KKR Co-Founder Kravis, Wife Gift $100 Million to Sloan Kettering for Cancer Project

(Bloomberg) -- KKR & Co. co-founder Henry Kravis and his wife, economist Marie-Josee Kravis, donated $100 million to Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York. 

The gift from the couple's foundation will fund the Cancer Ecosystems Project, which will study the relapse of the disease, according to a statement. It will bring together cancer researchers and computational scientists and comes as President Joe Biden revives his moonshot initiative to “end cancer as we know it.”

Marie-Josee Kravis is a vice chair of the cancer center's board. In 2014, the couple made a $100 million gift to create a Center for Molecular Oncology, also bearing their name. Their other donations have helped recruit and advance female scientists and support quantitative biologists. Henry Kravis, 78, has a net worth of $11.5 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. 

“We are honored to be able to continue our support of science and research at MSK through this initiative,” Marie-Josee Kravis said in the statement. “We want to build on this work in order to create greater understanding of cancer's relationship to the body and yield transformative treatments for people around the world.”

Memorial Sloan Kettering, the world's oldest private cancer center, has received support from billionaires over the years. David Koch gave $150 million in 2015, in what was his largest single donation ever at the time. Stanley Druckenmiller and his wife, Fiona, made a $100 million gift last month.

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