Trace an electronic product from material inputs to responsible end of life, identify supply-chain and e-waste risks, and find practical opportunities to design longer-lasting, more circular electronics.
Purpose of the template
Electronic products depend on complex global supply chains, critical materials, energy-intensive component production, and effective systems for repair, reuse, and recovery. This template helps teams map one electronic product or device category across its full life cycle.
It supports better decisions on responsible sourcing, environmental certification, product longevity, repairability, standardisation, take-back, safe data handling, and the prevention of unsafe e-waste dumping.
What is included
The template follows six connected stages:
Inputs & component materials
Component production
Device manufacturing
Use, repair & customer support
Collection, take-back & reuse
Recycling & responsible recovery
Each stage includes guiding questions and prefilled examples of key risks and opportunities, including critical-material sourcing, human rights, hazardous substances, supplier traceability, USB-C and other common standards, repairability, software support, data security, extended producer responsibility, certified recycling, and closed-loop materials.
The final stage feeds back into the first: recovered components and materials can become circular inputs for new products.
How to use it
Start by completing the Business profile and Electronics profile. Choose one product or device category—such as a laptop, smartphone, battery, display, charger, or network device—before mapping another.
Work from Stage 1 to Stage 6. Add sticky notes with findings, evidence, suppliers, sourcing locations, unanswered questions, assumptions, risks, and opportunities. Use green markers for opportunities or actions to explore, and orange markers for risks, gaps, dependencies, or requirements.
Finish by reviewing the full chain together. Prioritise the most important risks, agree the best opportunities to reduce virgin-material use and prevent unsafe e-waste disposal, identify evidence still needed, and assign actions, owners, and review dates.
Suggested workshop
Run this as a 90–120 minute cross-functional workshop.
Before the session, select one product or device category and gather available product specifications, bills of materials, supplier information, environmental certifications, repair and warranty data, take-back information, and applicable regulations.
Begin by agreeing the scope and completing the two profiles. Then spend around 10–15 minutes on each supply-chain stage, using the prompts to capture evidence, uncertainties, risks, and circularity opportunities. Mark the most important notes as green or orange as you go.
Use the final 15–20 minutes to agree priorities: the most significant environmental, social, supply, product-design, regulatory, and end-of-life risks; the most promising interventions; and the actions the business will take, support, or lead.
Who it is for
Use this template with sustainability, product design, engineering, procurement, IT, operations, supply-chain, compliance, legal, customer service, recycling, and leadership teams. It is also useful in supplier discussions, ecodesign workshops, e-waste planning, product-development projects, and circular-electronics strategy sessions.
A starting point, not a complete list
The template is deliberately prefilled with suggestions, example risks, and possible opportunities to make it easier to begin. These are prompts—not fixed answers or a complete checklist. Change, remove, add to, or adapt every element to reflect your product, components, markets, suppliers, customers, and business priorities.
What you will leave with
A shared map of the product’s supply chain, its highest-priority environmental and social risks, repair and circularity opportunities, key regulations and standards, evidence gaps, and a practical set of actions to reduce impact, extend product life, and ensure responsible end-of-life treatment.
