SoftBank

SoftBank’s measures to improve digital access for people with disabilities include offering discounts, smartphones and tablets for free, simplified smartphone apps and stores equipped with staff trained in sign language. The company also discloses the number of people with disabilities it employs and partners with organisations to support the education of people with disabilities. Additionally, the company reports its community investments.

Softbank promotes digital skills by providing programming workshops for elementary and junior high school students. The company also loans its robot Pepper to special needs schools to assist their educational requirements and supports school connectivity by providing smartphones and tablets for free.

SoftBank’s cybersecurity practices follow industry norms. It has a standalone security document which details how cybersecurity is managed, including defining internal processes for dealing with security issues, and has an incident response team. SoftBank is also one of the few companies to publicly provide copies of its information security management certification. The company has also made a high-level commitment to child online safety.

SoftBank’s support for start-ups is close to industry best practice. The company has established special funding and accelerators for start-ups founded by people from underrepresented groups, and it includes non-profit start-ups in its portfolio. With regard to supporting diversity in innovation, the company has started reporting the number of its women employees engaged in tech roles. Additionally, Softbank makes a commitment to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It also offers innovative services for households to promote renewable energy use and support forest conservation activities.

SoftBank can consider a dedicated initiative for enhancing digital opportunities for women and girls to help reduce the gender digital divide. The company can also disclose participation and impact metrics for its existing programmes for increasing digital access. Additionally, the company can improve transparency by reporting how the economic value it creates is distributed among its stakeholders, as well as the income taxes it pays and its employment in its main markets.

The company has an opportunity to develop programmes for advancing intermediate digital skills. It can also disclose participation metrics and impact assessments for its existing skills development programmes.

The company also has an opportunity to publish a transparency report disclosing the government requests it receives for personal data. Additionally, it can expand disclosure of its measures to protect children online.

The company can report on its contribution to open source initiatives and standards, as well as how it supports diverse and ethical research and development (R&D). It can also consider using the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as a framework for assessing its own goals and progress.

SoftBank commits to respecting human rights and the ILO core labour rights. However, the company does not disclose a process to identify and assess salient human rights risks in its own operations and in its business relationships. While the company states that “appropriate correction and relief measures” are implemented if a human rights violation occurs, it does not describe a global system that allows the company to prevent, mitigate or remediate its salient human rights issues. The company does disclose a grievance mechanism available to both employees and external stakeholders to raise human rights complaints or concerns.

SoftBank does not have a formal policy commitment to respect the health and safety of its own workers, but it does require its business relationships to commit to respecting workers’ health and safety. While the company states that it will strive to pay its workers a living wage, it is not clear by which year it plans to achieve this target. It discloses the proportion of its workforce covered by collective bargaining agreements. But it does not specify that it does not require workers to work more than regular and overtime hours. In relation to workforce diversity, SoftBank does not have a commitment to promote gender equality, but it has time-bound targets on gender equality and women’s empowerment. It also provides a breakdown of employees in different employee categories by gender. However, it does not disclose employee breakdowns against other indicators of diversity.

SoftBank has a public commitment to protecting personal data. Moreover, it discloses a global tax strategy, which is overseen by the company’s board. However, the company does not disclose its income tax payments in individual tax jurisdictions. The company does disclose its lobbying expenditures. SoftBank has a policy prohibiting bribery and corruption, and it includes anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses in its business relationship contracts. Furthermore, the company takes steps to identify and address bribery and corruption, and it has a grievance mechanism for stakeholders to raise concerns and complaints on the topic.