of aviation.
4. Six Senses
For creating a plastic-free playbook for luxury hotels
For nearly three decades, environmental protection has been a core value of Six Senses hotels and resorts. Last November, the luxury brand published a Plastics-Free Playbook, a guidebook to help other companies to follow the company’s work of eliminating plastics from its properties, one of its most aggressive sustainability efforts. The Playbook offers 82 actionable strategies, spanning operations from housekeeping to food and beverage, designed to tackle even the most elusive plastics. Six Senses has made the Playbook freely available, sharing its solutions and inviting the broader hospitality industry to join its “Plastic Freedom” journey.
Six Senses eliminated plastic bottles in 2003 and straws in 2016—long before these practices became industry standards. In 2017, the brand took a bold step, setting a five-year goal to catalog and reduce all plastics across its properties. This led to a yearlong grassroots effort where staff meticulously identified every plastic item in use, from coffee pods to air-conditioner components.
To scale its impact, Six Senses enlisted MBA students from a Swedish university to quantify their plastic usage—an eye-popping 5.5 million pieces annually. They identified 18 “unwanted categories,” which became the focus of an internal campaign featuring Old West-style “Unwanted” posters and mandatory educational videos for staff.
Supply chains have proven the biggest hurdles, yet Six Senses has taken steps to tackle them, and in many cases, it has cut other meaningful GHG emissions as a result. In the Maldives, for example, Six Senses Laamu reduced Styrofoam waste by establishing chicken farms to produce local eggs instead of flying them in in Styrofoam crates. While this cut back on plastic waste, it also created local economic opportunities, not to mention much fresher eggs for its guests.
Six Senses is starting to see knock-on effects from sharing the Plastics-Free Playbook. It’s been used as a training resource throughout the 6,400 properties of International Hotel Group (IHG is Six Senses’ parent company), as well as in the broader hospitality sector.
5. Nch’ḵay̓ Development Corporation
For finding creative solutions to cut through red-tape and build innovative, sustainable housing
In Vancouver, a new development is reshaping the skyline and redefining urban living along the coastline. Spearheaded by the Nch’ḳaẏ Development Corporation (NDC), composed of Squamish Nation members, Sen̓áḵw village is rooted in cultural revival, environmental stewardship, and housing innovation.
Set on the ancestral lands of the Squamish Nation, the projects aren’t subject to Vancouver’s strict land use rules. This has allowed the Squamish, in partnership with private developer Westbank, to build one of the tallest, densest developments in the city, with 6,000 rental units filling towers that range from 22 to 58 stories high.
The result is a revival of the region’s historic Coast Salish culture meeting modern urban development. Sen̓áḵw’s 11 towers are complemented by parks, commercial spaces, and an energy-efficient heating and cooling system powered by the Metro Vancouver regional sewer system. Scheduled for completion by 2030, the project addresses Vancouver’s housing affordability crisis but also restores Squamish heritage to the urban fabric. With projected earnings of $13 billion, Sen̓áḵw marks an economic milestone for the Nation, which was forcibly displaced from this land in 1913.
A leader in sustainable development, Sen̓áḵw will be Canada’s first large-scale net zero housing community. By prioritizing public transit, cycling, and pedestrian infrastructure, the development slashes its parking allocation to just 15% of units while accommodating 4,500 bike spaces with innovative underground ramps. A public transportation hub is in the works, too. Its design also incorporates 45,000 square feet of mass timber, cutting embodied carbon by 50% compared to traditional concrete.
Cultural identity is woven into every element, with towers designed to evoke mountains and longhouses adorned with copper “fins” reminiscent of salmon. Coast Salish art will enrich public spaces, interiors, and landscaping, ensuring that Squamish heritage is both visible and celebrated.
As Vancouver faces mounting housing and climate challenges, projects like Seṇ’áḳw and others—including the Jericho Lands and Heather Lands, growing housing and retail projects also in Vancouver—showcase First Nations as transformative forces in Canada’s real estate.
6. Cadence Design Systems
For building a new pipeline for women in engineering
In the high-stakes race to shape the future of artificial intelligence, ensuring that the technology serves everyone—not just a select few—is critical. Cadence Design Systems, renowned for its electronic design automation tools, is stepping up and bring more women into engineering work with its Fem.AI initiative.
Currently, women hold just 20% of jobs in AI. Cadence’s Fem.AI project is seeking to change that narrative by investing $20 million over the next few years in university and company partnerships that address three leakage points for professional women—graduating at the university level with a degree in STEM; getting a first job in the tech industry; and leaving at the 12-year mark, where 50% of women quit tech jobs (compared to a 22% rate at which they leave other jobs).
For example, Cadence has partnered with Break Through Tech (BTT), which empowers, trains, and connects students from different lived experiences to influential tech opportunities. Through their programs with partners, they serve 8,500 students annually—launching a generation of diverse tech talent into the workforce through corporate partnerships like Cadence—and have achieved an 80% first job placement rate for their students upon program completion.
7. Miele
For bringing circularity to washing machines, dryers, and vacuum cleaners
While German household appliance company Miele certainly hopes its devices last forever, the truth is that they do sometimes break. To help prolong their life and improve the company’s long-term sustainability, it is focusing on ways to make them more repairable.
