VANCOUVER, British Columbia, April 17, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- The TED Conference -- The Audacious Project has broken last year's record and raised more than $280 million to help fund eight thrilling projects aimed at tackling some of the world's toughest challenges. Launched in April 2018 with a mission to foster "collaborative philanthropy for bold ideas," The Audacious Project is a coalition of leading organizations and individuals. It is housed at TED, the nonprofit devoted to ideas worth spreading, and operated with support from The Bridgespan Group—a leading social impact advisor to nonprofits and NGOs, philanthropists and investors. This year's eight successfully funded projects were distilled from more than 1,500 applications.

"I'm thrilled to introduce another class of social entrepreneurs with jaw-dropping visions of a better future and vetted blueprints for the successful execution of their ideas," said Chris Anderson, Head of TED. "At a time when many people are fearful about humanity's prospects, these projects offer a beautiful counter-narrative of ingenuity, determination and hope."

According to Bridgespan's Chairman and Co-founder Tom Tierney: "It is incredibly exciting to see The Audacious Project turbocharging such outstanding leaders and bold aspirations; these collaborations are unleashing philanthropic capital, at scale, against some of the world's most pressing issues."

Today, The Audacious Project class of 2019 took to the TED stage to reveal their world-changing projects—all of them with a convincing path to execution, scale and impact.

THE 2019 PROJECTS
Center for Policing Equity
Educate Girls
Institute for Protein Design 
The Salk Institute for Biological Studies 
The END Fund 
The Nature Conservancy
Thorn
Waterford UPSTART

Learn more about the 2019 projects via The Audacious Project press kit.

Visit AudaciousProject.org to watch the reveal of the 2019 Audacious projects. Available for one week only.

ABOUT TED

TED is a nonprofit organization devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading, often in the form of short talks delivered by leading thinkers and doers. Many of these talks are given at TED conferences, including our annual gathering in Vancouver, as well as TEDWomen, intimate TED Salons and thousands of independently organized TEDx events around the world. Videos of these talks are made available, free, on TED.com and other platforms. Audio versions of the talks from TED2019 will also be published to TED's podcast TED Talks Daily, available on Apple Podcasts and all other podcast platforms.

TED's open and free initiatives for spreading ideas include TED.com, where new TED Talk videos are posted daily; TEDx, which licenses thousands of individuals and groups to host local, self-organized TED-style events around the world; the TED Fellows program, which selects innovators from around the globe to amplify the impact of their remarkable projects and activities; the Audacious Project, which surfaces and funds critical ideas that have the potential to impact millions of lives; TEDSummit, which gathers the most engaged members of the global TED community for brainstorms, discussions, performances, workshops and an eclectic program of mainstage talks; and the educational initiative TED-Ed. TED also has a library of original podcasts, including The TED Interview with Chris Anderson, Sincerely, X, and one of Apple Podcasts' most downloaded new shows of 2018, WorkLife with Adam Grant.

Follow TED on Twitter at http://twitter.com/TEDTalks, on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/TED, on Instagram at https://instagram.com/ted and on Snapchat at tedtalkshq.

ABOUT THE AUDACIOUS PROJECT

The Audacious Project was launched in April 2018, with a mission to foster "collaborative philanthropy for bold ideas." Housed at TED (the nonprofit devoted to ideas worth spreading) and operated with support from The Bridgespan Group (a leading social impact advisor to nonprofits and NGOs, philanthropists and investors), The Audacious Project brings together some of the most respected organizations and individuals in philanthropy—the Skoll Foundation, Virgin Unite, Dalio Foundation and more. The Audacious Project surfaces and funds critical projects with the potential to create global change. By removing barriers associated with funding, The Audacious Project empowers social entrepreneurs to dream boldly and take on the world's biggest and most urgent challenges. The 2019 projects include: Center for Policing Equity, Educate Girls, Institute for Protein Design at the UW School of Medicine, Salk Institute for Biological Studies, the END Fund, The Nature Conservancy, Thorn and Waterford UPSTART.

Learn more or support an existing project at AudaciousProject.org.

Press Contacts 
TED - Karen Navarre Wicki: audacious@thenumber29.com 

SOURCE The TED Conference

Related Links

https://www.ted.com