Chris West

Chris is currently a co-founder and Director of Sumerian Foundation and Sumerian Partners. In these roles, he both advises high net worth individuals, institutions and corporates (on how to maximise the impact of their programmes), and manages philanthropic capital (with a focus on deploying venture philanthropy to help social enterprises transition to scale in the UK and in Africa).

Chris helped establish the Shell Foundation in 2000 and was its Director from 2008-2015. In this role he promoted an "enterprise-based" approach to philanthropy, being one of the early pioneers of "venture philanthropy" and "impact investing". He helped create and scale up a portfolio of leading social enterprises involved in the provision of clean energy, sustainable mobility and job creation by small and medium sized enterprises in Africa and Asia.