AMD announced the publication of its 26th annual Corporate Responsibility Report highlighting the company’s accomplishments from the previous year, including performance against its 2014 to 2020 targets, and unveiling new goals through 2025 and 2030. This year’s report features four key environmental, social and governance (ESG) strategic focus areas that guide the company’s purpose-driven approach to high-performance computing: digital impact, environmental stewardship, supply chain responsibility, and diversity, belonging and inclusion.
“At AMD, we are inspired by the far-reaching potential of our high-performance computing solutions to help solve global challenges today and in the future,” said Susan Moore, corporate vice president of corporate responsibility and international government affairs at AMD. “We also recognize it is not just what our technology can do that matters, but also how we responsibly develop and deliver it. Embedding environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance and transparency across our business helps us make a positive difference for our stakeholders.”
Driving Meaningful Digital Impact
Last year, AMD established the COVID-19 High Performance Compute (HPC) Fund to provide universities and institutions with computing resources to accelerate medical research on COVID-19 and other diseases. The company also recently launched a new learning lab in Singapore for students and teachers to advance digital literacy skills, continuing the expansion of AMD learning labs in site communities worldwide. To demonstrate the company’s continued commitment to digital impact moving forward, the company has set a goal to benefit 100 million people by 2025 through AMD and AMD Foundation philanthropy and partnerships that enable STEM education, scientific research and the workforce of the future.
Advancing Environmental Stewardship
AMD continues to prioritize environmental stewardship within the company’s business strategy. The AMD 25×20 Energy Efficiency Initiative resulted in a 31.7x increase in performance per watt in its processors for mobile devices. Building on this momentum, the company now aims to achieve a 30x increase in energy efficiency by 2025 for AMD processors and accelerators powering servers for the rapidly growing markets of artificial intelligence (AI)-training and HPC. Additionally, AMD reduced greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from its operations (scope 1 and 2) by 38% from 2014 to 2020, ahead of its 20% goal. Looking forward, AMD has set a new science-based target for its operations that entails a 50% reduction in GHG emissions from 2020 to 2030.
Upholding a Responsible Supply Chain
The company’s partnership approach on supply chain responsibility focuses on delivering quality products while upholding high social and environmental standards. In 2020, 47% of AMD manufacturing suppliers had active audits under the Responsible Business Alliance (RBA), with average audit scores 39% better than the RBA average. The company has announced new 2025 supply chain goals that include auditing 100% of its suppliers while increasing their climate protection efforts and capacity building activities, such as training and industry engagements.
Fostering a Culture of Diversity, Belonging and Inclusion
AMD is committed to growing diversity, belonging and inclusion (DB&I) in its workforce to help embrace different viewpoints and experiences, foster innovation and challenge the status quo when needed. The company is expanding diversity data disclosures and efforts to deepen engagements with Historically Black Colleges and Universities and Hispanic-serving institutions in the U.S. For 2021, increased hiring of underrepresented groups is a component of the company’s strategic metrics and milestones. The company has increased investments in employee resource groups (ERGs) and announced a goal of 70% participation of its employees in AMD ERGs and/or other AMD inclusion initiatives by 2025.
Supporting Local AMD Communities Across the Globe
During a time when our world particularly needs partnerships between communities and businesses, AMD and employees significantly increased philanthropic support throughout our site communities worldwide. Through our combined COVID-19 response efforts, more than $26 million USD was received by universities, research institutes and community organizations in donated technology, personal protective equipment and corporate and employee giving (as of June 2021). In addition, 3,110 AMD employees participated in 71 company-sponsored volunteer events, contributing more than 7,050 hours of their time and talents last year.
The company’s ESG efforts in 2020-2021 have been recognized with 100 Best Corporate Citizens, Forbes America’s Most Just U.S. Companies, the Best Places to Work for LGBTQ Equality, the Bloomberg Gender-Equality Index, Fortune Change the World listing and the Responsible Business Alliance Compass Award for Innovation.