Jeffrey
Skoll is a Canadian-American businessman, philanthropist and movie producer who
became one of the richest people in the world as eBay's first president. After
helping eBay rise from startup to astounding success, he stepped down as president
and cashed out $2 billion of his stock in the company. He used this wealth to
start up a movie production company, Participant Productions, whose first three
films (Syriana, Good Night and Good Luck and North Country) brought
in 11 Oscar Nominations in 2006. In 2007 the documentary An Inconvenient Truth
won 2 Oscar nominations. In 1999, Jeffrey Skoll also created The Skoll Foundation
to promote social entrepreneurship, endowing it with $250 million of eBay stock.
Social entrepreneurs are "leaders who have identified sustainable solutions
to social problems that have fundamentally changed society." Jeffrey Skoll
has won numerous awards and accolades for his philanthropic work, including the
Outstanding Philanthropist Award from the International Association of Fundraising
Professionals in 2003, and in 2006, Time Magazine named Jeffrey Skoll one
of the 100 People of the Year.
