Resolved: stockholders recommend that Applied Materials, Inc. (the Company) establish a Public Policy Committee of the Board of Directors to oversee the Company's policies including human rights, governmental regulations and international relations affecting the Company's business.

Supporting Statement

The Company’s current Audit Committee, Human Resources and Compensation Committee, Corporate Governance Nominating Committee, Strategy Committee and Investment Committee are not adequate to deal with the very complicated challenges and high risks of the Company’s business related to public, especially international policies.

The Company recognized that “supply chains are core to our success” in 2018 Notice of Annual Meeting and Proxy Statement, but the mere membership of Responsible Business Alliance (RBA) has nothing to do with “global best practices” or “high standards” (p.ix).  For example, some very irresponsible companies (such as Foxconn and Huawei) are also members of this RBA club (http://www.responsiblebusiness.org/about/members/).

Although the Company stated that “We maintain the highest ethical standards in interactions with employees, customers, suppliers, competitors and public” (ibid.), there are only six sentences in the "International Business Conduct and Human Rights" section of the Company’s Standards of Business Conduct (http://www.appliedmaterials.com/files/english_sbc_rev1.pdf). They are either too general expectations without any meaningful enforcement (such as supply chains in China), or too narrow prohibitions irrelevant to the Company’s business (such as of child labor).