Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan say they will
give away 99% of their shares in the company to good causes as they
announce the birth of their daughter Max.
Mark
Elliot Zuckerberg is an American computer programmer, Internet
entrepreneur, and philanthropist. He is the chairman, chief executive,
and co-founder of the social networking website Facebook.
Born: May 14, 1984 (age 31), White Plains, New York, United States
Height: 1.71 m
Spouse: Priscilla Chan (m. 2012)
Net worth: 35.7 billion USD (2015)
Mr Zuckerberg made the announcement in a letter to Max on his Facebook page.
He said they were donating their fortune to the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative to make the world a better place for Max to grow up in.
The donation amounts to $45bn (£30bn) at Facebook's current value.
However the shares will not be donated to charity immediately, but over the course of the couple's lives.
Were Mr Zuckerberg to give away 99% of his shares immediately, he would still possess hundreds of millions of dollars. Ms Chan's worth has not been documented.
Max was born last week, although her birth was only made public on Tuesday.
In his letter Mr Zuckerberg said the aim of the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative is "to advance human potential and promote equality for all children in the next generation".
Its initial areas of focus will be personalised learning, curing disease, connecting people and building strong communities.
Mark has made a great Change in the world by doing this, He always tells that he used to live a simple life and he is happy with that.
The full amount is pledged over the course of Zuckerberg's life, and the Facebook CEO plans to maintain his majority voting position "for the foreseeable future," according to an SEC filing. In the immediate future, the Initiative will be funded by a series of three annual donations made from the sale of Zuckerberg's stock, at no more than $1 billion each year. Profits made by any of the Initiative's investment will be used for additional work to advance its goals.
The initiative's announcement, which is written as a letter to Zuckerberg and Chan's newborn child, focuses on two central goals: advancing human potential and promoting equality. The first goal is defined as "pushing the boundaries on how great a human life can be," including initiatives on medicine, economic opportunity, and access to information. The second group of projects focus more on alleviating poverty and empowering traditionally underrepresented groups. "Our society must do this not only for justice or charity, but for the greatness of human progress," the letter reads.
"Our society must do this not only for justice or charity, but for the greatness of human progress."
Those goals fit into a number of charitable projects Zuckerberg and Chan have already engaged in. Last year, the couple pledged $25 million dollars to fight the spread of Ebola, with the explicit aim of preventing a larger public health crisis "like HIV or polio." Zuckerberg also individually donated $100 million to the Newark public school system, although a significant portion of the money was swallowed up by bureaucratic inefficiencies.Some of the initiative's goals also align with Facebook's Internet.org project, which aims to establish zero-rated internet access in poor countries. "Many of the greatest opportunities for your generation will come from giving everyone access to the internet," the letter reads. "The internet is so important that for every 10 people who gain internet access, about one person is lifted out of poverty and about one new job is created." Other priorities include community education and childhood healthcare.
The project bears significant resemblance to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, another prominent philanthropy effort built on a Silicon Valley fortune. Launched in 2000, the Gates Foundation currently has an endowment of $44 billion, just shy of the donation pledged by Zuckerberg and Chan. Zuckerberg partnered with Gates earlier this week to fund clean energy research in the wake of the Paris Climate talks, and have worked together on education initiatives in the past. Melinda Gates has already replied to the couple's post, saying "the example you’re setting today is an inspiration to us and the world."