California · Nonprofit
TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION
TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION (California) receives grants from 148 organizations whose IRS filings report $6,076,122 to it, the largest being GS DONOR ADVISED PHILANTHROPY FUND FOR WEALTH MANAGEMENT INC ($589,250). 81 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2024
- $3.1M
- Funders on record
- 148
- Grants received
- $6.1M
- Net assets
- $1.2M
What Tower Cancer Research Foundation does
Mission
Through local investments, we advance groundbreaking cancer research and profoundly support people affected by the disease to create outsized impact in southern california and beyond.
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.
Program
In 2023, tower funded four new career development research grants for four promising young physician scientists located at ucla, uci and ucsd. Research areas focus on innovative therapies such as: the use of ph to target glioblastoma cells in hopes to improve treatment for this deadly disease; using a model of skin cancer, a new tool to track cancer cells in their natural habitat to find how lymphatic vessels shield cancer cells and aid their spread to other parts of the body; targeting liver-metastatic pancreatic cancer by identifying weaknesses that can be exploited to slow the growth of tumors in the liver or possibly prevent the establishment of metastasis from happening in pancreatic cancer; stem cell reprogramming of anti-tumor t cells to make til therapy a more effective treatment. In addition, tower continued funding mul-ti-year senior investigator grants. Total scientific grant expenditures in 2023 topped $700,000. Investing in novel ideas of young investigators and experienced senior investigators allows us to leverage our donor dollars to have maximum impact. In 2023 alone, tcrf researchers reported nearly $3m in follow-on funding, dozens of grants, publications…
$2,508,236 spentof which $889,920 as grants100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $2,508,236.
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 2021 to 2022, from $3.9M to $4.6M (+19%).
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.
116% of TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (51% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 7 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.
Board chair
Nancy Rosenfelt
Chairman of the board
As listed on its FY2024 Form 990.
The chief executive listed changed between the FY2021 and FY2022 filings.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 37 funders to 45 funders, grant income rose $406k → $1.2M.
23 of 148 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 46% 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 TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 148 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
TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 10% of grant income, and it takes 9 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 9 funders to its left
54% 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 TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 12% · 2018 21% · 2019 16% · 2020 17% · 2021 14% · 2022 16% · 2023 27% — 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
39% of TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 55% 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
89% of TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION's grant income comes from California funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $2.8M arriving through sponsors registered in 16 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
TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION's funding base is broadening — from 37 funders to 45 as grant income climbed.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 8,126 health nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2024
Organizations like TOWER CANCER RESEARCH 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
69% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
94%
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 TOWER CANCER RESEARCH 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 TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION?
- TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION (California) receives grants from 148 organizations whose IRS filings report $6,076,122 to it, the largest being GS DONOR ADVISED PHILANTHROPY FUND FOR WEALTH MANAGEMENT INC ($589,250). 81 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION have?
- IRS filings report 148 organizations giving $6,076,122 in grants to TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION, 81 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of TOWER CANCER RESEARCH FOUNDATION?
- GS DONOR ADVISED PHILANTHROPY FUND FOR WEALTH MANAGEMENT INC is the largest funder on record, with $589,250 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like TOWER CANCER RESEARCH 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 148 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