Dustin Aaron Moskovitz[Rosenstein, Justin. "Reply on Quora to: Who is the CEO of Asana?", Quora, February 8, 2011. Retrieved February 15, 2011.] with Justin Rosenstein. In March 2011, Forbes reported Moskovitz to be the youngest self-made billionaire in the world, on the basis of his then 2.34% share in Facebook.
Early life
Moskovitz, who is Jewish,
was born on May 22, 1984, in Gainesville, Florida, and grew up in Ocala, Florida.
He attended Vanguard High School, graduating from the IB Diploma Program.
Moskovitz attended Harvard University as an economics major for two years before he moved with Mark Zuckerberg to Palo Alto, California, in order to work full-time on Facebook.
Career
Facebook (2004–2008)
Four people, three of whom were roommates—
Mark Zuckerberg,
Eduardo Saverin,
Chris Hughes, and Dustin Moskovitz—founded Facebook in their Harvard University dorm room in February 2004. Originally called thefacebook.com,
it was intended as an online directory of all Harvard's students to help residential students identify members of other residences.
In June 2004, Zuckerberg, Hughes and Moskovitz took a year off from Harvard and moved Facebook's base of operations to Palo Alto, and hired eight employees.
[ "Finding Friends with Facebook" , Wired, July 3, 2005. Retrieved February 15, 2011.] They were later joined by
Sean Parker. At Facebook, Moskovitz was the company's first chief technology officer and then vice president of engineering.
Asana (2008–present)
On October 3, 2008, Moskovitz announced that he was leaving Facebook to form a new company called Asana with Justin Rosenstein, an engineering manager at Facebook. Asana's mission is to improve the efficiency of office workers, providing them with a tool to manage and track projects and tasks. Moskowitz has remained CEO, with Rosenstein now serving as board member and advisor.
In September 2020, Asana went public at a market value of about $5.5 billion in a direct listing.
In March 2025, Moskovitz announced his intention to retire from the company and transition to a chairman role once the company's board finds a replacement CEO.
Philanthropy
Moskovitz co-founded the philanthropic organization
Good Ventures with his girlfriend (and now wife)
Cari Tuna in 2011.
In June 2012, Good Ventures announced a close partnership with charity evaluator
GiveWell. Both organizations "are aiming to do as much good as possible" and thereby align with the goals of effective altruism.
has donated approximately $100 million from 2011 onward to GiveWell top charities Against Malaria Foundation,
GiveDirectly, Schistosomiasis Control Initiative, and Deworm the World Initiative, as well as standout charities and other effective altruist organizations.
The collaboration with GiveWell led to a spinoff called the Open Philanthropy Project, whose goal is to figure out the best possible way to use large sums of money (starting with Moskovitz's multi-billion-dollar fortune) to do the best.
Moskovitz and Tuna are also the youngest couple to sign Bill Gates and Warren Buffett's Giving Pledge, which commits billionaires to give away most of their wealth in the form of philanthropy.
Politics
Moskovitz has voted for the Democratic Party candidates in each election in which he has voted, but he wrote: "Though we've voted for the Democratic nominee each of the times we've cast a ballot, we've considered ourselves independent thinkers who respect candidates and positions from both sides of the aisle."
Prior to their donation for the 2016 election cycle, Moskovitz and Tuna had donated roughly $10,000 over their lifetime to federal candidates, most of it to
Sean Eldridge, the husband of Facebook co-founder
Chris Hughes.
Moskovitz, through his support of Open Philanthropy, has contributed to California YIMBY. Open Philanthropy, mainly funded by Moskovitz and his wife, has donated around $500,000 to the cause.
For the 2016 United States presidential election, Moskovitz announced that he and his wife would donate $20 million to support Hillary Clinton, the Democratic Party nominee, arguing that the dangers of a Donald Trump presidency were significant, and that they were making their donation despite being skeptical of allowing large donors to influence election cycles through money.
For the 2020 United States presidential election, Moskovitz donated $24 million to support the Democratic Party nominee Joe Biden.
For the 2024 United States presidential election, Moskovitz donated $10 million to support the Democratic Party nominee Kamala Harris via the Future Forward PAC,[ Harris Sets Record for Biggest Fund-Raising Quarter Ever - New York Times, 21 October 2024] with a further $38 million via Asana,
Other business activities
Moskovitz was also the biggest
angel investor in the mobile photo-sharing site Path, run by another former member of Facebook, David Morin. It was reported
[Lacy, Sarah. "Inside the DNA of the Facebook Mafia" , Techcrunch, February 13, 2011. Retrieved February 15, 2011.] that Moskovitz's advice was important in persuading Morin to reject a $100 million offer for the company from
Google, made in February 2011.
[Arrington, Mike. "Google Tried To Buy Path For $100+ Million. Path Said No." , Techcrunch, February 2, 2011. Retrieved February 15, 2011.] In 2020, Moskovitz led a $40 million Series D funding round for fusion power start-up
Helion Energy.
Personal life
Moskovitz met
Cari Tuna on a
blind date, and they married in 2013.
He and Tuna attend Burning Man regularly, and Moskovitz has written about his reasons for doing so.
Media depictions
Moskovitz is played in the movie
The Social Network by actor
Joseph Mazzello. Responding to a question on
Quora, Moskovitz said that the film "emphasizes things that didn't matter (like the
Winklevoss twins, whom I've still never even met and had no part in the work we did to create the site over the past 6 years) and leaves out things that did (like the many other people in our lives at the time, who supported us in innumerable ways)."
[Moskovitz, Dustin. "Reply on Quora to: What does Dustin Moskovitz think of the Facebook movie?" , Quora, July 16, 2010. Retrieved February 15, 2011.]
Further reading
External links
