Started: June 2015
Website: thefounderspledge.org
Twitter: @FoundersPledge
Location: UK-wide

Launched out of Founders Forum in June 2015, Founders Pledge encourages time-poor UK tech entrepreneurs to donate a percentage of their exit proceeds, when they sell their businesses, to charitable causes.

Each pledge, of which there have been 489 to date, is legally binding and must be a minimum of two percent, although the average figure pledged by entrepreneurs is four percent.

The initiative aims to make it easy to contribute in a meaningful way, engaging entrepreneurs at the beginning of their ventures to enable them to incorporate social values early on.

“It’s super easy and super high impact” explains co-founder David Goldberg.

And pledgers become part of a community that’s about something much bigger than simply tech. Founders Pledge runs around ten workshops for pledgers each year to help ‘give them the knowledge to be change makers’ and also help them to share their expertise with charities.

In 2016 Founders Pledge announced a partnership with accelerator Mass Challenges, which encourages its alumni to pledge, and it also works with Ignite and Entrepreneur First.

The initiative is administered by Founders for Good, a not-for-profit company, and funded 100 percent by sponsors, partners and private donors, which means 100 percent of each donation goes to charitable causes.