Intel ranks among top companies
Intel continues to rank among the top corporate philanthropists in the Bay Area according to the 2007 San Francisco Business Times Corporate Philanthropy Survey.
Intel was recently recognized for this honor at a corporate philanthropy summit, where Intel president and chief executive officer Paul Otellini took part in an executive panel discussion on philanthropy.
San Francisco Times publisher Mary Huss interviews Intel president and CEO Paul Otellini, who was recently part of a panel discussion on corporate philanthropy.
In its annual survey, released in July, the San Francisco Business Times highlighted Intel as the third most generous philanthropic corporation in the San Francisco Bay Area.
For the last two years Intel has held on to the second spot, but this year AT&T¹ jumped ahead of Wells Fargo to claim the top spot; Wells Fargo claimed the second spot.
"There’s a commitment to corporate social responsibility and philanthropy and giving," said Dave Stangis, Intel Director of Corporate Responsibility, who accepted the award on Intel’s behalf. "At Intel we really do look at it as a strategic part of our program. Instead of giving it’s viewed almost as investing. Investment in community, investment in human development."
Intel contributed slightly more than $10 million to Bay Area charities, non-profit and education organizations during 2006. Some of the cash gifts Intel provided in the Bay Area in 2006 included: $10,000 to Junior Achievement, $100,000 to Second Harvest Food Bank of Santa Clara and San Mateo counties based in San Jose, $60,000 to the Santa Clara Unified School District.
Intel has ranked among the top three corporate philanthropists in the Bay Area since the San Francisco Business Times began the list six years ago. At the philanthropy summit Intel was also one of ten companies to receive the Levi Strauss Community Commitment Award for giving one percent or more of its annual revenue.
"We’ve been around for 40 years," said Stangis. "And our founders Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore brought a culture of innovation and giving to the company. It’s part of the Intel value set."
That’s a point Otellini emphasized later on during the panel discussion when he reflected on the culture he say Noyce and Moore establish.
"Intel is a 40 year old company, and the founders of the company long established the tradition of giving back to the community. Bob and Gordon focused on education in the early days for the obvious reason. The obvious reason is that we needed talented people and the state of education, even then, needed some work. We've evolved that; we've kept focused on that."
Otellini shared with a crowd of about 800 attending the corporate philanthropy summit, including leaders of Bay Area non-profit organizations, a snapshot of Intel’s corporate philanthropy philosophy.
"We have an active program of company giving, in terms of cash," said Otellini. "We have employee giving, focus on volunteerism. Our 85,000 employees gave a quarter million hours last year. Thirty-eight percent of the company volunteers somewhere. And we match those hours with dollars that go to schools where they volunteer. So we actually put money behind their efforts."
Otellini also explained how Intel focuses most of its efforts on education, including Intel Teach, and Intel Computer Clubhouse.
"The program that I’m must proud of is a thing we call Intel Teach," said Otellini. "We have now trained 3.9 million teachers around the world on how to improve their curriculum, how to use technology to become better teachers, and to integrate technology in the classroom. We’re going to train 10 (million) over the next five years. It touches many, many kids when you think of the multiplicative effect of how many kids, 10 million teachers will touch over their careers."
¹As part of its acquisition of SBC, AT&T state regulators ordered AT&T to assume two commitments to non-profits: one from SBC for $9 million per year for five years, and another from SBC’s 1998 acquisition of PacBell for $5 million per year for 10 years.
