Current Board Members
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Board member: Bill Gates, Sr., Co-Chair

The foundation believes a proactive, major-project approach provides the best opportunities for long-term improvements in the health of the world’s most vulnerable populations. Our giving strategy is to develop partnerships with established organizations with a proven track record of visionary leadership and effective implementation. The foundation awards substantial grants to key organizations, who in turn direct the use of the funds to meet strategic objectives.

Initiatives selected for funding are those which, to the greatest extent possible:

• Address important disease burdens in the poorest countries;
• Offer an opportunity to achieve leverage, catalyzing a larger response or mobilizing new resources to improve health;
• Form creative partnerships or coalitions to achieve project objectives;
• Have global relevance or provide results which transcend any country or regional focus;
• Result in measurable benefits to impoverished groups;
• Focus on interventions with high potential cost-effectiveness; and,
• Ensure broad dissemination and utilization of results and lessons learned.