Impact investment is tranforming the landscape of charitable giving December 17, 2015 THE CITY of London has learned a thing or two about bad press in recent years. But attention moves on, as it always does, and in 2015 it has been the turn of charities to face tough headlines. The days of leaving the voluntary sector to get on with its work away from the glare [...]
Using technology to keep children safe December 17, 2015 A high-tech service is helping to revolutionise the way the public is alerted to missing or abducted children in the hours after they disappear. Using social media and partnerships with crime agencies, Child Rescue Alert is able to notify greater numbers of people than ever before about potentially at-risk youngsters and how the public can [...]
No. 1: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation December 17, 2015 USA – £2,059m With over £20bn given away since its foundation in 2000, the spending power of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation on development aid is bigger than that of most countries. The organisation formed by Microsoft co-founder and former chief exec Bill Gates and his wife Melinda, who also worked for Microsoft in [...]
No. 2: Wellcome Trust December 17, 2015 UNITED KINGDOM – £556m Mostly known for its work to improve human and animal health, the Wellcome Trust focuses on supporting talented researchers and accelerating the application of their research in the real world. The trust funds 4,000 scientists and a wide array of medical and biomedical research including on how genes affect health, how [...]
No. 3: Novamedia/Postcode Lotteries December 17, 2015 THE NETHERLANDS – £469m Making good citizenship fun: that is the motto of Dutch based Novamedia. Founded over 25 years ago, Novamedia, as the owner of various brands and lottery formats, sets up lotteries to raise funds for charity organisations and to increase awareness of their work. Novamedia organises charity lotteries in three countries, with the [...]
No. 4: La Caixa Foundation December 17, 2015 SPAIN – £350m The 110 year old La Caixa Foundation stems directly from the Spanish bank set up in 1904 by Catalan lawyer Francesc Moragas. Moragas had a deep sense of public responsibility and the bank was the first in Spain to provide social insurance. From 1918 La Caixa began to allocate part of its [...]
No. 5: Ford Foundation December 17, 2015 UNITED STATES – £314m Motor pioneer Henry Ford and his son Edsel established the Ford Foundation in the US in 1936 to advance human welfare. The organisation started with a gift of $25,000 (£16,000) and now holds an £8bn endowment, having approved over £330m in grants in 2014. Following a two year period of transition, [...]
No. 6: The Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust December 17, 2015 CHINA – £303m The Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC) is one of the oldest institutions in Hong Kong, founded in 1884. It is a company limited by guarantee with no shareholders and obtains its net earnings from racing and betting. The money remaining after payment of dividends, prize money, taxes, operating costs and investments to [...]
No. 7: Silicon Valley Community Foundation December 17, 2015 UNITED STATES – £287m In 2006, two community foundations merged into the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, with the aim to create positive regional change in the San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties in the Silicon Valley. The Foundation describes itself as a center of philanthropy, partnering with donors to strengthen the common good in the [...]
No. 8: National Philanthropic Trust December 17, 2015 UNITED STATES – £285m The National Philanthropic Trust (NPT) was founded in 1996. Since then, it has raised almost £3.5bn in charitable contributions and currently manages £2.6bn in charitable assets. NPT has made more than 121,000 grants totaling over £1.1bn to charities all over the world. NPT is one of the organisations in this list [...]