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Texas · Private foundation

The Wildcat Foundation

Its FY2024 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

$10M
Granted FY2024(still arriving)
22
Grants FY2024
11
Organizations funded FY2023
27%
First-time grantees FY2023
Read the full brief
Median grant, FY2024
$456,215
Largest grant, FY2024
$1,175,075
Organizations funded a year
11 to 21
FY2017 to FY2023
States reached, FY2024
6
Total assets, FY2024
$6.1M
Applications
Preselected organizations only
Per its most recent filing; check its own site

How open it is to new grantees

In FY2023, 27% of the organizations The Wildcat Foundation funded were first-time grantees, receiving 37% of its grant dollars.

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2023, 63% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $4.7M went to new ones.

50%100%’18’19’20’21’22’23
RenewedFirst-time

Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant

’18’19’20’21’22’23
AnimalsInternationalEnvironmentCivil RightsEducationPublic BenefitOther
How this is measured
First-time means a grantee’s first year in the filing window; renewed means funded in an earlier year too. The renewed share climbs naturally as a portfolio matures, so the signal is a year that bucks it (a wave of new grantees). The earliest year is left-censored: relationships that predate the data read as new. Theme is the grantee’s IRS cause.
The numbers by year
Fiscal yearOrganizations fundedTo those organizationsFirst-time grantees
FY2024still arriving10$10M0%
FY202311$13M27%
FY202214$17M14%
FY202113$18M15%
FY202012$17M0%
FY201918$19M17%
FY201817$17M24%
FY201721$15Mn/a
100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2024.

Animals$49MInternational$36MArts & Culture$25MRecreation & Sports$5.4MEnvironment$4.8MCrime & Legal$2.2MCivil Rights$882kPhilanthropy$485kOther$0

Where its grants go

Grant dollars by states, across the years we hold.

Which US states its grants reach

WA
ID
NY
OH
NJ
CA
CO
VA
DE
DC
TX
FL

Top grantees

Largest recipients by total granted, FY2017 to FY2024, and the share of each one’s budget the grants supplied at peak.

GranteeTotal grantedYearsShare of their budget
Undercurrent Inc$24,592,777660%
Frankfurt Zoological Society - US Inc$16,624,632833%
Wildlife Conservation Society$16,077,14962%
Pams Foundation Inc$15,935,570870%
Empowers Africa Inc$7,755,002250%
Save the Rhino International Inc$5,783,588883%
The Center for Advanced Defense Studies$5,373,854815%
Lukuru Wildlife Research Foundation$2,453,839386%
Houston Zoo Inc$2,324,77380%
Care for Wild$1,735,286283%
Show all 30 grantees

What it could do for these grantees

Plus 5 recipients with no EIN on record ($16M), not named here.

Where it is load-bearing

The Wildcat Foundation supplied at least a quarter of the budget for 14 of its grantees at some point. The chart plots its 30 largest grantees; load-bearing ones sit top left.

25%50%75%100%$1.0M$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetUndercurrent Inc: $24,592,777 over 6y, 60% of budgetFrankfurt Zoological Society - US Inc: $16,624,632 over 8y, 33% of budgetWildlife Conservation Society: $16,077,149 over 6y, 1.5% of budgetPams Foundation Inc: $15,935,570 over 8y, 70% of budgetEmpowers Africa Inc: $7,755,002 over 2y, 50% of budgetSave the Rhino International Inc: $5,783,588 over 8y, 83% of budgetThe Center for Advanced Defense Studies: $5,373,854 over 8y, 15% of budgetLukuru Wildlife Research Foundation: $2,453,839 over 3y, 86% of budgetHouston Zoo Inc: $2,324,773 over 8y, 0.5% of budgetCare for Wild: $1,735,286 over 2y, 83% of budgetBorn Free USA united with API: $1,562,381 over 1y, 77% of budgetAfrican Parks Foundation of America: $1,545,000 over 1y, 12% of budgetEnv Wildlife Conservation Trust: $900,601 over 7y, 56% of budgetForgotten Parks Foundation: $770,000 over 3y, 74% of budgetChengeta Wildlife: $662,000 over 1y, 41% of budgetNational Whistleblower Center: $528,000 over 2y, 62% of budgetMaasai Wilderness Conservation Fund: $500,000 over 4y, 12% of budgetFauna & Flora International USA Inc: $485,000 over 1y, 42% of budgetThe American Himalayan Foundation: $440,000 over 2y, 4.4% of budgetFocused Conservation Solutions Inc: $407,000 over 2y, 19% of budgetGorongosa Project Inc: $354,084 over 1y, 3.5% of budgetTsavo Conservation Group Inc: $333,000 over 1y, 92% of budgetAkashinga Inc: $328,625 over 2y, 2.8% of budgetWildlife Guardians: $240,616 over 3y, 7.6% of budgetUniversity of Washington Foundation: $238,533 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetVirunga Fund Inc: $231,000 over 1y, 21% of budgetWorld Wildlife Fund Inc: $125,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetFriends of the Peace Parks Inc: $46,545 over 1y, 0.9% of budgetCenter for US Global Leadership: $25,000 over 1y, 0.3% of budgetSmithsonian Institution: $20,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budget

