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How Melinda French Gates Plans to Spend $1B on Solo Philanthropy Mission | Observer
Earlier this year, Melinda French Gates shocked the philanthropic world when she stepped down from the 24-year-old foundation she started with her former husband and Microsoft (MSFT) co-founder Bill Gates . The direction of French Gates’ individual philanthropic goals have since started to take shape, with an initial $1 billion commitment earmarked towards dozens of organizations focused on the rights of women and other underrepresented groups.
⁘I was just ready to be able to have full decision-making control about where all the funds go,⁘ French Gates told Time of her decision to depart the foundation in an interview published today (June 18). While her new philanthropic endeavors will be funded with $12.8 billion from Gates and French Gates’ estimated net worth of $11.1 billion —a stark contrast from the $75.2 billion endowment of the Gates Foundation—the philanthropist said she doesn’t ⁘see it honestly as a downsizing.⁘
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After a stint away from the spotlight, FrenchGates seems to have reached the other side. In May, almost exactly three years after news of the divorce broke, she announced her departure from the foundation that began above a pizza parlor with her and two other employees before it was officially launched in 2000. As she leaves, she wants to make a few things clear. She is doing well. She is not out of the philanthropy business; she just announced her second billion-dollar funding plan (her first was in 2019 ). And she’s focused on one issue: helping women thrive.
FrenchGates no longer wants to be the soft humanist layer surrounding Bill Gates’ hard-data-driven core or a modern Eleanor Roosevelt , well-meaning but powerful only because of her spouse. She has never wanted to ride anybody’s coattails. On the cusp of turning 60, she’s both looser and more direct than in our interviews in prior years , maybe because she now has as unobstructed a view of her goals as she does of the yachts in the lake outside her office window. And she has her own wealth plus $12.5 billion from her ex’s personal stash to achieve them. “I feel like, Wow, I’m 60. I better surround myself with people and still travel [so that] I’m still absolutely learning, because the world is moving, the world is changing,” she says. “I’m totally unencumbered to work in any way I want.”
FrenchGates went to Duke University for a bachelor’s in computer science and an M.B.A. while interning over summers at IBM. When she went for her rubber-stamp interview before accepting a job there, she mentioned she still had an interview at a newbie company, Microsoft. The hiring manager told her to take that job, because there would be more opportunity for advancement.
