Jeff Bezos’ exec MacKenzie Scott has announced she’s doubling her donation pledge by giving away a whopping $640 million to 360 small charities.
Through her philanthropic company Yield Giving, Scott, 53, has allocated the funds to nonprofits who responded to an open call for applications.
She became one of the world’s richest women when she divorced Amazon founder Jeff Bezos in 2019 and walked away with $28.9 billion.
Scott began giving away billions that year to handpicked organizations. Beneficiaries of the latest $640 million donation however were selected via an open call for applications.
She has now given away more than $16.5billion she received from Bezos, while the Amazon founder who has since moved on with fiancé Lauren Sanchez has given roughly $2billion away.
MacKenzie Scott has announced she’s giving $640 million to 360 nonprofits that responded to an open call for applications
Through her philanthropic company Yield Giving, Scott, 53, has allocated the funds to nonprofits with more than 6,000 applying
In a brief note on her website, Scott wrote she was grateful to Lever for Change, the organization that managed the open call.
She also thanked the evaluators for ‘their roles in creating this pathway to support for people working to improve access to foundational resources in their communities’, adding: ‘They are vital agents of change.’
Some 6,353 small nonprofits applied for the $1 million grants when applications opened.
‘In light of the incredible work of these organizations, as judged by their peers and external panelists, the donor team decided to expand the awardee pool and the award amount,’ said Lever for Change, which specializes in running philanthropic prize awards.
Competitions like the open call can help organizations who do not have connections with a specific funder get considered, said Renee Karibi-Whyte, senior vice president, Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors.
‘One of the best things about prize philanthropy is that it surfaces people and organizations and institutions that otherwise wouldn´t have access to the people in the power centers and the funding,’ she said.
Her organization also advises funders who run competitive grants or philanthropic prize competitions to phase the application to diminish the burden of applying on any organization that is eliminated early.
The 279 nonprofits that received top scores from an external review panel were awarded $2 million, while 82 organizations in a second tier received $1 million each.
The ‘open call’ asked for applications from nonprofits who are community-led with missions ‘to advance the voices and opportunities of individuals and families of meager or modest means,’ Yield Giving said on its website. Only nonprofits with annual budgets between $1 and $5 million were eligible to apply.
‘In a world teeming with potential and talent, the Open Call has given us an opportunity to identify, uplift, and empower transformative organizations that often remain unseen,’ Cecilia Conrad, CEO of Lever for Change, said in a statement.
With gifts totaling $12 billion, Scott has given about six times as much in the last two years than her ex, Jeff Bezos (left) has in his entire life despite his pledge to donate $13 billion
The 2.5-acre Beverly Hills property with a pool and tennis court includes a 12,000 square foot main home — described as a Spanish hacienda-style mansion, along with a guesthouse
The awardees were selected through a multilayer process, where applicants scored fellow applicants and then the top organizations were reviewed by a panel of outside experts.
Scott has given away $16.5 billion from the fortune she came into after divorcing Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, 60.
Initially, she publicized the gifts in online blog posts, sometimes naming the organizations and sometimes not. She launched a database of her giving in December 2022, under the name Yield Giving.
In an essay reflecting on the website, she wrote, ‘Information from other people – other givers, my team, the nonprofit teams I´ve been giving to – has been enormously helpful to me. If more information about these gifts can be helpful to anyone, I want to share it.’
Since her split with Bezos, she has devoted much of her time and energy to identifying the most worthy and effective charitable organizations to donate her cash to.
This includes donating her $55 million Beverly Hills estate to a charity that will use a large portion of the proceeds to house the homeless and go toward an immigrant integration program.
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, 60, and his fiancée, Lauren Sanchez, 54, were spotted walking around the Coconut Grove Art Festival in Miami on President’s Day
Meanwhile, in November 2023 Bezos announced that he will be giving $118 million to nonprofit groups supporting families experiencing homelessness.
Since their divorce Bezos has found love again with fiancée Lauren Sánchez.
He announced late last year that they would be leaving Seattle and moving to his childhood home of Miami to be closer to his parents.
‘As exciting as the move is, it’s an emotional decision for me. Seattle, you will always have a piece of my heart,’ the billionaire said in an Instagram post/
Bezos also shared in the post a video of himself in Amazon’s first ‘office’ in Seattle, where he founded the company out of his garage in 1994 and grew it into one of the biggest retailers in the world.
The brief video show’s Bezos’ desk in the cramped garage, with an extension cord running from inside the home to a fax machine, due to the lack of adequate outlets in the space.
‘It doesn’t take long to tour the offices of Amazon.com, Inc,’ the young CEO, who was then 30, said in the video.