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United States-Japan Foundation (USJF)
The United States-Japan Foundation was founded in 1980 after Ryoichi Sasakawa, through the Nippon Foundation, donated $44.8 million to create an independent...
United States-Japan Foundation (USJF)
The United States-Japan Foundation was founded in 1980 after Ryoichi Sasakawa, through the Nippon Foundation, donated $44.8 million to create an independent US-based philanthropy. American diplomats Angier Biddle Duke and Robin Chandler Duke co-founded the organization, establishing dual headquarters in New York and Washington, D.C. The foundation's endowment is overseen by a board led by Chairman Lawrence K. Fish, former CEO of Citizens Financial Group, and President and CEO Jacob M. Schlesinger, who assumed the role in 2023. USJF's investment posture spans nine distinct asset classes, including buyout, venture, growth equity, distressed debt, mezzanine, natural resources, secondaries, real estate, and fund-of-funds commitments. The portfolio tilts heavily toward private markets, with confirmed allocations to private real estate funds across mixed-use properties. Unlike peers that outsource entirely to an OCIO, USJF retains a direct-investment architecture that mirrors the endowment model of a research university, though specific portfolio companies remain undisclosed. The foundation maintains offices in New York, Washington, D.C., and Tokyo, embedding itself in both American and Japanese deal ecosystems. An estimated $90–$110 million (Altss estimate) underpins the foundation's dual mission of capital deployment and grantmaking. Its flagship non-investment asset is the US-Japan Leadership Program (USJLP), a curated network of over 500 fellows across sectors — a resource that doubles as a proprietary sourcing channel and a vector for bilateral influence. In May 2023, Jacob Schlesinger moved from journalist to CEO, signaling a generational transition at the top. Board affiliations reinforce trans-Pacific access: Trustee Wendy Cutler serves as Vice President of the Asia Society Policy Institute, Trustee James Kondo chairs the International House of Japan, and Trustee Stan Kasten is President of the Los Angeles Dodgers. The foundation's structure is a misfit in typical allocator taxonomies — it behaves like a hybrid of a private foundation and a small institutional investor with a permanent-capital advantage and a deeply political, non-commercial mission. Governance straddles two nations, and its board blends financial-operating executives with career diplomats, creating a risk posture that prioritizes long-term relationship preservation over pure return maximization. That architecture, coupled with the USJLP network, places USJF closer to a bilateral sovereign-adjacent platform than a conventional charitable endowment.
General information
Firm type
Foundation
Year founded
1980
Location
Region
North America
Country
United States
City
New York
Corporate office
145 East 32nd Street, New York, NY 10016, United States
Additional offices
Washington, D.C., United States · Tokyo, Japan
Principals
Ryoichi Sasakawa
Founder
Angier Biddle Duke
Co-Founder
Robin Chandler Duke
Co-Founder
Lawrence K. Fish
Chairman of the Board of Trustees
Jacob M. Schlesinger
President and CEO
Caroline Kennedy
Trustee
Wendy Cutler
Trustee
Stan Kasten
Trustee
Keiko Tashiro
Trustee
Jeffery W. Yabuki
Trustee
Sector focus
Frequently asked questions
Who oversees the foundation's endowment and investment decisions?
The endowment is governed by the Board of Trustees, chaired by Lawrence K. Fish, former CEO of Citizens Financial Group. Day-to-day leadership sits with President and CEO Jacob M. Schlesinger, appointed in 2023. The foundation does not name a CIO publicly; investment strategy appears to be driven by the board and embedded staff, operating with an in-house endowment model rather than a fully outsourced OCIO.
What is the relationship between the US-Japan Foundation and the Nippon Foundation?
The Nippon Foundation, under Ryoichi Sasakawa, provided the original $44.8 million endowment grant in 1980 to create the US-Japan Foundation. Despite the shared founding lineage and ongoing board-level affiliations — USJF Trustee James Kondo chairs the International House of Japan, a Nippon Foundation grantee — the two are legally independent entities: USJF is a US-domiciled 501(c)(3), and the Nippon Foundation is a Japanese philanthropic organization.
How does the US-Japan Leadership Program (USJLP) relate to the foundation's capital deployment?
USJLP is the foundation's flagship networking initiative, comprising over 500 fellows from the US and Japan across government, business, and culture. While officially a programmatic expense, the network potentially functions as a proprietary sourcing channel for private-market deal flow and co-investor introductions, giving USJF an edge that a purely financial endowment would lack. The foundation treats the program as a core mission asset rather than a for-profit deal club.
Does the foundation commit exclusively to US-Japan cross-border strategies?
No. While the foundation's grantmaking focuses on US-Japan bilateral projects, its investment portfolio spans broad private-market categories — buyout, venture, distressed debt, real estate, and natural resources — with a disclosed geographic footprint that includes US-based assets and Tokyo-based real estate. The foundation does not restrict its managers to cross-border mandates.
How large is the foundation's investment portfolio, and is that number publicly confirmed?
The United States-Japan Foundation does not publicly disclose its assets under management. Altss estimates the endowment at $90–$110 million based on the original $44.8 million 1980 endowment, cumulative grantmaking history, and observed private-market allocations. No external publication has independently verified a precise AUM figure.
What is the governance structure, and how is the board composed?
A bi-national Board of Trustees governs the foundation. It blends financial-operating executives (Chairman Lawrence K. Fish, Trustee Jeffery Yabuki of Motive Partners), diplomats (Former U.S. Ambassador Caroline Kennedy, Wendy Cutler of the Asia Society Policy Institute), and Japanese corporate leadership (Keiko Tashiro of Daiwa Securities). This composition embeds the foundation in both US and Japanese elite networks, reinforcing a permanent bilateral mandate.
Does the foundation accept outside capital or operate as a multi-family office?
No. USJF is an independent, single-endowment foundation. It was capitalized once by the Nippon Foundation in 1980 and has not opened to external limited partners. It does not function as a multi-family office, nor does it manage third-party discretionary accounts.
Profile maintained by Altss using OSINT (open-source intelligence), regulatory filings, licensed data partners, and verified direct submissions. Read the methodology. Last updated: . Continuous refresh with full update cycles at least every 30 days.
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