Ajoy Vase works as an independent advisor to philanthropy, research and government. In the past 4 years he developed a strategy for the NSF SBIR Program to become more diverse, equitable and inclusive and shaped the grantmaking of Schmidt Futures, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, Matt Dalio’s Endless Network and Valhalla Foundation.
Prior to this, he was one of the first ten employees at the Chan Zuckerberg Education Initiative (CZI) and helped that team deploy and manage over $500M in philanthropic capital for education and the workforce. He supported the launch of AERDF, a joint education R&D initiative of the Gates Foundation, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and Walton foundation.
He chaired the Data Funder Collaborative for two years - a consortium of technology forward philanthropies that made collaborative tech and research investments in public infrastructure. In addition to some of the partners named above, this consortium included the Ballmer Group, Overdeck Family Foundation, Heising-Simons Foundation, Arnold Ventures, Dell Foundation and Walton Family Foundation.