A global investment company has opened a UK branch of its foundation after moving 200 staff members to a new office in central London.
Wolfgang Egger set up Patrizia investment company in 1984 in Germany and opened its charitable foundation, which receives 1% of the firm’s profits and invests in services for children, in 1999.
Egger recently registered the Patrizia Foundation UK with the Charity Commission and launched the organisation this month at the investment firm’s new international hub in Covent Garden.
The UK foundation will be led by director Carol Gillanders alongside chair Astrid Gabler and fellow trustees Sabine Wunderlich and Simon Woolf.
Lord and Lady Lloyd Webber have also been appointed ambassadors of the foundation.
Its first UK project will be to support the Music in Secondary Schools Trust (MiSST), of which Lady Lloyd Webber is a trustee, to provide funding for musical instrument tuition for 300 children in disadvantaged schools across the UK.
Globally, the Patrizia Foundation aims to reach a million children and young people worldwide by 2030 and has reported supporting 700,000 so far.
Plan to partner with other charities
Speaking to Civil Society, Gillanders said part of the motivation for the UK foundation launching was the level of need in the UK.
“But clearly, there’s a funding job to be done as well, to be able to fund all the things that we want to do. But, you can tell Wolfgang’s vision is great, but we have to be strategic in how we deliver the services and how we do what we do best.”
She said the foundation was focused on its project with MiSST at the moment but would be looking to support other UK charities in the future to deliver services.
“We’re looking very strategically at what areas we can have the most impact but we want to do it in the right pace,” she said.
Egger said “it would be super” if the foundation were to help 300,000 children in the UK to reach its global target by 2030 but said the main focus was to find suitable charity partners.
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