SEATTLE, June 2, 2015 /PRNewswire/ — Today the Giving Pledge announced the addition of ten new individuals and families to the pledge since May 2014, bringing the current total of signatories to 137. Launched in 2010 and now in its fifth year, the Giving Pledge is a multi-generational, global initiative created by Warren Buffett and Bill and Melinda Gates that encourages billionaires to give the majority of their wealth to philanthropic causes.
The ten new signatories announced today are: Judy Faulkner, Harold Grinspoon and Diane Troderman, Gordon and Llura Gund, Elie and Susy Horn, John W. Jordan II “Jay”, Brad and Kim Keywell, Ruth and Bill Scott, Hamdi Ulukaya, Sunny and Sherly Varkey, and Sir Ian Wood.
Globally, signatories represent 14 countries: Australia, Brazil, Germany, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Russia, South Africa, Taiwan, Turkey, Ukraine, UAE, United Kingdom, and United States. In the United States, they are from 26 states and the District of Columbia, with the largest contingents from California and New York. With a BS in Mathematics from Dickinson College, an MS and a Doctorate of Science (honorary) from the University of Wisconsin and a Doctorate of Science (honorary) from Mount Sinai, NY, she taught computer science for several years in the UW system and then worked as a healthcare software developer, creating one of the first databases organized around a patient record.
Harold Grinspoon and Diane Troderman
Harold Grinspoon is the founder and Chairman of the Board of a private multifamily investment and management company, which is one of the fifty largest apartment owners in the country.
Gordon and Llura Gund
Gordon Gund is the Chairman and CEO of Gund Investment Corporation, a Princeton, NJ firm founded in 1968 that oversees a broad range of investment activities.
He is a co-founder and Chairman of the Foundation Fighting Blindness (FFB) of Columbia, MD. Lulie retired in 2013 as Vice President of the Board of Trustees of the George Gund Foundation in Cleveland, OH, after 29 years on its Board.
Elie and Susy Horn
Low-profile real estate builder Elie Horn founded Cyrela Brazil Realty in 1978 and built it into the largest publicly traded developer of high-end residential buildings in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. Horn was born in Syria, arrived in Brazil when he was 11, and started working when he was 19.
Ruth and Bill Scott
An Ashland, Nebraska native, Bill Scott joined Buffett Partnership in 1959 and Berkshire Hathaway in 1970, where he remained until he retired in the early 1990s. Ruth Scott also grew up in Ashland.
Hamdi Ulukaya
Hamdi Ulukaya founded Chobani in upstate New York in 2005 and launched Chobani Greek Yogurt in 2007.
Hamdi sits on the boards of the American Turkish Council, Turkish American Society, Federal Reserve Bank of New York and Pathfinder Village for down syndrome.
Sir Ian Wood
Born and educated in Aberdeen, Ian Wood graduated from Aberdeen University in 1964 with a First Class Honours Degree in Psychology. He is Chairman of The Wood Foundation, a Scottish-based charity with a global outlook including significant activities in supporting smallholder farmers in the tea industries in Tanzania and Rwanda.
