California · Nonprofit
B612 Foundation
B612 Foundation (California) receives grants from 22 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,788,173 to it, the largest being VANGUARD CHARITABLE ENDOWMENT PROGRAM ($957,500). 15 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 98% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- Revenue FY2024
- $5.6M
- Funders on record
- 22
- Grants received
- $3.8M
- Net assets
- $4.7M
What B612 Foundation does
Mission
Develops tools and technologies to understand, map, and navigate our solar system and to protect Earth from asteroid impacts. Our mission combines science, technology, education, and advocacy programs.
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.
Programs
Asteroid Institute - In 2024, the Asteroid Institute advanced asteroid discovery by identifying 27,500 new asteroids using large-scale computation on the ADAM platform applied to archival datasets. ADAM combined curated datasets totaling 5.3 billion point sources, expanding our unified collection of observations and enabling future discoveries. We strengthened collaborations with the Minor Planet Center and ATLAS Observatory, refined open-source tools for global researchers, and prepared for the Vera Rubin Observatory's first light in 2025 to transform solar system mapping. Learn more at B612.ai
$3,422,922 spentof which $109,405 as grants87% of program spendingAsteroid Education and Advocacy - At Google Next, B612's partnership with Google Cloud was featured for enabling discovery of previously undetected asteroids using large-scale computation on the ADAM platform. During 2024, B612 sustained support for the LSST Solar System Science Collaboration, funding software tools, technical workshops, and fellowships to improve Rubin Observatory data analysis and coordination. Outreach included a prize-winning thesis presentation at the IAU, public programs during the solar eclipse in Texas, and expanded mentoring at observatories to strengthen global asteroid research. Asteroid Day, recognized by the United Nations each June 30, grew to 600 events worldwide in 2024. Learn more at b612foundation.org
$474,372 spentof which $800 as grants12% of program spendingSchweickart Prize Program - The Schweickart Prize, established in 2023 and named for Apollo 9 Astronaut Rusty Schweickart, aims to advance our ability to protect life on Earth from asteroid impacts. In 2024, the Asteroid Institute awarded the first student prize to Joseph "Joe" DeMartini for his SUNSET Collaboration proposal to detect Sunward Near-Earth Objects (SNEOs), which are hard to observe yet pose high impact risk. The ceremony, co-hosted at the Chabot Space & Science Center in Oakland, presented DeMartini with a meteorite and $10,000 grant to help realize the SUNSET Collaboration. Learn more at schweickartprize.org
$26,000 spentof which $10,000 as grants1% of program spending
The 3 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $3,923,294.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2023 to 2024, from $5.0M to $6.3M (+25%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2021 1% · 2022 3%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
99% of B612 Foundation’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (67% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 3 of the last 8 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Chief executive
Dr Edward Lu
Board Secr/Exec Dir Asteroid Inst
Board chair
Peter Schwartz
Board Chair
As listed on its FY2024 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 7 funders to 9 funders, grant income rose $90k → $510k.
13 of 22 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 98% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of B612 Foundation’s funders (the co-funder graph). Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
B612 Foundation has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 25% of grant income, and it takes 3 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 3 funders to its left
98% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund B612 Foundation.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 27% · 2018 73% · 2019 42% · 2020 77% · 2021 79% · 2022 46% · 2023 45% — growing more concentrated.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
53% of B612 Foundation's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 68% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
98% of B612 Foundation's grant income arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors, whose addresses record where the money is held rather than where the donor is. Of the $61k that is directly attributable, 51% of it comes from California funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $3.7M arriving through sponsors registered in 10 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
B612 Foundation runs a healthier operating margin than three-quarters of the 482 science & tech nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 482 science & tech nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2024
Organizations like B612 Foundation
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In California
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
92% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
50%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for B612 Foundation: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds B612 Foundation?
- B612 Foundation (California) receives grants from 22 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,788,173 to it, the largest being VANGUARD CHARITABLE ENDOWMENT PROGRAM ($957,500). 15 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 98% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- How many funders does B612 Foundation have?
- IRS filings report 22 organizations giving $3,788,173 in grants to B612 Foundation, 15 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of B612 Foundation?
- VANGUARD CHARITABLE ENDOWMENT PROGRAM is the largest funder on record, with $957,500 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like B612 Foundation find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in California. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2024 (financials across 2017–2024), and the filings of 22 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing