Tencent polices supply chain corruption
February 4, 2021
By Chris Forrester
Tencent, the South African and Chinese-backed web-giant, says it has fired staff and named and shamed 37 supplier companies in an anti-corruption drive.
Tencent Holdings is China’s biggest social media and videogames company, said in a statement February 3rd that it had reported 40 staff to the authorities since it commenced its anti-corruption drive in late 2019.
The 37 named companies have been blacklisted and had their relationship with Tencent terminated.
In its latest report, Tencent said 22 cases of embezzlement and bribery were uncovered since the fourth quarter of 2019. Most of the cases were linked to Tencent’s Platform and Content Group, which runs video-sharing businesses, while violations were also found in the online game and cloud business departments, Tencent said. Four former employees have been investigated by authorities on criminal charges of taking bribes.
In a report on Japan’s Nikkei, quoting China’s Caixin, it said that Tencent set up an anti-bribery office and warned staff and suppliers of six areas where violates would lead to consequences. The list included fraud, bribery, leaking trade secrets and having any sort of conflict of interest.
Back in 2017 fourteen companies including Alibaba Holdings and Baidu set up a similar anti-corruption task force alliance to fight business violations. In early 2019, DJI Technology, the world’s largest manufacturer of consumer drones, revealed a series of internal corruption cases that cost it 1 billion yuan ($150 million) in 2018. Most were linked to DJI’s supply chain management and procurement department. A total of 45 employees were caught, 29 of whom were fired and 16 of whom were handed over to local law enforcement departments.
Tencent said it would stick to a “zero tolerance” policy towards unethical behaviour.