Since our founding, we’ve pioneered new technologies and business methods that harness the power of markets for social good, meaningfully improving employment and income outcomes for those with the greatest barriers to formal work. Our impact prioritizes creating conditions for our team members and communities to thrive, minimizing our effect on the planet, and working with our customers to help them achieve their own impact goals.
A core tenant of our impact commitments is sharing our progress. Learn more about our impact priorities, key results, and work to achieve key benchmarks in our latest Impact Report.
At Sama, we believe responsible actions lead to positive impact. We have a duty to put people and the planet at the core of our everyday business decisions. Our model, and its goals, help us to be socially accountable to ourselves, our customers, and the world. Responsibility is a journey, and we are committed to being purposeful in our approach at every step along the way.
Sama worked with Partnership on AI and several other public and private entities to help develop Responsible Sourcing of Data Enrichment Services, a white paper that outlines how choices made while procuring data enrichment services impact work well-being.
We are committed to working with our customers to advance shared social impact and sustainability goals and support the adoption of responsible practices across the supply chain.
We take steps to ensure our supply chain is ethical from inception to implementation. Our Supplier Code of Conduct outlines our expectations for, and definition of, responsibility for our own suppliers.
We are committed to minimizing barriers to formal employment for historically marginalized groups, especially women and youth living below the international poverty line in East Africa. Through our purposeful hiring model, we’ve connected more than 13,000 individuals to dignified digital work.
We are committed to helping our team members learn and grow through formal training, on-the-job skill building, and scholarship programs. We support team members in mapping out their career goals, within or beyond Sama.
Through the Leila Janah Foundation, Sama provides funding and mentorship to small social enterprises in Kenya and Uganda. The Foundation’s signature program, the Give Work Challenge, has funded 29 small businesses and provided mentorship and other supports founded and/or led by Sama employees.
We are committed to building a global team and cultivating a company culture that is inclusive, honors and celebrates diversity, and ensures equitable experiences for all. Through ongoing outreach, we aim not only to understand team members’ experiences at Sama, but also priorities and needs of their communities.
Businesses have an important role to play in preventing and mitigating climate change and its adverse impacts, and reducing waste. It’s our responsibility to advance climate action using human-centered approaches that address the immediate challenges it poses not only on the planet, but on our team members and the communities in which they live.
Climate change is one of the most important development challenges of our time. Although Africa contributes only 2-3 percent of global emissions, the subregion, East Africa, where our largest offices are located, is deeply feeling the impacts of a changing climate.As part of our commitment to make better decisions for the planet, Sama has set two science-aligned carbon reduction targets to achieve by 2030. Read more about our targets and what it took to set them here.
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Leila Janah, our late founder, firmly believed that providing meaningful, dignified, living wage work is the best way to lift people out of poverty. She founded Sama in 2008 driven by the belief that “talent is equally distributed, but opportunity is not.”
Using cutting edge social enterprise models, she oversaw the development of version one of our platform, expanded our operations to three continents, and impacted over 65,000 people.
Today, our vision is to pioneer new technologies and business methods that harness the power of markets for social good, leveling the playing field for those who do not share equally in the benefits of human progress.
Sama continues to provide equitable access to work opportunities and growth. Our entry-level workforce development strategy focuses on creating access to employment and supporting professional advancement.
“Don’t underestimate the ripple effect of what you do. These kinds of actions have toppled empires.”
Certified B Corporations are businesses that meet the highest standards of verified social and environmental performance, public transparency, and legal accountability to serve as a force for good. B Corps are accelerating a global cultural shift to redefine success in business and build a more inclusive and sustainable economy. Sama is one of the only AI companies with B Corp Certification, named Best for the World 2021 in the Workers area.
In 2021, MIT and Innovations for Poverty Action released findings from a multi-year Randomized Control Trial (RCT) on Sama’s impact-focused business model. This study found those with access to training and work at Sama had significantly higher employment rates and earnings.
Read the results here.
Social and environmental responsibility cannot exist without measurement and accountability. Third party verification, alignment with global standards and ongoing research and evaluation are essential to understanding the impact we are having and where we need to do more.
Review our latest impact metrics here.
First batch client acceptance rate across 10B points per month
Get models to market 3x faster by eliminating delays, missed deadlines and excessive rework
Lives impacted to date thanks to our purpose-driven business model
2024 Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) score and an NPS of 64
Sama provides ML Professionals and AI team Leads with an indispensable solution for Computer Vision data labeling.
