Out of 182 entries from over 35 countries, five teams made it into the final round of this year’s Corporate Responsibility Award competition. In ­October 2007, the finalists presented their projects to the Company’s executive management at the ­Siemens Business Conference in Berlin. In recog­nition of their achievements, CEO Peter Löscher ­awarded the first-place team €50,000 and each of the runner-up teams €10,000 for the continuation and further development of their projects.

First prize went to a team from I&S Water Tech­nologies in Australia for developing an efficient, ­reliable system – known as the Safe Water Kiosk – for the treatment of drinking water. According to ­estimates from the World Health Organization, 1.2 billion people in the world currently have no access to clean drinking water – especially in regions with poor ­infrastructure. Addressing this major challenge of our time, the Australian team – working together with the SkyJuice Foundation of Sydney – developed a ­solution using Siemens technology. The inexpensive water filtration system, which operates very ­reliably over a long period with minimum maintenance, has already been introduced in Kenya, where it’s pro­viding 2,500 people with clean drinking ­water. More than 300 of the systems are now deployed in 16 countries on four continents.

Since many childhood diseases are relatively rare, the knowledge and experience needed to diagnose and treat them effectively is often available at only a few locations. To address this problem, employees at Siemens Medical Solutions and ­­Siemens Corporate Technology – together with their partners in the Health-e-Child project – are exploiting state-of-the-art information technology to speed up knowledge transfer in pediatric medicine. By linking leading healthcare facilities, research institutions and companies, the Health-e-Child information platform enables the latest knowledge in pediatric medicine to be made rapidly available worldwide. The aim is to create a global network encompassing health­care providers even in remote areas. This project ­leverages opportunities provided by the European Union’s sixth Framework Program for Research and Technological Development.

In the past, graduates of engineering programs in Mexico were often not well equipped to keep pace with worldwide developments in their fields. Typically, engineering curricula had little practical relevance and training programs were too long. No wonder the field wasn’t attracting many young people. Now, ­Siemens VDO in Mexico – in cooperation with the government, universities and local chambers of commerce – has developed three highly focused and streamlined study programs. This project will help ensure a steady supply of well-qualified Mexican engineers – and Siemens in Mexico will no longer have to spend a whole year training its new engineering employees.

A partnership between mdexx, an Automation and Drives company, and Martinshof, a sheltered workshop in Bremen, Germany, has been flourishing for over ten years now. The project began in 1998, when mdexx employees proposed using rooms available on company premises for the Martinshof project. Ever since, Martinshof personnel and mdexx employees have been training and supervising a small group of disabled people, who are taking over increasingly complex tasks in the factory. The Martinshof workers travel to mdexx on their own and work side-by-side with mdexx employees, tremendously increasing their self-reliance and self-esteem. A showpiece of successful workplace integration, the project is enabling the disabled participants to achieve greater professional and social recognition while promoting understanding for the disabled among mdexx employees.

The Caring Hands team at Siemens Medical Solutions in the U.S. has formed a close partnership with the United Way, one of North America’s leading chari­ties. In 2006, volunteers and coordinators raised a record $705,993 for charitable purposes – an amount that reflects the strength of the partnership and of which the participants can be justly proud. The work of a constantly growing network of volunteers, the regular training of coordinators and continuous coverage in the internal media at Medical Solutions USA made this outstanding achievement possible.

Further information about the Corporate Responsibility Award, the winners of the year 2007 and about Siemens Corporate Citizenship you will find under www.siemens.com/craward and www.siemens.com/corporate_citizenship.