Responsible Supply Chain

Setting expectations for suppliers to advance sustainable practices throughout our value chain.

Click through to learn about our 2024 impact in action. For detailed supply chain data, please see our corporate responsibility KPI webpage. 

Supply chains are key drivers of economic development, enabling the delivery of crucial goods, services and materials on a global scale. As the regulatory landscape and stakeholder expectations evolve, businesses and their supply chains must keep pace to remain competitive, resilient and trustworthy.

We work with more than 20,000 suppliers globally¹ to ensure a resilient, reliable and geographically diverse supply chain.²

Aligning Around Shared Standards

We seek suppliers that share our commitment to strict ethical and environmental standards. Our guidelines are conveyed through our Principles of Conduct for Suppliers (Supplier Principles), which align with international standards bodies such as the International Labour Organization (ILO).

We set expectations for adhering to the Supplier Principles through our Supplier Portal and contract agreements. We also expect suppliers to hold their subcontractors to the same principles and require that both comply with all applicable laws and regulations. Suppliers must verify alignment to our Supplier Principles through a self-attestation process every 18–24 months. To ensure compliance, we also survey a subset based on risk level. Supplier risk level — and subsequently survey frequency — is determined with a high-risk activities questionnaire completed by our sourcing managers in cooperation with the relevant AT&T departments.

Environmental, Health & Safety (EHS) Expectations

We expect suppliers to demonstrate robust EHS policies and practices, and to operate in a manner consistent with our corporate responsibility practices. Suppliers must provide safe, healthy workplaces that meet relevant standards, laws, rules and regulations. They must also agree to share appropriate health and safety information and training with employees.

Defining Our Artificial Intelligence (AI) Expectations

Our Supplier Artificial Intelligence Requirements outline our expectations for suppliers — and their subcontractors — when creating and using AI tools, systems, solutions and activities on AT&T’s behalf. This includes ensuring suppliers are responsible for any outcomes generated by AI, with careful oversight of the data used, goals set and algorithms deployed, and a commitment to upholding the highest ethical standards at all times.

Ensuring Responsible Procurement

When it comes to sourcing, we embed sustainability-oriented considerations by:

• Adding sustainability clauses to requests for proposals and agreements.
• Training sourcing managers on sustainability principles.
• Updating sourcing managers on the sustainability performance of existing suppliers.

Through our due diligence process, we screen potential suppliers prior to contract execution, utilizing an onboarding questionnaire. Based on their responses and the presence of any high-risk indicators, we deploy risk mitigation measures such as contract language and other controls. We also perform business- and risk-specific compliance monitoring as appropriate.

Modern Slavery

We are committed to assessing and addressing modern slavery and human trafficking risks within our operations and supply chain. We continuously assess the nature and extent of our risk exposure by reviewing supply chain areas that may be at higher risk.

Employees in specific job functions are trained on modern slavery and human trafficking risk and conduct reputational risk due diligence on new and existing vendors. When information that could be a risk factor is identified, it is brought to supply chain leadership and appropriate legal teams for review.

Read more about our efforts in our Modern Slavery Statements.

Conflict Minerals

Through our Supplier Principles, we set the expectation that the products we sell will not contain conflict minerals that directly or indirectly finance or benefit armed groups. We ensure applicable contracts reference our expectation that suppliers do not use conflict minerals in the products they provide to AT&T. We also require that suppliers comply with applicable conflict mineral rules.

We reserve the right to audit for any known instances of noncompliance. Where noncompliance issues are identified, we work with suppliers to remedy them, suspending or terminating contracts with those that fail to demonstrate a commitment to this or any of our Supplier Principles.

Annual JAC Audits

We maintain membership — and board member status — with the Joint Alliance for CSR (JAC) and leverage that to inform our efforts in supply chain human and labor rights, including modern slavery. We participate in JAC’s collaborative audit initiative, conducting annual supplier audits with globally recognized independent auditors. JAC utilizes a common audit framework, based on the SA8000 and ISO 41001 Standards, that covers topics such as child labor, forced labor, health and safety, freedom of association, nondiscrimination, disciplinary practices, working hours, wages and compensation, the environment and business ethics. JAC also shares resources, including audit results and corrective actions, among members to promote best practices.

The process involves a coordinated on-site audit, followed by appropriate corrective actions to improve sustainability and social responsibility-related conditions. Any corrective actions are managed and implemented with the relevant suppliers to resolution. If a factory receives a result that raises concern, it may be reaudited after one year.

Through JAC, AT&T also uses Mobile Worker Surveys to supplement on-site factory audits. These surveys enable two-way communication directly between auditors and factory workers without management intervention, increasing visibility of potential human rights issues that would otherwise go unreported. 

In 2024, JAC audited 139 factory locations (of which 115 were JAC-led audits and 24 were RBA-led Validated Assessment Program audits),³ including 72 at AT&T suppliers’ facilities. AT&T led a combined six audits and Mobile Worker Surveys of our suppliers’ factory locations.

Of 115 JAC-led audits, 90% resulted in corrective actions and mutually agreed-upon corrective action plans due to audit findings. 85% of corrective actions were in the following areas: Health & Safety (44%), Working Hours (19%), Environment (11%) and Wages and Compensation (11%). 

Supplier Environmental Sustainability

AT&T encourages suppliers to reduce their environmental impact, target energy efficiencies and respond to our sustainability-related information requests. This includes supporting them in setting science-based targets that will help reduce their own energy consumption and emissions, as well as our value chain emissions.

