Our success depends on fostering successful relationships with stakeholders. We are conscious of our duty to promote our success with regard to our stakeholders under s172(1) of the Companies Act 2006.
We acknowledge that the success of Graphcore’s strategy is reliant on positive engagement with all the Group’s stakeholders. Graphcore has a global and diverse community of stakeholders, each with its own interests in and expectations of the Group. Due to the scale and geographic spread of our businesses, stakeholder engagement mostly takes place at an operational level and the Board is therefore reliant on executive management to help it fully understand the impact of the Group’s operations on its stakeholders.
During the year, the Board considered information from across the Group’s businesses in the form of presentations from executive management and reports and took part in discussions which considered, when relevant, the impact of the Group’s activities on its key stakeholders. These activities, together with direct engagement by the Board and individual Directors with the Group’s stakeholders, helped to inform the Board in its decision-making processes. As a Board, the collective role of the Directors is to act as responsible guardians and stewards of the Group. In so doing, the Board ensures that the Group is optimally positioned to achieve its long-term sustainable aims while safeguarding the interests of all its stakeholders.
Our People
Without talented and committed employees, we could never deliver on our ambitions. We aspire to make Graphcore a great place to work in order for our people to better serve our customers. We place considerable value on the involvement of our employees and continue to keep them informed on matters affecting them and on the various factors affecting the performance of the Group and the Company. This is achieved through formal and informal Companywide meetings, Company updates as well as regular Employee engagement surveys, further details of the Group’s engagement activities with employees can be found in the People and Culture section of the Strategic Report on page 10. Our Chief People Officer sits on our Executive management team.
Our Customers, Partners, Suppliers and Others
At each scheduled board meeting, the board reviews data, reports and feedback from key stakeholder engagement activities with customers, partners, suppliers and others. Using this information, the board and executive management are able to identify and carefully consider the interests of stakeholders who may be affected by key decisions and reflect on how such interests should be taken into consideration strategically as part of the board’s decision-making process.
Investors
We greatly value strong relationships with our investors. We uphold our commitments with frequent dialogue and regularly scheduled meetings, covering a wide range of strategic, operational, financial and ethical topics.
We value the output received from this communication and endeavor to incorporate this into business operations.
Communities and environment
With a global presence, we recognize the importance of respecting the communities we do business in. We like our offices to be in central locations with good public transport links and we have implemented energy saving initiatives including low-energy lighting and recycling waste facilities. We also support schemes such as cycle to work.
This is the second year the Company has published carbon emissions data as a large Company under the Streamlined Energy and Carbon Reporting within the climate section of the Strategic Report on page 13. The Group is committed to further building out its environmental reporting.
We continue to help build a community of IPU developers by enabling easier access to IPUs and supporting developers with code, model examples and documentation. Programs to give access to academics around the world are facilitating research on IPUs which is shared with the wider AI community.
GRAPHCORE LIMITED
Section 172 (1) Statement (continued)
Business Conduct
We are committed to acting fairly and upholding the highest standards of business conduct.
We approach our operations with the utmost integrity and ethical behavior. Business decisions are balanced with risk and compliance, with consideration given to the environment we operate in and the effect those decisions may have.
We are an equal opportunity employer and have clear and detailed equal opportunities policy. We are determined to ensure that no applicant or employee receives less favorable treatment on the grounds of gender, age, disability, religion, belief, sexual orientation, marital status, or race, or is disadvantaged by conditions or requirements which cannot be shown to be justifiable.
Consequences of any decision in the long term
When making any decisions, each Director ensures that they act in a way that they consider, in good faith, would most likely promote the success of the Group for the benefit of its members as a whole, and in doing so, have regard for the matters set out in section 172(1).
Approved by the Board and signed on its behalf by:
N Toon
Director
18 May 2023