Take-Two Interactive - 1792 Exchange

Rating Overview

Take-Two Interactive is Medium Risk.

Take-Two Interactive is Medium Risk. The company often yields to political activism in shaping corporate governance, potentially alienating consumers, dividing employees, and harming shareholders. The company implements race and identity-based policies that replace merit, excellence, and integrity with preferential treatment and outcomes. The company occasionally embraces corporate initiatives that redirect its central focus from business goals to partisan policies and divisive issues at times. This approach fails to safeguard free exercise, free speech, and free enterprise.

Rating Criteria

Corporate Weaponization Risk Levels
Criteria	Risk Level
Cancellations	Medium Risk
Discriminatory Philanthropy	Medium Risk
Employment Protection	High Risk

Corporate Weaponization ⓘ

Corporate Governance and Public Policy Risk Levels
Criteria	Risk Level
Advocacy Bias	High Risk
Funding	High Risk
Political Actions	No Data

Corporate Governance and Public Policy ⓘ

Rating Criteria Detail

Criteria Risk Level Rationale

Corporate Weaponization

Criteria:

Has canceled customers, suppliers, or vendors due to their political views or religious beliefs OR corporately boycotts, divests, or sanctions regions, people groups, or industries.

Risk Level:

Medium

Rationale:

Take-Two Interactive promotes divisive sex and gender policies. Its Global Code of Business Conduct and Ethics requires international vendors to include sexual orientation and gender identity in their nondiscrimination policy (1). However, the company has not publicly canceled customers, suppliers, or vendors based on political views or religious beliefs (2).

Criteria:

Charitable giving (including employee matching programs) policies or practices discriminate against charitable organizations based on views or religious beliefs.

Risk Level:

Medium

Rationale:

Take-Two Interactive likely uses Benevity as its charitable giving platform. Benevity vets charities according to the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Hate List, which includes mainstream libertarian, conservative, family, and religious advocacy organizations (1)(2)(3).

Criteria:

Employment policies fail to protect against viewpoint or other discrimination and/or are ideological in nature.

Risk Level:

High

Rationale:

Take-Two Interactive offers DEI training to its employees (1). The company appears to prioritize diversity over merit in its leadership composition. From its Guidelines for Directors and Board Governace: “The Committee will seek to promote through the nominations process an appropriate diversity on
the Board of professional background, experience, expertise, perspective, age, gender, ethnicity and country
of citizenship” (2). Take-Two Interactive does not provide viewpoint protections for its employees (3).

Corporate Governance and Public Policy

Criteria:

Uses corporate reputation to support causes, organizations, or policies hostile to freedom of expression.

Risk Level:

High

Rationale:

Zynga Games, a subsidiary of Take-Two Interactive, opposed various state and local legislation intended to protect parental rights, girls’ sports, bathroom facilities, and gendered spaces (1)(2). Take-Two Interactive supports DEI within its business practices. From its Diversity Statement: “Diversity is key to our success. We
are committed to enhancing diversity at Take-Two and throughout our industry” (3). Take-Two Interactive has pledged to work with organizations to support the rights of the LGBTQIA community (4).

Criteria:

Uses corporate funds to advance ideological causes, organizations, or policies hostile to freedom of expression.

Risk Level:

High

Rationale:

Take-Two Interactive offered a scholarship to gay gaming and other organizations to end inequality (1)(2). The company donated to It Gets Better Project which focuses on uplifting LGBTQ youth (3)(4). Zynga Games, a subsidiary of Take-Two Interactive, is a sponsor of Out in Tech, an LGBTQ-focused nonprofit that advances DEI-style inclusion initiatives that aim to increase LGBTQ+ representation in the technology industry through recruiting, workforce development and networking initiatives. The organization partners with corporations to advance LGBTQ+ inclusion initiatives and integrate LGBTQ+ representation goals into talent development and employee engagement strategies (5)(6)(7)(8). Otherwise, there are no publicly known cases of Take-Two Interactive using corporate funds to advance ideological causes, organizations, or policies (9).