We engage strategic suppliers representing at least 80% of our supplier spend through annual assessments to understand their sustainability performance. We also request information about emissions allocated specifically to AT&T, product-level emissions data and areas for collaboration.

For more on how we manage Scope 3 emissions, see our Efficiency & Emissions issue brief.

Supplier Inclusivity

We are proud to be a long-standing leader in supplier inclusivity, being one of the first U.S. corporations to launch a dedicated program back in 1968. We aim to drive economic growth and impact for suppliers and their communities by fueling local employment and providing competitive value.

Today, our supplier inclusivity efforts center around four pillars:

• Supplier Advocacy: Our sourcing organization, business unit partners and prime suppliers work closely to identify opportunities for consideration and inclusion of all suppliers. Our efforts also include supplier coaching, mentoring and capability assessment to support current and prospective supplier contract success.
• Prime Supplier Program: Leverages our strong relationships with our strategic suppliers to build a more inclusive pipeline of subcontractors.
• Small Business Engagement: Focuses on furthering our commitment to economic growth by supporting purchases from small local suppliers. By doing so, we aim to bolster economic development within local communities and enhance our commodity areas.
• Supplier Financing Program: Enables suppliers to leverage the credit power of AT&T. Our suppliers benefit by freeing up additional cash flow at a low interest rate that many are not eligible to receive at their financial institutions.

Learn more about AT&T Supplier Inclusivity.

Supply Chain Resilience

In recent years, global supply chains have faced unprecedented disruptions and a continuously evolving geopolitical landscape — highlighting the importance of improved supply chain resiliency. To address such challenges, we’re enhancing our capabilities to proactively respond to and manage risks by improving our supply chain visibility and risk mitigation practices in collaboration with suppliers. These efforts include:

• Geopolitical Risk Management: The geopolitical environment is constantly changing — regional conflicts, wars and shifting global trade spheres as a result of evolving trade policies and tariffs continue to significantly impact supply chains around the world. The volatile geopolitical landscape requires us to prepare for unexpected events that may impact AT&T’s suppliers and supply chain. To best prepare for these events, we are collaborating with suppliers to discuss mitigation plans, mapping our exposure and monitoring real-time supplier disruption alerts to quickly assess and mitigate risk.
• Supplier Risk Assessment: Our supplier visibility and resiliency efforts aim to reduce supplier risk to AT&T. We have worked to leverage industry data as well as supplier data to holistically understand potential supplier risk to AT&T. These data collection efforts include evaluating supplier financial health, assessing mission-critical suppliers and gauging the impacts of key inputs, such as raw materials and commodities, to our supply chain.
• Supply Chain Mapping: We have implemented an extensive data collection program that has allowed us to map and better understand where our suppliers concentrate manufacturing of key products and components. With this improved visibility, we will continually evaluate our supplier base to ensure we are achieving an industry-leading cost structure balanced with risk mitigation and resiliency.
• AI Applications: We have integrated a spectrum of AI applications into our operations, including robotic automation, real-time routing and Internet of Things (IoT) sensing, to build a more resilient and responsive supply chain.
• Diversification: Geopolitical actions such as tariffs and trade restrictions are prompting us to continue diversifying our supply chain to mitigate impacts and ensure supply chain resilience. 

Understanding Ongoing Supplier Performance

Ensuring suppliers uphold our expectations is crucial to building a responsible supply chain, and we maintain various processes to assess supplier performance. We continuously screen suppliers against governmental restricted parties lists to ensure we do not engage with sanctioned individuals or entities. We also use our ongoing due diligence process to monitor contracted suppliers to ensure we do not conduct business with entities that pose risks to our operations, brand or reputation.

Suppliers and their employees can contact AT&T regarding corporate responsibility standards or noncompliance concerns at inquiry@attsuppliers.com.

Responsible Supply Chain Governance

Our supply chain is wide-reaching and complex; we maintain an oversight structure that is equally comprehensive, including:

• Board of Directors: Provides the highest level of oversight of AT&T activities, including those of our Global Supply Chain (GSC) organization.
• Executive Vice President — GSC: Holds top managerial responsibility for supply chain management and serves as a member of the Corporate Responsibility Governance Council. The council is led by our Chief Sustainability Officer and comprises senior executives and officers responsible for business areas most closely linked to our current corporate responsibility priorities.
• GSC Team: Manages daily supply chain activities, including requests for proposals and quotes, negotiations, contracting, contingency planning and ongoing supplier management and evaluation.
• Risk Management Team: Responsible for preserving assets and shareowner value by minimizing the financial effects of accidental losses, including supply chain-related activities. Also responsible for establishing insurance requirements for contractors and vendors and reviewing insurance clauses within contracts.

In 2024, we spent more than $65 billion on goods and services worldwide.

Advancing Action for the Planet

Throughout 2024, we delivered trainings for nearly 200 AT&T employees. These trainings covered topics like climate, changing sustainability regulations and what AT&T is doing to support suppliers in reducing supply chain environmental impacts. By doing so, we can equip our sourcing managers with the information they need to better support suppliers on their sustainability journeys.

We also partnered with CDP to deliver a webinar for suppliers to help enhance their disclosure efforts. During the year, 254 suppliers reported data to AT&T through the CDP questionnaire.

To evolve our approach to assessing suppliers, we engaged EcoVadis for the first time to explore supplier performance across environment, labor and human rights, ethics and sustainable procurement. We began onboarding suppliers to this new process, which will help us gain an increasingly holistic insight into supplier sustainability performance.