Over the past three years the Motorola Solution Foundation has awarded over 50 grants in 12 countries in the Asia-Pacific region. The charitable arm of the multinational corporation aims at promoting educational and community-building projects in the areas in which it operates.

The grants are part of Motorola’s CSR programme, and fund projects in Australia, China, Honk Kong, India, Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Taiwan and Thailand. “The Motorola Solutions Foundation supports educational and charitable initiatives that make communities safer or inspire students to enter careers in engineering or technology,” explains Matt Blakely, Director of the Motorola Solutions Foundation. “We are proud to partner with these organisations that will to positively impact the communities where our employees live and work.”

In India, the grants will support engineering internships for the Foundation for Advancement of Education and Research. Students from disadvantaged backgrounds will be able to undertake a one-month internship at a number of top-level engineering institutes to gain vital work experience before entering the job market.

Motorola’s aim is to empower local communities in the region. In Sri Lanka, the grant will fund the Inter University Enterprise Mobility Development competition where local undergraduate students will gain experience in mobile application developments. All of Motorola’s initiatives’ foster the educational development of the local workforce, bringing development to the region.

Many multinational corporations have similar programmes to Motorola’s. Modern notions of CSR encourage big companies to give back to the communities where they operate. Educational and community building programmes are often the CSR projects for a number of companies. “A plethora of research points to a majority of stakeholders agreeing that CSR is a ‘must do’,” says Kristian Darigan Merenda, Edelman’s senior vice president of brand and corporate citizenship.

ImpaktCorp, a Toronto-based advisory services firm that helps large companies align business and social outcomes, has carried out research that revealed corporations that are regarded as leaders in terms of business performance all tend to assume similar CSR strategies. “We found five interrelated criteria that form a new blueprint for how corporations can maximise their investments in CSR: business-based social purpose, clear theory of change, quality and depth of information, concentrated effort, and partnering with experts,” explains Paul Klein, the founder of ImpaktCorp.

For Mohammad Akhtar, senior vice president of Motorola in Asia Pacific and the Middle East, their own approach to CSR, particularly their education projects is much more straight forward. “The Foundation provides funding to support programs that expand awareness and engagement in communities,” he says. “The Motorola Solutions Foundation grants enable people to live their lives in a more connected and meaningful way.”