Fostering sustainable value: business actions and main implications for sustainable development

This thesis work explores the concept of sustainable development conceived as a process which will enable governments, institutions, firms and all individuals to make a transition toward a more inclusive and sustainable economy, achieving positive impact in the global community. More in depth, the analysis will focus on firms belonging to private sectors, which are considered key actors in this process of change, given their resources and scope of activity. Thus, the objective of this thesis is to demonstrate how the implementation of sustainable development practices foster the creation of sustainable value for the firms and the community, through a “collection of papers” structured in three chapters. Taking into account the increasing importance of this research area and consequently the considerable increase of related works, this thesis aims to analyse specific aspects of business related to sustainability issues, helping to create new knowledge in this field. This work starts with a Structured Literature Review, which investigates how specific Industry 4.0 technologies favour the achievement of sustainable development practices. Subsequently, a theoretical paper is presented in order to describe a framework, which incorporates sustainable development in corporate purpose, explaining how the achievement of SDGs could be integrated in the corporate functioning, pursuing business purposefulness. The third chapter regards an empirical research on the EU Taxonomy and its implementation process in Enel group is examined. Finally, the conclusions are presented, with research findings, implications and future research paths emerged from this work.