Corporate responsibility

ARM’s corporate responsibility programme encompasses accountability to shareholders, commitment to employees and their families, service to our Partners, fostering good relationships with suppliers, involvement in the betterment of local communities and minimising impact on the environment. Within each of these pillars, we focus on continuous improvement measured by internal objectives, external audits and benchmarking.

Employees

ARM endeavours to attract and retain the best people available by being a good and ethical employer. In the UK, ARM participated in the Sunday Times “Best Company to Work For” survey in 2008 and in January 2009, was presented with a 1 star award which means it is a “first class” employer. In 2008 ARM was judged by the UK’s Guardian newspaper as a “Top Employer”.

Benefits

Employees receive benefits including private medical/healthcare; health, travel and life insurance; pensions/401k plan, sabbaticals and flexible working. ARM aligns the interests of employees and shareholders by providing equity participation through restricted shares under the Employee Equity Plan and the opportunity to buy shares through savings plans. ARM supports family-friendly initiatives such as a child care voucher scheme in the UK and a flexible spending account in the US.

Feedback, development and training

ARM recognises the importance of enabling employees to learn and develop, encouraging each individual to embark on a path of self-betterment using a blend of reflection and feedback, coaching, mentoring, training and education. At least once a year, employees and managers have a formal discussion on performance and development through the ARM Feedback and Development System. Training needs are tracked, delivered and progress is monitored through our Learning and Development team, ensuring that the Group’s skills base is increased in line with business needs and personal aspirations.

Health and safety

The safety and welfare of employees, contractors and visitors is a priority. ARM has adopted UK health and safety legislation as the global corporate standard due to its depth and breadth and maintains membership of the British Safety Council to reflect this standard. ARM’s global internal audit programme, the Facilities Management Review, evaluates health and safety performance across all sites with a goal of consistency of health and safety provision world-wide. We have seen increased awareness from design centre managers of health, safety and welfare issues and their mitigation in 2008, in the results of audits conducted by Lloyds Register Quality Assurance (LRQA).

To date ARM has had no serious issues and retains a very low accident rate – less than two recorded accidents per one hundred employees annually.

Health and safety issues are communicated to employees through various media including the intranet, email and workshops. As part of ARM’s induction process, an extensive workshop introduces new employees to health and safety issues in their office.

Suppliers

ARM has relatively few suppliers, but the Company engages in dialogue with larger vendors to assess their CR credentials. ARM evaluates suppliers on several factors including vendor policies (where applicable) and the reputation of the supplier or contractor. ARM encourages suppliers and contractors to abide by its Human Rights and Ethical Trading Policy. ARM continues to work with suppliers and service providers to minimise environmental impact, wherever practicable.

Local communities

ARM believes a good corporate citizen invests in and engages with local communities.

Business community

ARM is a founding member of both The Learning Collaboration (TLC) and the Cambridge Network as well as a founding sponsor of the Electronics Knowledge Transfer Network. In 2008, ARM co-founded the Cambridge Business Lectures. Four lectures were held in 2008 with combined attendance of more than 1,000. The lectures are free to participants through corporate sponsorship.

Youth and education

ARM supports educational endeavours through sponsorship of science/IT-related education initiatives and donations of supplies such as redundant computer equipment to schools. We support the Engineering Education Scheme, Young Engineers and Young Enterprise as well as the Cambridge University Entrepreneurs, University of Texas College of Communication, Cambridge University Engineering Society and primary educational establishments.

ARM’s University Programme engages with universities in nearly every region of the world, including the EU, North and South America, Australia, India, China and Japan – designing course material, providing technical seminars, donating equipment and software and offering assistance to students. This reflects ARM’s commitment to help universities produce graduates with the necessary skills that its Partners need.

Employee volunteering and gift matching programme

ARM encourages employees to support their local communities by providing paid volunteer time and a charitable gift matching programme. Employee volunteering includes acting as school governors, mentors to young people, or volunteers to organise events to raise money for charity. Some employees volunteer time for work on engineering projects with school and college students.

Environment

ARM designs technology at the heart of low-power products across a wide range of application areas. Intelligence within its low-power IP cores can be used to measure, manage and control the environmental performance of consumer electronics and IT equipment, while improving functional performance and reducing carbon footprint. Additionally, ARM can leverage its Connected Community™ of partners to provide complete low-power solutions for products based on the ARM architecture.

ARM’s activities do not produce harmful waste or emissions, and the Ethical Investment Research Service (EIRIS) grades ARM as an environmentally “low impact” business. However, ARM recognises the need to mitigate any form of environmental impact. ARM’s environmental performance is measured against targets to reduce resource usage, increase reuse and recycling and control carbon emissions.

ARM works with LRQA environmental auditors to develop and improve our environmental management system. LRQA’s twice yearly environmental and health and safety themed audits are now integrated with their other accreditation work, which has increased understanding of ARM’s environmental objectives among the local management and provided action plans for achieving these objectives. Adopting LRQA’s Business Assurance approach provides an independent assessment of the ARM Management System and the various review procedures in place within the company. This approach enables LRQA to verify ARM’s compliance with ISO9001:2000 and components of other relevant ISO standards.

In UK offices where ARM procures its own energy, supplies are from renewable sources. The application of a greener policy on energy procurement is being extended to other ARM locations where practicable. For example, the new 92,000 sq ft office in San Jose, California has incorporated some of the building technologies that score towards the Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System and this principle will be implemented in future sites where feasible. In the UK, ARM decreased CO2 production by 22% from 2006 to 2007 and by 89% between 2007 and 2008. In 2008, ARM also implemented an off-site regional Data Centre in the US and by centralising these services the number of server rooms distributed across multiple ARM locations was reduced with an associated reduction in environmental impact.

ARM continues to assess its waste management strategies and improve the provision for recycling. Paper, cardboard packaging, glass, aluminum and plastic can be recycled in many locations. In the UK, paper recycling grew by 56% between 2006 and 2007 and by 103% between 2007 and 2008. Likewise the cardboard packaging recycling growth between 2006 and 2007 of 12% saw a further increase of 30% between 2007 and 2008.

Travel

ARM recognises the environmental impact of travel and employees are encouraged to cycle to work, to share car journeys, or to use public transport. Consistent with local custom and practice, bus transport is provided for employees in Bangalore to minimise the environmental impact of individual travel to work and to reduce congestion. In a company of 1,740 people, there are fewer than 30 company cars.

Business travel, particularly by air, is important to maintain ARM’s very effective Partner relationships, but ways this can be reduced are regularly reviewed. Video conferencing is utilised where practicable and we are progressively upgrading our equipment to make this option more effective. Data regarding flights is benchmarked with a view to reducing business travel while ensuring that good business relationships are maintained. Despite ARM’s increased headcount and number of locations between 2006 and the end of 2008, we have achieved a reduction in flight-related CO2 production of 3.4% over this period.

Ethics and equal opportunities

ARM recognises its ethical responsibilities to all stakeholders which are manifested in a range of policies and processes. ARM conducts its business with integrity, respecting cultures and the dignity and rights of individuals. The Company has an obligation to promote respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms for all, without distinction as to colour, ethnic origin, gender, age, religion or similar belief, political or other opinion, disability or sexual orientation.

Business continuity plans

ARM has developed business continuity plans for all of its operations world-wide to enable business to continue should a serious event or incident occur. These plans are designed to protect the interests of ARM’s stakeholders and in particular ARM’s employees, property and other assets, and to provide facilities and infrastructure to reinstate business operations as quickly as possible after an event. The continual review of these plans forms part of the management review process alongside environmental management and health, safety and welfare.

A more detailed CR report is available on our website at www.arm.com