Throughout our history spanning over 400 years, we have inherited and upheld Sumitomo’s Business Philosophy. One of its core tenets, “Business is People” represents our unwavering belief that our people are the source of our competitiveness and the driving force behind our growth. This is also reflected in the Group’s Management Principles and Activity Guidelines. In addition, we put into practice the vision and philosophy for global talent management outlined in our Global HR Management Policy.

This culture of valuing our people has long been perpetuated as an integral part of our Group’s DNA, and we have always positioned talent discovery and development as top management priorities.

The Group, which is engaged in a wide variety of businesses on a global scale, aims to maximize the use of its own management capital to create new value by addressing social challenges, thereby enhancing corporate value sustainably over the medium to long term. Driving this value creation model are our people—our human capital—each of whom bring diverse knowledge and experience to conceive and advance our businesses. To achieve further growth as a Group, we must fully unlock the potential of our people and strengthen the collective capabilities of our organization. We will further accelerate investment in human capital so that individual talent with a variety of backgrounds and experiences is empowered to take on challenges that shape the future. By advancing these efforts, we will enhance the effectiveness of our management strategies and achieve sustainable growth in corporate value.

To the "Value Creation Model" on page 14.

The Group, which is engaged in a wide variety of businesses on a global scale, aims to maximize the use of its own management capital to create new value by addressing social challenges, thereby enhancing corporate value sustainably over the medium to long term. Driving this value creation model are our people̶our human capital̶each of whom bring diverse knowledge and experience to conceive and advance our businesses. To achieve further growth as a Group, we must fully unlock the potential of our people and strengthen the collective capabilities of our organization. We will further accelerate investment in human capital so that individual talent with a variety of backgrounds and experiences is empowered to take on challenges that shape the future. By advancing these efforts, we will enhance the effectiveness of our management strategies and achieve sustainable growth in corporate value.