Tap a dot to name the grantee.

How this is measured
Share of budget is the funder’s grant in a year over the grantee’s total revenue that year, at its highest across the years we hold; revenue is from all sources. Only grantees confirmed against their own filings, whose grants do not exceed their revenue, are plotted: the largest 30.

Nonprofits that may fit its grantmaking

Co-funders

Grantmakers whose grantees overlap with this funder’s far more than size alone predicts. Closer means stronger alignment; arcs show where they also fund each other. Here they form a tightly interlocked group: most of these funders back each other's grantees too.

The Woodtiger FundPA20× affinity7 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: The Woodtiger Fund · Seadream Family Foundation Inc · Wyss Foundation · Arcus Foundation · National Geographic Society · Marin Community Foundation · American Endowment Foundation · National Philanthropic Trust · Gs Donor Advised Philanthropy Fund for Wealth Management Inc · Paypal Charitable Giving Fund · The Pfizer Foundation Inc · Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program

How this is measured
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. Overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.

Compare The Wildcat Foundation with peer funders

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to The Wildcat Foundation?

Find your warmest path to The Wildcat Foundation through trustees and officers whose names appear on both boards. Search for your organization and Plinth traces the shortest route it can evidence.

Each link is a name appearing on two organizations’ public IRS 990 filings, matched on that name and, where the filings support it, on location. A same-state match has geographic support, which is a second matching feature rather than confirmation that the two are one person; a cross-state one is the likeliest to be two people who share a name. Every hop shows its tier, low-confidence and distant paths are held back rather than guessed, and it is worth confirming the person before you use the introduction.

About The Wildcat Foundation

How much does The Wildcat Foundation give?
The Wildcat Foundation reported 22 grants totaling $10,050,128 in its FY2024 IRS filing. It funded between 11 and 21 organizations a year over FY2017 to FY2023.
What does The Wildcat Foundation fund?
By grant dollars over FY2017 to FY2024, its largest causes are Animals (40%), International (29%), Arts & Culture (20%).
Who are The Wildcat Foundation's largest grantees?
By total granted over FY2017 to FY2024: Undercurrent Inc ($25M), Frankfurt Zoological Society - US Inc ($17M), Wildlife Conservation Society ($16M).
Does The Wildcat Foundation fund new organizations?
In FY2023, 27% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.
Does The Wildcat Foundation accept unsolicited applications?
Its most recent filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and does not take unsolicited requests. Check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.
Which funders back the same organizations as The Wildcat Foundation?
Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include The Woodtiger Fund, Seadream Family Foundation Inc, Wyss Foundation.
Where is The Wildcat Foundation based?
The Wildcat Foundation is based in TX.

On method. Every financial figure here is read from IRS e-file XML, the funder’s own 990/990-PF, and from the multi-year returns of the 35 grantees we resolved, each linked to its source. Grantee outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III), read as association with funding, never as caused by it. Low-confidence name matches are suppressed rather than guessed. How we build these →

How this is measured
Each figure carries one of six labels. Filed is what the funder reported on its return. Official is another government record about an organization, such as a federal award or a charity register, joined by name where no shared identifier exists. Resolved is an identity we worked out where the filing named a recipient without an EIN, kept only above a measured confidence threshold. Computed is arithmetic over those, like themes, portfolio clusters and co-funder strength. Context is a statistic about a place rather than about an organization, which is what the need overlay is: it describes the area a grantee’s address sits in, not where its work lands. Inferred is drawn by a model from text, like the partnerships read out of public news and organization websites. Each is labeled where it appears.

Generated from the IRS Form 990-PF e-file return for fiscal year 2024, released 2024. Filings run roughly 12 to 24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

Source object · view filing

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