Ron Conway

SOURCE OF WEALTH: Founder Angel Investors and SV Angel; investments in Google, Facebook, Square, Twitter, PayPal and others

FUNDING AREAS: Healthcare, Bay Area community, gun control, homelessness, public policy

OVERVIEW: Ron Conway retired from investing in 2018 to spend more time on his philanthropic work. A signatory of the giving pledge, he bankrolled the Ron Conway Family Gateway Medical Building at the University of California San Francisco. In addition to healthcare in the Bay Area, Conway gives to organizations that work with the homeless and to democratic policy and political campaigns. He also supports measures for gun control nationally.

BACKGROUND: Ron Conway graduated from San Jose State University with a degree in political science. Early in his career, he worked in marketing in the technology sector, eventually taking on executive roles. In the 1990s, Conway began a long and successful run as an “angel investor,” supporting tech startups including Facebook, Zappos, Square, Airbnb and Twitter at the earliest stages of development. In 1998, he launched his own investment firm, Angel Investors, LP. Conway's net worth has been estimated at upwards of $1.5 billion, but he is not currently on the Forbes billionaire list. He is well known in the Bay Area’s tech, political and celebrity circles, and he and his wife, Gayle, are active in local civic life. Conway has held many trustee positions, including the UCSF Medical Center Campaign Cabinet, the Salesforce.com Foundation and the Tiger Woods Foundation.

HEALTH: Conway’s health philanthropy has so far prioritized projects and organizations n the Bay Area. In 2015, Conway and family donated $40 million to help pay for a new outpatient medical building at the UCSF Medical Center at Mission Bay. This appears to be Conway's largest grant to date. The 207,500-square-foot facility that anchors the $1.5 billion hospital complex, named the UCSF Ron Conway Family Gateway Medical Building, hosts outpatient services for women, children and cancer patients. Conway has also supported the Avielle Foundation, which promotes brain research, the UCSF Neuroscience Initiative and “The Fight for Mike,” which funds research on Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease at the University of California.  

GUN CONTROL: Conway had little interest in national affairs until the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. The shooting occurred while the Conways were hosting a Christmas party with guests which included Gabrielle Giffords. Her presence was interpreted as “a sign” by Conway, who has since become a gun control activist. Conway started the Smart Tech Challenges Foundation with several other venture capitalists to encourage the development of gun safety technology, working with organizations like the Sandy Hook Promise. Another recipient, the Avielle Foundation, is also involved in research on violence prevention. Conway also serves on the board of Americans for Responsible Solutions, a non-profit super PAC formed by Gabrielle Giffords in 2013 to help stem gun violence. 

BAY AREA COMMUNITY: Conway has supported a number of civic initiatives in the Bay Area, including public-private collaborations with tech companies and Democratic contenders for public office. He founded and chairs sf.citi (the San Francisco Citizens Initiative for Technology and Innovation), a nonprofit that is "leveraging the collective power of the tech sector as a force for civic action in San Francisco" and names tech giants including Google, Facebook and Salesforce as collaborators. Conway supported the successful campaigns of San Francisco mayoral candidates Ed Lee and London Breed, and more recently joined several other tech industry executives and investors to fight efforts to recall California Governor Gavin Newsom. Conway has also given steadily to Sacred Heart Schools in Atherton (at least $500,000 annually over the past few years), the San Francisco Parks Alliance and KIPP Bay Area Schools.

HOMELESSNESS: Conway has supported select organizations that work with homeless populations in California. With former San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, he helped establish Project Homeless Connect, which connects the homeless with basic services including medical, dental and vision care and employment assistance. In 2016, Conway partnered with Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff on a three-year initiative to end “chronic family homelessness” in San Francisco.

PUBLIC POLICY: In March 2013, Conway helped fund a think tank called the Economic Innovation Group with Napster cofounder Sean Parker, investor Joe Sanberg and Dana Settle, cofounder of the venture capital firm Greycroft Partners. Based in Washington, D.C., the Economic Innovation Group is "an ideas laboratory and advocacy organization dedicated to building a more entrepreneurial and innovative U.S. economy." The group conducts research and uses "data-driven advocacy to address America's most pressing economic challenges." The think tank surveyed 25,000 ZIP codes for its Distressed Communities Index, which is meant to "visualize economic distress and prosperity" across the U.S. The group has also conducted research on where new businesses have formed since the Great Recession, and has surveyed Millennials on their views of the economy. 

LOOKING AHEAD: Conway retired from his investing career in 2018, with the expectation of spending more time on his philanthropic endeavors. He appears to have a preference for local issues, but may expand his national support of gun control and policy development toward economic equity.

LINKS: Ron Conway Twitter