On April 8, Tencent released its 2023 ESG report. "Digital technology and artificial intelligence are Tencent's core competencies for sustainable development. Tencent Chairman and CEO Pony Ma said in the report that advanced technology is fundamental to Tencent's ability to create user value, business value and innovative social value.
In the past year, Tencent has made many innovative explorations in various areas of ESG. In terms of environmental protection, we will continue to promote the goal of carbon neutrality, significantly increase the proportion of renewable energy, and continue to carry out biodiversity conservation actions based on technology. In terms of technical security, Tencent has been investing in R&D for a long time while focusing on strengthening AI systems and data security, and in terms of improving its governance capabilities, Tencent joined the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC) in 2023 and actively promoted the green transformation of its supply chain.
Based on these practices, in December last year, S&P Global also included Tencent in its Dow Jones Sustainability World Index and Emerging Markets Index. The 2023 S&P Global Sustainability Assessment has improved Tencent Holdings' (00700.HK) ESG score, placing it in the top five in the industry, surpassing Google and Meta.
Core product "Accessibility+"
As one of the first technology companies to develop information accessibility, Tencent has invested a lot of technology to help people with disabilities bridge the digital divide and better integrate into everyday life.
By the end of 2023, Tencent has applied for more than 80 accessibility-related patents, involving more than 40 products and functions, and its core products have been optimized for accessibility. Tencent has also made four accessibility-related technology patents open to the public to promote the industry's common progress in the field of information accessibility. In 2023, Tencent and the China Disabled Persons' Federation jointly established a Barrier-free Joint Innovation Lab to help build a barrier-free environment and support people with disabilities and seniors to participate in social life and economic activities on an equal footing.
In order to solve the problem of hearing impairment, in 2023, Ethereal Action will further launch the "Tencent Ethereal Remote Hearing Service Platform", relying on Tencent Ethereal audio AI technology, so that the hearing-impaired can complete the remote fitting of hearing aids at home through Tencent Meeting. QQ Music uses technologies such as vocal accompaniment separation, artificial intelligence music generation, and accompaniment adaptation, so that people with medium and high frequency hearing loss can also hear the songs and enjoy the integrity and beauty of the music without destroying or changing the melody of the original song.
In terms of supporting the digital rights and interests of the physically handicapped community, Tencent has also launched a number of solutions based on technologies such as voice-to-text conversion, OCR image reading, and eye movement input, so that users with disabilities can operate the computer to complete the input by moving their eyes and gazing. For individual businesses with disabilities, Tencent has also launched the "Self-Reliance Small Store Assistance Action", launching a series of support measures such as digital business training, free barrier-free business tools, exclusive free insurance and exclusive customer service.
Two cancer screenings were carried out in 13 low-resource areas
While focusing on accessibility for vulnerable populations, the report also mentions solutions to other social problems.
In terms of digital healthcare, Tencent continues to explore the development of inclusive healthcare. Based on the accumulation of AI recognition and processing technology for medical imaging, Tencent has developed the "Miying Digital Intelligence Medical Imaging Platform" and a number of auxiliary diagnostic systems to support the inclusive large-scale screening and timely treatment of some diseases at the social level.
Advanced auxiliary diagnosis technology effectively reduces the cost of large-scale screening and diagnosis and treatment of some diseases. Taking cervical cancer and breast cancer as examples, with the help of AI-assisted diagnosis and other technologies, resources will be invested in 2023 to help carry out large-scale screening and diagnosis of "two cancers" for about 100,000 school-age women in 13 pilot areas with low medical resources.
In 2023, Tencent released a large medical model based on the self-developed basic model "Tencent Hybrid", which can be applied to multi-scenario product matrices such as intelligent Q&A, family doctor assistant, and digital intelligent medical imaging platform, which can be embedded in the whole process of medical links, and help improve the level and quality of medical services in application scenarios such as department guidance, doctor recommendation, pre-consultation, doctor-patient dialogue, automatic generation of medical records, and intelligent hospital customer service.
