Bill Gates, co-founder of billionaire Microsoft, is the 13th richest man in the world, said he will donate 99% of the remaining technology wealth to the Gates Foundation, which will close in 2045 earlier than originally planned in 2045.
According to Forbes, Gates' current assets are worth $113.5 billion. His promise is one of the biggest ever, surpassing the promises of John Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie when adjusting for inflation.
Only Berkshire Hathaway investor Warren Buffett has pledged to donate its proceeds, currently estimated at $160 billion by Forbes, depending on stock market volatility and could be even bigger.
The donation will be distributed over time and will allow Gates and his ex-wife Melinda French Gates to start together in 2000, spending an additional $200 billion over the next two decades.
The foundation already has $77 billion built from donations from Gates, France Gate and Buffett, accounting for 41% of the foundation’s funding.
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“There are a lot of reasons that can be incorporated into these, and it's really exciting,” Gates said in an interview with the Associated Press.
Tech tycoons have long struggled to combat the Gates Foundation’s global health crisis and funding education, investing heavily in eliminating polio, financially supporting vaccine development and distribution efforts, and other disease-resistant programs.
Gates also lashed out at Elon Musk, accusing the world's richest people of “killing the world's poorest children” through a huge cut to the U.S. foreign aid budget.
Musk oversees U.S. cuts, and he has publicly brags for the U.S. international development agencies to “integrate wood chips” and their Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). About 80% of U.S. Agency plans will be cut; the agency spent $44 billion worldwide in fiscal 2023.
“The richest people in the world kill the poorest children in the world are not a pretty child,” Gates told the Financial Times.
In an interview with Reuters, Gates warned of decades of progress in reducing mortality rates over the next four to six years as the government cuts its funds globally.
“The death toll will start to increase for the first time … because of resources, this will be millions of deaths.”
Thursday’s announcement marks the end of the Foundation’s contribution.
“I think 20 years is the right balance for us to make as much progress as we can and give people a lot of notifications, and now that money is going to go away,” Gates said.
In addition to the $100 billion spent over the past 25 years, the foundation is at the forefront of scientific research, helping to develop new technologies and maintain key partnerships with countries and companies.
“The foundation work is much more impactful than I expected,” Gates said, comparing his role as a philanthropist to become a second career.
The announcement may mark a change in the nature of the operations of the charitable foundation.
Philanthropy expert and publication author Rhodri Davies said announcing the end of the funding was “happy bold” Private means of public interest.
He added: “There appears to be more evidence that the Foundation’s philanthropic norms may be shifting from defaults that are permanently operated.”
Gates added that like all private citizens, he has the right to choose the way he spends his money and has decided to do everything he can to help reduce childhood deaths around the world and has already achieved success in some ways.
According to the United Nations, between 2000 and 2020, the foundation successfully cut childhood deaths in half.
Mark Suzman, the foundation’s CEO, said the foundation has played a “catalytic role” in helping to build a Vaccine Alliance (Vaccine Alliance) that provides vaccines to children through Gavi.
The Foundation remains ambitious in its efforts to eradicate and control deadly diseases and reduce malnutrition.
Gates hopes that by solving these problems, wealthy donors will be free to solve other problems in the future.
– Documents with the Associated Press and Reuters
& Copy 2025 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
