By Caitlyn Chen<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With only five years remaining to implement the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs<\/a>) \u2013 a roadmap to create a better future \u2014 time is running out fast. Urgent action is needed across all sectors to tackle interconnected social challenges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For corporations, in particular, there are growing expectations that while business goals are important, a company looking to unlock growth, resilience, and its full potential should integrate social innovation into its corporate strategy to become a real force for good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Connecting over a billion people, our app is a platform that can drive real social good.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s a goal we\u2019ve long worked towards at Tencent<\/a>. Realising that our innovations for consumers and partners can be applied to advance social development, we adopted \u201cTech for Good\u201d as our guiding mission in 2018. Then in 2021, we established a dedicated Sustainable Social Value (SSV) organisation as an engine to implement that fundamental vision. By integrating social value into our products, services, and culture, we\u2019re leveraging our technological and business capabilities to bridge gaps, remove barriers, and improve people\u2019s lives and the planet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But what does this look like in practice for a company like ours? Here are some examples.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When it comes to social innovation, sometimes small steps are best to break down barriers and build trust.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Our flagship communication app, Weixin in China and WeChat internationally, makes staying in touch, sharing moments, and paying for things easy, safe, and fun. Connecting over a billion people, it is also a platform that can drive real social good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sensing strong user support for charitable causes and understanding the barriers that exist to giving, we\u2019ve developed tools on Weixin that make it simple for users to donate to charities, even very small amounts, while ensuring donations are well spent and that fast, transparent feedback \u2013 essential to building trust \u2013 is provided.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Let me share a story that brings this to life. A Weixin user donated one cent to a meal fund for sanitation workers. Three days later, he received a notification that his donation, pooled with others, had provided a hot lunch to a sanitation worker in his city. Encouraged, he donated again, this time a larger amount.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Over the past 10 years, small acts of kindness like this have added up to over RMB 30 billion (USD 4 billion) to support tens of thousands of charity projects in healthcare, children\u2019s safety, education, and more. This coincides with an increase of about four times<\/a> in the proportion of people who donated money in the past decade in China, a journey we\u2019re excited to be part of.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The best way to make a difference is to work strategically with others, leveraging our respective expertise to amplify progress.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Weixin\u2019s power of connection and real-time communication can be very helpful in health emergencies like cardiac arrests, where timely coordination and action are critical to saving lives. How can we systematically maximise its potential in these urgent scenarios?<\/p>\n\n\n\n We\u2019ve collaborated with local hospitals and emergency helplines \u2013 in China, people dial 120 \u2013 to build a rescue network that can act within minutes. This system ensures seamless communication across emergency responders, maps nearby Automated External Defibrillators (AEDs), and even enables bystanders to act as first responders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We\u2019ve seen this in action in cities like Dongguan, where a man collapsed at work, but the nearest ambulance was 16 minutes away. When a colleague called 120, dispatchers sent a text message linking the caller to a Weixin video call with a doctor, who guided the team through live video to restore the man\u2019s heartbeat and breathing before the ambulance arrived.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This network has already saved hundreds of lives in pilot cities, raising survival rates from merely two percent to 17 percent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Addressing complex societal challenges requires open and collaborative ecosystems where expertise, resources, and vision align to drive systemic impact.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Beyond technology, corporations like ours can accelerate progress towards the SDGs by leveraging our business know-how, cross-sector connections, and market-tested experience to empower innovators tackling urgent global challenges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Consider climate action: Our CarbonX Program<\/a>, launched with partners across sectors, supports low-carbon technology innovators to scale at a pace needed for the world to achieve net zero by 2050. Winning teams gain not only catalytic funding, but also academic mentorship, real-world pilot opportunities, and critical market insights through a feedback loop involving investors and industry leaders. Now in its second phase, CarbonX<\/a> is expanding its reach, inviting global innovators to test their research beyond the lab.<\/p>\n\n\n\n By fostering ecosystems uniting corporations, investors, academia, startups, and more, we can bridge gaps between sectors and amplify high-impact solutions with coordinated actions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While technology offers powerful tools, it\u2019s the shared goals and collaboration with partners that unleash our full potential.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n To ensure our efforts create meaningful change, we developed the SQI framework (Scale, Quality, Impact) to guide every initiative. In pilot phases, we prioritise quality, focusing on tangible improvements for beneficiaries and refining our problem-solving efficiency. As solutions mature, we ensure they stay effective and scalable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Collaboration fuels this progress. At events like the 2024 Sustainable Social Value Innovation Summit<\/a>, and the World Economic Forum in Davos, we\u2019ve witnessed the exponential power of collective action\u2014the Schwab Foundation<\/a>\u2019s global community of nearly 500 social entrepreneurs and innovators, for instance, has already positively impacted 931 million lives<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The road ahead is long, but it is one we walk together. We will continue leveraging our technologies and business expertise to empower individuals, communities, and organisations to achieve more. Because goodwill grows possibilities, and together, we can turn them into realities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Caitlyn Chen With only five years remaining to implement the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) \u2013 a roadmap to create a better future \u2014 time is running out fast. Urgent action is needed across all sectors to tackle interconnected social challenges. For corporations, in particular, there are growing expectations that while business […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":20649,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5937","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/menub.earth\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5937","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/menub.earth\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/menub.earth\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/menub.earth\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/menub.earth\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5937"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/menub.earth\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5937\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20650,"href":"https:\/\/menub.earth\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5937\/revisions\/20650"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/menub.earth\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/20649"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/menub.earth\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/menub.earth\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/menub.earth\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Harnessing technology to uplift people and the planet<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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1. Small actions, big impact<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
2. A life-saving network<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
3. Cross-Sector Ecosystem for Innovation<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
If you want to walk far, walk together<\/h4>\n\n\n\n