In the face of sudden disasters, Tencent uses its information technology capabilities to help social organizations build a basic platform for disaster emergency rescue and disaster early warning, and work together in earthquake early warning, snow disaster rescue, AED rescue, etc., to help improve the success rate of emergency support. Among them, Tencent and the Sichuan Provincial Earthquake Administration jointly launched the WeChat earthquake early warning function, which can quickly push earthquake early warnings through WeChat, so that everyone can receive accurate earthquake early warning information in a timely manner, quickly avoid risks, and effectively respond to natural disasters.
In terms of digital philanthropy, relying on digital technology and a transparent and credible mechanism, Tencent's philanthropy platform continues to improve its donor services and strengthen "transparent" philanthropy. Taking the "99 Giving Day" that has been held for 9 years as an example, more than 65 million people donated more than 3.8 billion yuan during the "99 Giving Day" in 2023 alone.
Initiation of "Nature Risk Assessment" for the first time
In addition to the focus on "people", the report also mentions the protection of "nature".
"We continue to promote our carbon neutrality plan and reduce emissions through energy management. Our fourth-generation data center technology, T-block, improves data center energy efficiency, while we advance the transition to renewable energy for O&M power. James Mitchel, co-chairs of the ESG Working Group, and Law said that in 2023, the proportion of renewable electricity used will increase from 7.2% in 2022 to 12.4%. This was driven by an increase in the installed capacity of self-built renewable energy facilities to 52.2 MW and an increase in the purchase of renewable electricity to 600 million kWh, an increase of 166.3% and 79.6% respectively compared to 2022.
AI also has a new role to play in energy conservation. Relying on the AI algorithm model, the operation of each equipment is optimized by integrating changes in IT data, terminal environmental data, and outdoor weather data, so as to achieve overall energy-saving optimization on the premise of meeting cooling needs. The application of AI tuning and optimization technology can effectively reduce the PUE of data center modules. In 2023, Tencent will further expand the application scope of AI adjustment and optimization technology. In 2023, new modules with this technology will reduce electricity consumption by about 5,000 MWh and avoid carbon emissions by 2,851.5 tons.
In terms of ecological protection, in 2023, Tencent launched the "Nature Risk Assessment" for the first time, which analyzes the impacts, dependencies, risks and opportunities of the company's business operations on nature and biodiversity, as an important reference for the company to plan future actions. Tencent's Birdwatcher WeChat mini-program, which contains a database of 1,500 species of birds, uses GPS and AI image recognition technologies to track the birds' locations and migration paths, and encourages the public to take and upload pictures of migratory birds when they spot them, helping scientific research institutions study bird migration.
Manage the "double-edged sword" of technology
Technology is a double-edged sword, especially in the wave of generative artificial intelligence, Tencent has its own thinking on how to make technology more "good". "Our technology and business teams make decisions for good before committing resources, clarifying 'what to do' and 'what not to do' in line with our technology for good mission vision. Ma Huateng said in the report.
To this end, Tencent pays close attention to issues such as bias, discrimination, privacy, abuse, ethics, and values in the field of artificial intelligence, and follows the principles of "knowable", "controllable", "usable", and "reliable", and has established an AI technical committee, focusing on areas including but not limited to AI large models, natural language processing (NLP), optical character recognition (OCR), image recognition, recommendation algorithms, deep learning training and reasoning, etc.
By the end of 2023, Tencent had obtained more than 3,600 authorized patents to protect users' digital rights. With the extensive and in-depth application of AI in products and services such as social networking, advertising, and games, Tencent has further strengthened its control over third-party data processing, completed the technical upgrade of network security protection capabilities such as zero trust, API security, honeypot services, and threat intelligence, and formed an active defense and security capability system of "intelligence-attack-defense-management-planning". In addition, Tencent Cloud has also opened some basic security capabilities to small and medium-sized enterprises free of charge.