Larry Brilliant

Pioneering Physician and Philanthropist

BIG IDEAS

• Birds, Bugs, and Business: Preparing for Crisis
  The first years of this century have brought increasing shocks—technological, political, economic, and climatic. Now we are facing mounting concerns about a possible biological crisis: an avian flu pandemic. But what is its probability? What steps can we take to prepare? And what are the broader implications for business and society?
• Changing the World: One Challenge at a Time
  Larry’s career reads like a movie script. It starts with him as a young doctor who gets recruited to deliver a Native American baby on the occupied Alcatraz Island in the San Francisco Bay in the late 1960s. He then gets swept up into the literal making of a movie, which involves psychedelic buses traveling cross country with the likes of Wavy Gravy and culminates in a Pink Floyd concert in England. He and some others stay on the bus, and travel for the next few years all the way to India. There, Larry meets Ram Dass and studies with a guru in a monastery in the Himalayans. The guru tells him to join the United Nations and eradicate smallpox. After numerous attempts to join the effort, accompanied with journeys up and down the mountain, he finally gets a UN job and eventually becomes a leader of the WHO program that indeed eradicates history’s greatest killer. The story doesn’t stop there. Brilliant goes on to launch a foundation that eventually helps as many as 2 million blind people regain sight—with the help of the Grateful Dead and Steve Jobs, among others. He also becomes involved in a technology company that provides the core hardware and software for the founding of the pioneering online community, the WELL. Brilliant’s career is in every way remarkable. So, too, are his insights into where the world might be heading. In this presentation, he delivers multiple perspectives: those of a physician, a former CEO, a technologist, and—now—one of the world's most visible philanthropists, to challenge each of us to change the world.

SNAPSHOT BIO

Dr. Larry Brilliant is executive director of Google.org. An online pioneer and veteran philanthropist, Larry oversees the philanthropic wing of the leading Internet search engine, which has committed more than $1 billion to philanthropic activities. A self-described social change "addict," Larry recently won the prestigious TEDPrize, which grants recipients $100,000 and one wish to change the world. In February 2006, Larry announced his wish: to form the International Networked System for Total Early Disease Detection (INSTEDD), an international non-governmental network that will detect early signs of emerging, global health crises, such as pandemic bird flu.

A Closer Look at Larry

FOCUS AREAS
What's on Larry's current research agenda?

Larry spends most of his time traveling to remote areas of the globe to evaluate current Google.org initiatives and identify potential opportunities and partnerships. Recently, he traveled to India to visit eye clinics and polio vaccination projects and to China to discuss clean energy alternatives.

ENGAGEMENTS
How have other organizations utilized Larry's expertise, and what's ahead on his schedule?

Among other engagements, Larry has presented at:

• the Global Health Council 33rd Annual International Conference of Global Health
• the National Association of Public Hospitals
• Knox College (commencement address)
• the Wealth & Giving Forum