Google puts capitalist spin on philanthropy
By Jim Hopkins
USA Today
SAN FRANCISCO — Challenging convention, Google's maverick founders might join other entrepreneurs trying a capitalist approach to philanthropy.
The nascent Google Foundation is weighing investments in for-profit companies that also pursue worthy causes. That's a switch from mainstream philanthropy, where money goes to nonprofit charities.
Foundations based on tech wealth are among the 10 biggest in the United States. 1. Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, $28.8 billion, Microsoft. 7. William & Flora Hewlett Foundation, $6.5 billion, Hewlett-Packard. 8. David and Lucile Packard Foundation, $5.2 billion Hewlett-Packard. 9. Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, $5.0 billion, Intel. Foundations ranked by asset size overall among foundation. Sources: Organizations, Foundation Center
Google, whose founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin are each worth about $8 billion, has until recently said little about the foundation since announcing last year that it might "eclipse Google itself" in world impact.
Foundations
Now the company, which challenges business as usual with its "don't be evil" pledge, says the foundation might back for-profit and nonprofit "social" entrepreneurs. "We want to do something that is innovative," says Sheryl Sandberg, vice president of global online sales and operations.
The online search giant has not given up on traditional philanthropy. "We are exploring many models," Sandberg says.
One possibility: creating a nonprofit version of Google that might be called Google.org.
Sandberg says the company is interviewing executive director candidates, a key step to deciding causes the foundation will support. Google's philanthropy now includes the Google Grants program, which gives free advertising to hundreds of nonprofits focused on poverty, human rights, environmental and other causes.
Google's founders would be joining other entrepreneurs toying with new approaches to philanthropy.
"It's a rapidly growing field," says Kerwin Tesdell of the Community Development Venture Capital Alliance, which promotes socially responsible investing.
EBay founder Pierre Omidyar last year said his foundation would start investing in for-profit startups in addition to nonprofits. Ben & Jerry's Ben Cohen uses his $5 million Barred Rock venture-capital fund to invest in startups, such as an apple pie maker creating jobs in rural Vermont.
Omidyar's foundation, renamed the Omidyar Network, has pumped $5.6 million into for-profits, including United Villages of Cambridge, Mass. United Villages develops software and hardware bringing phone, e-mail and other electronic communication to poor villages in India, Cambodia and other nations. United Villages co-founder Amir Hasson declined to say how much it got from Omidyar this year.
Still, he said Omidyar and others are "playing a critical role today in bridging the gap for entrepreneurs who have ideas that can really begin to solve some global problems."
