Melinda French Gates no longer plans to give the bulk of her wealth to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation but instead will spread it across multiple philanthropic endeavors, according to people familiar with the matter, the Wall Street Journal reports.

After announcing in May 2021 that they were divorcing but would continue to serve as co-chairs and trustees of the Gates Foundation, French Gates and Bill Gates committed $15 billion to its endowment in July. In late November, they posted separate pledge letters to the Giving Pledge, which they co-founded in 2010 with Warren Buffett. In her letter, French Gates reiterated her commitment to giving away the majority of her wealth but did not specify that it would go to the Gates Foundation, as the former couple’s 2010 joint letter had. “I think philanthropy is most effective when it prioritizes flexibility over ideology—and ... in my work at the foundation and Pivotal Ventures I’ll continue to seek out new partners, ideas, and perspectives,” she wrote. In his letter, Gates wrote that the foundation was his “top philanthropic priority.”

It is possible that French Gates will make additional donations to the foundation even as she gives to other charities, one of the people familiar with the matter told the Journal. She pledged $1 billion in 2019 to Pivotal Ventures—the investment and incubation company she established in 2015—to promote gender equality in the United States, with a focus on issues such as women in technology and innovation, women in public office, women and girls of color, paid family and medical leave, caregiving, and adolescent mental health.

Devex noted that the foundation made an edit to its January 26 press release announcing the appointment of four board members, replacing the mention of pledges from Gates, French Gates, and Buffett to “devote the bulk of their remaining resources to the foundation” with the phrase “the expectation of future pledges.”

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