Life Sciences
Five million children die before their fifth birthday every year; more than 250 million cases of malaria, tuberculosis, and HIV lead to 2.8 million deaths; and 1 in every 4 children grow up malnourished. Today’s most exciting advances in biotechnology hold enormous potential to help tackle these major global health challenges.
We invest in new frontiers of science to address global health challenges through paradigm-shifting drugs, vaccines, biologics, and gene therapies. We support the development of critical assets and platform technologies that facilitate the discovery, manufacturing, and delivery of more effective, lower-cost vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics. These include novel technologies in vaccine and drug development and delivery, alternative biologics, in vivo cell therapy and gene editing, low-cost point-of-care diagnostics, and food and microbial therapeutics.
Investments
Investors
Vanessa Bhark
Principal
Seattle
Vanessa Bhark is a Principal at the Gates Foundation’s $2.5 billion Strategic Investment Fund (SIF), the foundation’s venture capital, debt, and guarantee fund. Prior to joining the Gates Foundation in 2021, Vanessa was a member of the investment team at Frazier Healthcare Partners, focused on biopharmaceuticals. Vanessa has also held positions in corporate and business…
Zainab Bakrin
Associate
Seattle
Zainab Bakrin is an Associate at the Gates Foundation’s Strategic Investment Fund, focused on the Biotech Accelerator program. Prior to joining the Gates Foundation in 2024, Zainab was a member of the investment team at Casdin Capital, where she focused on life science tools, diagnostics, healthcare IT, and industrial applications of biotechnology. Zainab started her…
Ryan Kreitzer
Partner
Seattle
Ryan Kreitzer joined the Strategic Investment Fund in 2014. Based in Seattle, Ryan invests across fintech, healthtech, agritech & climate, focusing on innovative companies that develop new solutions to long-standing challenges that impact patients, farmers and consumers globally. He also leads SIF’s investing practice in Sub-Saharan Africa, where he invests in businesses that deliver innovations…
David Rossow
Founding Partner
London
David Rossow joined the foundation in 2010 as part of a $400 million pilot to establish the Strategic Investment Fund. He currently heads the fund’s international work with a focus on biotech in Europe, and tech-enabled service & product delivery in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. Prior to joining the foundation in 2010, David worked…
Antonio Garcia Maldonado
Principal
London
Antonio Garcia Maldonado is a Partner at SIF. He works on international investments with a focus on biotech in Europe and Israel, and tech-enabled service/product delivery in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. Prior to joining the foundation, Antonio worked in the investment banking division at JPMorgan. There, he worked on structuring and executing M&A, equity…
Will Kaplan
Principal
Seattle
Will joined the Gates Foundation in 2022, and works to evaluate, structure, and manage strategic investments across many different sectors to support the Foundation’s program strategies. His work to date has included guarantees supporting new tools to address malaria and to support childhood nutrition, as well as investments in financial services. Prior to joining the…