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Bill Gates Has Perfected Managerial Philanthropy

palladiummag.com · 3,914 words · saved by 1 readers

In 1998, Bill Gates was facing the breakup of the empire he had spent his entire adult life building. The U.S. Department of Justice was suing Microsoft for antitrust violations and there was a real chance that the company would be forced to split into pieces. An unsympathetic media was piling on and portraying Gates as the archetypal villainous tech mogul. It was during this difficult period that Gates embraced philanthropic giving for the first time, making a $100 million donation to pay for vaccines for children. This was not the first time a wealthy American accused of being a monopolist had sought to rehabilitate his public image through philanthropy. From Stanford University to Carnegie Hall, the names of the Gilded Age robber barons live on in the institutions they supported. Before the end of Microsoft’s 18-month trial, Gates would contribute $20.3 billion to his foundation. It was the most expensive charm offensive in U.S. history. It was also the beginning of a strategy that

Kuhlmann/Bill Gates at the Munich Security Conference, 2017 In 1998, Bill Gates was facing the breakup of the empire he had spent his entire adult life building. The U.S. Department of Justice was suing Microsoft for antitrust violations and there was a real chance that the company would be forced to split into pieces. An unsympathetic media was piling on and portraying Gates as the archetypal villainous tech mogul. It was during this difficult period that Gates embraced philanthropic giving for the first time, making a $100 million donation to pay for vaccines for children. This was not the f

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