Board Diversity Policy

1. Purpose

The Board Diversity Policy aims to enhance governance effectiveness by optimizing the composition of the Board of Directors. A diverse board can bring together different perspectives, experiences, and expertise, injecting more comprehensive thinking dimensions into decision-making, thereby improving the company's governance standards and maximizing long-term shareholder value.

Diversity among board members is a crucial cornerstone for supporting the implementation of the company's strategy and its sustainable development. When structuring the Board, we will comprehensively consider multiple dimensions of diversity, including gender, age, educational and cultural backgrounds, professional skills, and industry experience. Meanwhile, we maintain an open attitude towards attracting emerging talents. All director appointments strictly adhere to the principle of "integrity and competence", and under the premise of meeting the overall capability requirements of the Board, diverse considerations are fully integrated.

2. Scope of Application

This Policy applies to the appointment of current and future directors of the company's Board of Directors.

3. Implementation Principles

Principle of Fairness: Directors shall be selected strictly based on their capabilities, professional backgrounds, and actual contributions to the company, ensuring a fair process. Gender, age, or any other non-business-related factors or discriminatory factors shall not be used as exclusionary selection criteria.

Principle of Transparency: The selection process shall be open and transparent to protect the right to information of all shareholders and stakeholders, as well as their right to participate in providing feedback.\

Principle of Effectiveness: The selection of board members shall help improve the quality and efficiency of the company's decision-making, thereby ensuring the stable and sustainable development of the company.

4. Dimensions of Diversity

Gender: Gender shall be regarded as one of the important factors when considering and nominating board candidates, so as to ensure a balanced gender ratio in the Board and fair decision-making.

Age: Diversity in the age groups of board members is conducive to expanding the company's decision-making perspectives. Generally, senior directors possess rich experience and wisdom, while younger directors can provide unique insights into future trends and cutting-edge technologies.

Professional Background: Board members shall have diverse professional backgrounds relevant to the company's development and operations, such as finance, law, risk management, marketing, operations, and industry-specific professional knowledge and skills. When appointing new board members, consideration shall be given to whether their professional skills and backgrounds are complementary to those of existing board members, so as to ensure the Board has comprehensive professional capabilities.

Cultural Background: The company actively recruits directors with different cultural backgrounds to meet its global and diverse needs in operations and development.

5. Implementation and Supervision

Enhance Transparency

Set board diversity targets, such as gender ratio, and continuously track the progress of achieving these targets.

Disclose the current status and progress of board diversity, and regularly release relevant information to accept supervision from shareholders and the society.

Ensure Applicability: Adjust the policy statements and framework in a timely manner based on internal and external factors such as the company's strategy, market changes, and social development trends, so as to ensure the policy's applicability and effectiveness.

Strengthen Understanding and Consensus: Regularly conduct theme-based training on diversity for board members and senior management, and encourage board members to participate in cross-cultural exchange activities to enhance their understanding and consensus on diversity issues.

Supplementary Provisions

GDS will update the content of this Policy from time to time to adapt to changes in relevant guidelines and standards.