In 2024, the company unveiled a design study for the Vooper (“Vac” for vacuum cleaner, “Loop” for cycle) at IFA Berlin in late 2024. The cordless hand-stick is designed with parts that can be easily replaced—unlike plastics glued together in inseparable bonds—and, equally importantly, made of valuable materials that can be reused at the end of the Vooper’s life cycle. While still a pilot, the Vooper is sparking significant industry interest that underscores Miele’s influence in fostering circular-economy principles.
Another standout initiative is Miele’s washing machine refurbishment project in the Netherlands, which launched in 2022. By thoroughly inspecting and overhauling old machines, Miele offers them as affordable alternatives to new models, at discounts ranging from 25% to 70% off the recommended retail price, complete with a one-year warranty. Miele also runs its new products through long-term endurance tests that ensure they last up to 20 years. Customer warranties cover 10 years, supporting the brand’s belief that the best environmental practice is to have machines repaired—versus buying new—and keep them in service as long as possible.
8. Toyota
For building up a green “city” for mobility-focused inventors
For decades, Toyota has been a global leader in integrating environmental, social, and governance (ESG) values with tangible outcomes. Nowhere is this vision more vividly realized than in the Woven City, a test course for mobility that the company is constructing in Japan’s Shizuoka Prefecture.
Woven City will focus on four key areas of research—the mobility of people, goods, information, and energy. The seeds of Woven City were planted in 2011, following the Great East Japan Earthquake. After Toyota relocated its Higashi-Fuji plant, the company envisioned a new installation on the site where views, talents, and abilities intertwine. Designed by renowned Danish architect Bjarke Ingels (BIG), among others, the city runs primarily on hydrogen-powered fuel cells—the same technology behind Toyota’s Mirai vehicle—and incorporates renewable energy sources like solar power, a multi-pathway approach to achieving carbon neutrality.
Slated to open in late 2025, it will eventually host around 2,000 residents, or “Weavers,” and serve as an incubator for groundbreaking ideas. Initial inventors include companies—HVAC company Daikin; Nissin, a foods company; and educational company Z-kai, among others—that will test solutions ranging from AI-driven mobility to innovative vending machine concepts.
Blending tradition with innovation, the city’s design features Japanese cypress and recycled materials, employing age-old Japanese design techniques like laminated wood bending. Meanwhile, cutting-edge technologies will streamline everything from garbage collection to water use, creating a model for smarter, more sustainable living.
9. Catan
For revamping a classic game to teach valuable climate lessons
Catan has long been synonymous with strategic board gaming, captivating players across the world since its inception in 1995 as The Settlers of Catan. Klaus Teuber’s pioneering creation revolutionized tabletop gaming with its resource-trading mechanics and immersive world-building, ultimately transforming a niche hobby into a global phenomenon.
Teuber passed away in 2023, but in the last decade of his life, he worked on a new version of Catan. This edition addressed a subject that was timely and also important to him, his son and successor Benjamin Teuber, and their team. Called Catan: New Energies, the game includes energy as well as climate change crises as levers on the board, encouraging players to ask themselves how to best build societies responsibly.
Unveiled in June, Catan: New Energies challenges players to balance environmental responsibility with economic growth. Decisions are fraught with consequences: Should one invest in polluting fossil fuels for rapid expansion or adopt renewables at a slower, greener pace?
Catan: New Energies is already sold in dozens of languages and countries. Its initial print run sold out quickly, and the reprint hit shelves right before the December holidays. It was also Catan’s bestseller at PAX Unplugged, a tabletop-gaming-focused convention held annually in Philadelphia.
Printed and assembled in the U.S., it’s crafted from sustainably sourced wood, cardboard, and paper, forgoing plastic entirely.
10. Faith in Nature
For giving a voting board seat to a representative for “nature.”
In 2022, natural beauty brand and B Corporation Faith in Nature made history as the first company to appoint Nature to its board of directors. Represented by rotating nominations of scientists, lawyers, and environmentalists, Nature acts as an independent vote and director, providing invaluable insights into decisions impacting the environment.
This past year, the Nature Guardian’s input informed the redevelopment of Faith in Nature’s product line. Among other changes, items are now packaged in recyclable aluminum and boast 99.5% natural-origin ingredients, which has also prevented over half a ton of plastic waste in just six months.
The company is also working with suppliers—a family-owned lavender farm in England, a women’s cooperative in Ghana that makes shea nut butter, tea tree farmers who also work to save koalas—on measuring their environmental and social impact, the first results of which were published in January. The company’s sales have surged by 11%, with key retailers reporting growth as high as 20%. Faith in Nature’s carbon footprint per £1 million (about $1.2 million) revenue is a mere eight metric tons, significantly outperforming industry averages.
Beyond internal achievements, the company’s open-source framework may be catalyzing a movement. Its Nature on the Board (NOTB) reports have been downloaded more than 4,000 times. Luxury interiors brand House of Hackney and the Scottish Association for Marine Science, among other entities, have embraced the concept.
Explore the full 2025 list of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies, 609 organizations that are reshaping industries and culture. We’ve selected the companies making the biggest impact across 58 categories, including advertising, applied AI, biotech, retail, sustainability, and more.
No comments