# Michael Moritz **Draft profile.** Welsh-born journalist-turned-venture-capitalist; one of the most successful early-stage tech investors in Silicon Valley history. **Joined [[Sequoia Capital]] in 1986** after co-authoring *Going for Broke: The Chrysler Story* as a *Time* journalist; was the **partner who wrote the $12.5M Google check** in 1999. Other major portfolio: Yahoo!, PayPal, [[YouTube]], Zappos, Skyscanner, eToys. **Stepped down from Sequoia in July 2023** after nearly four decades; he is now **chair of the board of [[Klarna]]**, the Swedish BNPL lender that listed on the NYSE in September 2025, and bought 3.47 million of its shares for about $50 million in 2026. Estimated net worth: **~$7B** (2026). Born **1954 in Cardiff** to Jewish parents who had fled Nazi Germany; Oxford history degree → Wharton MBA. ## Crankstart Foundation Moritz's primary philanthropic vehicle is **[[Crankstart Foundation]]** (founded 2000 with his wife, novelist/sculptor Harriet Heyman): - **$3.8B in assets** — the **largest family foundation in San Francisco** (larger than the [[Sergey Brin]] Family Foundation at $3.3B and the James Irvine Foundation at $3.2B). - **Giving Pledge signatory** — committed to giving away 50%+ of his wealth. - **$300M+ donated to San Francisco–focused causes**, particularly civic reform, homelessness, and local journalism. - **£150M committed to the National Gallery London** (September 2025) for a new extension. ## San Francisco Civic Politics Moritz has become **one of the most consequential funders of the recent San Francisco moderate-Democrat civic-reform movement** — particularly through funding of [[TogetherSF]] and adjacent operations that successfully recalled District Attorney [[Chesa Boudin]] (2022), elected a moderate-Democrat board of supervisors majority, and pushed back against the city's progressive-Democratic-Party machinery. The work has been characterized by supporters as "fixing San Francisco" and by critics as a billionaire-funded ideological capture of city politics. ### After the 2024 defeat: backing Lurie [[TogetherSF]] put about $5.4M behind Mark Farrell for mayor in 2024, and Farrell finished fourth. Moritz did not walk away. He is the **largest donor ($2,593,096)** to Mayor [[Daniel Lurie]]'s 2026 charter-reform committee (SF Ethics, through Oct 1, 2026), which seeks the expanded mayoral power TogetherSF's 2024 Prop D failed to win. He also gave against the June 2026 Overpaid CEO tax. See [[San Francisco Charter Reform]] and [[San Francisco Overpaid CEO Tax]]. His [[Crankstart Foundation]] is also a funder of Lurie's [[Tipping Point Community]]. ## California Forever Moritz is a named LP in **[[California Forever]]** alongside [[Marc Andreessen]], [[Reid Hoffman]], [[Laurene Powell Jobs]], the Collison brothers, [[Chris Dixon]], [[Nat Friedman]], [[Daniel Gross]], and [[John Doerr]]. Crankstart Foundation (separately) was a named donor to **[[Fast Grants]]** in 2020. ## Why It Matters in This KB ### 1. He is the most KB-active member of the California Forever consortium Beyond the CF stake, Moritz's Crankstart-funded San Francisco civic politics, his Fast Grants donation, and his long Sequoia investment record place him at the intersection of **multiple KB-tracked threads** — tech oligarchy, Progress Studies, urban-policy capital, traditional VC. ### 2. Sequoia Capital is the canonical Silicon Valley VC firm Moritz's near-four-decade Sequoia tenure shaped what modern Silicon Valley venture capital looks like. **Tracking his portfolio is tracking the canonical early-internet success curve** (Google, PayPal, YouTube, Yahoo, Zappos). ### 3. The 2006 cancer diagnosis structurally shapes the philanthropic posture Moritz was diagnosed in 2006 with a rare, incurable form of blood cancer. The diagnosis is openly cited in reporting on why Crankstart's giving pace accelerated through the 2010s — the foundation is structured around the assumption that the principal has limited time. ### 4. The Welsh-Jewish refugee background is a notable biographical thread Moritz's parents fled Nazi Germany to Wales; he is one of the few Silicon Valley megadonors with explicit Holocaust-survivor family history. His philanthropic priorities — particularly civic reform and the National Gallery donation — reflect the cultural-institutional emphasis of that European-Jewish-establishment lineage. ## Draft Notes / To Expand - Add detailed [[Crankstart Foundation]] profile - Document the [[TogetherSF]] funding pipeline and political outcomes - Trace specific Crankstart grant patterns year-by-year - Detail Harriet Heyman's separate creative work and the joint foundation governance - Map the Boudin recall campaign funding in detail - Add specific Fast Grants donation amount if disclosed - Investigate Moritz's role in the broader San Francisco YIMBY / housing-reform movement ## See Also - [[Daniel Lurie]] — 2026 charter-reform committee's top donor - [[San Francisco Charter Reform]] · [[Neighbors for a Better San Francisco]] · [[Tipping Point Community]] - [[Sequoia Capital]] — Career-defining institution - [[Crankstart Foundation]] — Philanthropic vehicle (page TBD) - [[California Forever]] — LP position - [[Fast Grants]] — Crankstart donation - [[Patrick Collison]] / [[John Collison]] — Co-investors - [[Marc Andreessen]] / [[Reid Hoffman]] / [[Laurene Powell Jobs]] — CF co-investors - [[Philanthropy Ecosystem]] — Money-flow MOC