Massachusetts · Nonprofit
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc (Massachusetts) receives grants from 2069 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,499,008,498 to it, the largest being PAN-MASSACHUSETTS CHALLENGE INC ($450,000,000). 1160 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $3.9B
- Funders on record
- 2,069
- Grants received
- $1.5B
- Net assets
- $4.5B
What Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc does
Mission
The mission of dfci is to provide expert, compassionate, and equitable care to children, adults, and their families, while advancing the understanding, diagnosis, treatment, cure, and prevention of cancer and related diseases. We train new generations of clinicians and scientists, disseminate innovative patient therapies and scientific discoveries around the world, and reduce the impact of cancer, while at all times maintaining a focus on those communities that have been historically marginalized.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Clinical care - see schedule o
$2,583,812,037 spent$3,030,902,186 earned by the program74% of program spendingResearch - see schedule o
$835,998,547 spent24% of program spendingCommunity benefits - see schedule o
$49,344,471 spentof which $8,197,302 as grants1% of program spending
The 3 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $3,469,155,055.
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 2019 to 2020, from $3.1B to $3.9B (+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: 2017 9% · 2018 8% · 2019 8% · 2020 9% · 2021 9% · 2022 7% · 2023 6% · 2024 5% · 2025 5%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
20% of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (1% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 1 of the last 9 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.
The chief executive listed changed between the FY2019 and FY2020 filings.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 527 funders to 798 funders, grant income rose $121M → $218M.
86 of 2069 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 21% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
Left out of every figure on this page: $73M from 92 payers (the payer shares this organization's board, largest Jewish Communal Fund); $12M from one payer (an institutional transfer, not a grant programme, largest Crimson Lion Foundation). These are real filings, and they are not money Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc raised.
From the IRS filings of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 2069 funders by total. 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
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 30% of grant income, and it takes 6 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 6 funders to its left
80% 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 Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 42% · 2018 41% · 2019 42% · 2020 10% · 2021 36% · 2022 29% · 2023 33% — diversifying over time.
“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
41% of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 56% 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
53% of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc's grant income comes from Massachusetts funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $311M arriving through sponsors registered in 30 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
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc has grown faster than three-quarters of the 1,256 health nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 1,256 health nonprofits over $100M, FY2025
Government funding Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $2.1B on record — $1.8B federal, $389.6M state.
- Department of Health and Human Services$1.6B
- Department of Defense$149.7M
- Department of Energy$3.2M
- National Science Foundation$2.1M
- Department of Veterans Affairs$534k
- MA$389.6M
- FL$773
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc
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 Massachusetts
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
91% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
84%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 20 states
Part of a family of 11 related entities
- Dana-Farber Global Oncology LLC · disregarded
- Binney Street Capital Fund LLC · disregarded
- Dana-Farber National Workforce LLC · disregarded
- Dana-Farber Inc · exempt
- The Dana-Farber Trust Inc · exempt
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc: 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 Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc?
- Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc (Massachusetts) receives grants from 2069 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,499,008,498 to it, the largest being PAN-MASSACHUSETTS CHALLENGE INC ($450,000,000). 1160 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc have?
- IRS filings report 2069 organizations giving $1,499,008,498 in grants to Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc, 1160 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc?
- PAN-MASSACHUSETTS CHALLENGE INC is the largest funder on record, with $450,000,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Inc find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Massachusetts. 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 FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 2069 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 22, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing