Social Impact

At Meltwater, people are central to everything we do. This philosophy extends to our employees, customers, investors, partners, suppliers, and the communities in which we operate. By harnessing our people, products, and resources, we are committed to being a force for good in the places where we live and work. We believe in the power of people and technology to have a positive impact on the future, and in building a diverse, equitable and inclusive organization to fuel innovation and sustainable growth.  

Our culture and values extend to our work across DEI, employee engagement, philanthropy and community partnerships, and we are committed to continuous improvement in all of these areas.

In 2008, Meltwater’s founder Jorn Lyseggen founded MEST based on the principle that “talent is everywhere, but opportunity is not.”

Leveraging our core strengths as an innovation leader, Lyseggen chose to invest in innovation on the African continent, an area of the world that historically has been underserved and underfunded, and launched a technology training program to fuel the next generation of African entrepreneurs.

MEST, Meltwater’s non-profit arm, is an Africa-wide technology training program, internal seed fund, and network of hubs offering incubation for technology startups in Africa. Founded in Ghana in 2008, MEST provides critical skills training, funding, and support in software development, business, and communications to aspiring tech entrepreneurs. Beyond tech and entrepreneurial skills training, MEST Africa provides a real-world advantage to entrepreneurs through funding, business incubation, and access to a global tech network. MEST has launched numerous successful startups that have gone on to receive follow-on funding and admission to the world’s top tech accelerators, has hosted guest lecturers from Fortune 100 companies, and counts Mastercard Foundation, Microsoft, and 500 Startups among its partners.

MEST is a fundamental piece of Meltwater’s history and culture. Each year Meltwater employees visit MEST and participate in onsite and virtual mentorship programs where they lend their professional expertise in tech, sales and marketing to the entrepreneurs and portfolio companies.

Learn more about MEST at meltwater.org.

Creating a diverse, equitable and inclusive organization is a key focus for Meltwater. Our DEI efforts are organized around key objectives including training & education, recruiting, inclusive culture and leadership diversity and accountability.

Meltwater supports a number of employee-led Affinity Groups who drive inclusion and education across the organization.

• mPowered, is Meltwater’s multi-cultural affinity group with chapters in the Americas and Australia. mPowered promotes inclusion through discussion, education and advocacy. The group provides a forum for employees to discuss issues that affect underrepresented groups and strives to create a culture where employees feel their voice is heard, their opinions are valued, and that they can be a part of positive change. The group has held numerous DEI workshops, trainings, and speaker sessions since its inception in 2020. 
• The EMEA DEI Council is an employee-led task force that works on market-specific initiatives across the region to foster education, discussion, and advocacy on DEI issues. The council has rolled out trainings and leadership sessions across the region on topics such as cultural sensitivity, diversity-based business coaching, and more. 
• The Women in Tech Initiative is a global community spanning all regions at Meltwater which invites in industry-leading speakers and creates an environment to share ideas, discuss topics that genuinely matter and build a mutual learning exchange.The initiative has seen speakers from Coca-Cola, Nike, and Google, and is led by a team of ambassadors spanning the globe.

Meltwater chooses corporate sponsorships that are in line with our own values and philosophy. Since 2020, Meltwater has been the title partner of the Meltwater Champions Chess Tour, in partnership with the Play Magnus Group. Play Magnus Group’s mission is to promote chess and chess learning that fosters positive social outcomes. They accomplish this through training and education, supporting chess in schools, advancing gender equality, supporting aligned non profits and promoting tolerance, inclusion and respect. Meltwater actively supports PMG in this work through activations, employee participation and sponsorship.

Meltwater regularly partners with nonprofits in the markets in which we work to volunteer and address the needs of the local communities that we operate in. Employees partner with local non-profits through volunteer days, and the company makes corporate donations to nonprofits with missions that are important to our teams around the world. This is in addition to the $2.5million USD that is given as annual funding to the Meltwater Foundation supporting MEST.

These are some of the ways that Meltwater shows a commitment to our people and those in our communities, but we are also committed to continuous improvement and expanding these programs in order to have a greater impact. Meltwater conducts an annual Employee Engagement survey to benchmark employee sentiment around key issues and track where we are doing well and where we can still improve, with action plans to build strategies and programs that will impact these areas going forward.