Nandan Nilekani’s EkStep to be part of philanthropic venture by Bill and Melinda Gates

A group of the world’s leading philanthropists, including Bill and Melinda Gates and Rockefeller Foundation, have created a new venture – Co-Impact – to create a global model for collaborative philanthropy and systems change at scale.

Co-Impact will work with Infosys cofounder Nandan Nilekani’s EkStep Foundation, the venture said in a statement. The philanthropic venture will invest $500 million in three critical areas – health, education and economic opportunity.

The venture’s initial core partners include Bill and Melinda Gates, Richard Chandler, Jeff Skoll, Dr Romesh and Kathy Wadhwani and the Rockefeller Foundation. EkStep, which was cofounded by Nilekani’s wife Rohini, will serve as Co-Impact’s technical partner by supporting a number of Co-Impact programmes ‘with their open knowledge and societal platform assets as well as capacity building’.

“At EkStep, we are investing in creating open digital public goods. Our intent is for it to benefit an ecosystem of innovators who can create contextual solutions for the development sector through the Societal Platforms approach. We support Co-Impact’s visionary efforts of driving large-scale systemic development,” Rohini and Nandan Nilekani said.