Announcing UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital
[Editor's note: This was written by Marc Benioff, Chairman and CEO of salesforce.com]
In business, we say that people overestimate what you can do in a
year and underestimate what you can do in a decade. This is true in
philanthropy as well.
It’s this idea—one that we’ve seen proven at salesforce.com—that has
inspired my wife, Lynne, and me to transform how we approach our
personal philanthropic giving. For the last two decades, we’ve been
privileged to be involved in philanthropy, both personally and through
the Salesforce.com Foundation. We’ve enjoyed the rewards of giving to a
wide variety of causes around the world. We’ve met amazing
philanthropists and social entrepreneurs, worked with a variety of
organizations, and seen the difference philanthropy can make. We’ve
also learned what giving back means to us.
Now, we’re making our most significant philanthropic gift ever – and
changing our focus for the next decade.
The Salesforce.com Foundation will continue to support local and
global nonprofits with technology innovation and efficiencies, provide
consistent volunteer support, and award grants to the most deserving
organizations. However, Lynne and I will transform our own
philanthropic efforts from supporting a wide variety of organizations
to concentrating on just one. We will give exclusively to UCSF
Children’s Hospital, which has the research base for the next
generation of discoveries, a commitment to advancing health worldwide,
and a focus on every child, regardless of resources. This is where we
believe our time and resources will make the most impact in the next
decade and beyond.
Our initial $100 million gift to UCSF Children’s Hospital
will help fund the construction of its new home at UCSF Medical Center
at Mission Bay, UCSF’s new children’s, women’s specialty, and cancer
hospitals. Our goal is for the new institution, UCSF Benioff Children’s
Hospital, to serve as the most advanced children’s hospital in the
world, providing patient-centered care, supporting the translation of
medical research into clinical practice, developing the next generation
of medical technology, and training the caregivers of the future who
will advance healthcare worldwide. There’s a critical need for
increased capacity of specialty children’s hospital services in
California and nationally, particularly for the poorest children. This
gift will enable the first and only hospital helipad in the city and
allow UCSF to expand its world-class capabilities to better serve
children locally, nationally, and internationally.
We strongly believe in giving back to the San Francisco community
that has given so much to us, and where the majority of the employees
at salesforce.com live. Additionally, given the decline in personal
philanthropic giving and reduced government funding, we recognize that
we need to do more.
We chose to get involved with UCSF because its mission to advance
health worldwide is aligned with ours. One of San Francisco’s largest
employers and a magnet that has attracted biotech companies to the
city, UCSF is an important engine to our economy in addition to the
advances in health care and services it provides our community. U.S.
News & World Report named UCSF as one of the top-ranked facilities
in California, and its children’s hospital is among the best in the
nation. Now led by new Chancellor Dr. Susan Desmond-Hellmann, the
former president of Genentech, UCSF is well positioned to serve as one
of the world’s finest medical institutions.
As the largest public recipient of National Institutes of Health
research funds, UCSF has become a powerhouse of research, generating
patents and innovations that benefit patients worldwide and generating
significant revenue to the university. For example, the hepatitis B
vaccine developed at UCSF is the top-earning invention in the entire UC
system. Advances like these have led to the creation of more than 66
biomedical companies. We’re particularly inspired by the contributions
UCSF has made in advancing children’s health. Researchers and
physicians at UCSF Children’s Hospital discovered the cause of
respiratory distress syndrome—the number one killer of premature
babies—and developed therapies now used around the world to save
thousands of lives every year. Among many firsts, they also pioneered
cochlear implants for children, bringing hope to deaf children and
adults; performed the first fetal surgical procedures; helped prevent
the spread of HIV/AIDS from mother to baby; and introduced new
therapies for childhood cancer.
We’re excited about the unique opportunity to support UCSF’s new
Mission Bay development, a multi-billion dollar campus that is the
nexus of UCSF’s innovations in medical research and patient care. We’re
proud to have a strong existing relationship with this institution.
Lynne is active on the UCSF Foundation’s Board of Directors and we have
previously supported various research projects and endowed four chairs
in honor of world-class physicians, researchers, and teachers: Dr.
James Ostroff (Gastroenterology), Dr. Robert Wachter (Hospital
Medicine), Dr. Larry Rand (Maternal Fetal Medicine) and Dr. Louann
Brizendine (Neuropsychiatry). Finally, UCSF’s stellar management team
including Chancellor Desmond-Hellmann, Medical School Dean Dr. Sam
Hawgood and Medical Center CEO Mark Laret, has proven they can help us
make UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital a worldwide leader.
With the exception of the work we do through the Salesforce.com
Foundation, most of our giving has been anonymous. Lynne and I have
made a strategic decision to make this gift public. We’ve seen how our
1-1-1 integrated corporate philanthropy model has influenced many
companies, including Google, to build philanthropy into their
day-to-day operations. We’ve also evangelized this model in three
books—Compassionate Capitalism, The Business of Changing The World, and
Behind the Cloud—and witnessed the power of sharing information as a
way to involve others and magnify the difference we can make
collectively. We hope that by sharing the impact of this gift, other
entrepreneurs will be encouraged to make significant contributions to
causes that are important to them. We’ve been inspired by our friends,
Michael and Susan Dell, and Alan and Vivien Hassenfeld, who have
demonstrated the importance of giving back during one’s lifetime and
who have shown us the way with Dell Children’s Medical Center of
Central Texas and Hasbro Children’s Hospital.
We’re honored to contribute $100 million to UCSF to advance
health care for the youngest patients in our community and worldwide.
But we also understand this is just the beginning. UCSF still needs to
raise a significant amount to fund the UCSF Medical Center at Mission
Bay, and we hope others will join us, now, and for the next ten years.
A decade is enough time to make a magnitude of difference. Tremendous
progress in children’s health can be achieved by 2020 when we focus our
energies, resources and passion on a singular cause.
