Nike's Co-Founder Just Gave $1.1 Billion To Build Oregon's First Women's Hospital.

Phil and Penny Knight have committed $1.1 billion to Providence St. Vincent Medical Center and its Providence Heart Institute in Portland, Oregon, in one of the largest single gifts to a healthcare institution in American history, the medical center announced on September 15, 2026. The centerpiece of the gift is Oregon's first hospital dedicated entirely to women's health, to be built on the Providence St. Vincent campus. The Knights have supported the Providence Heart Institute for more than a decade, previously contributing more than $200 million including a $75 million gift earlier this year, and the new commitment builds directly on that foundation. The Phil and Penny Knight Pavilion already stands on the Providence St. Vincent campus. Dr. Dan Oseran, executive medical director of the Providence Heart Institute, told CNBC that prior Knight funding had allowed the institute to start a heart transplant program and recruit physicians with the administrative and research time to pursue their areas of expertise, creating what he described as a very unique environment. The new $1.1 billion will expand cardiovascular care across multiple Providence hospitals, fund clinical research and training programs, and underwrite the construction and staffing of the women's hospital, which Providence CEO Ray Moreno described as a response to the reality that women's health needs change throughout life and that patients are too often asked to navigate multiple specialties and care settings without coordinated support.

The Knights, whose net worth stands at approximately $25 billion according to Forbes, have given so comprehensively to Oregon that the scale of their philanthropy in the state has become one of the defining features of the region's public institutions. They have given more than $2.7 billion to Oregon Health and Science University, including a $2 billion gift for its Knight Cancer Institute the prior year. They have donated more than $2 billion to the University of Oregon, Phil Knight's alma mater, including $500 million to launch the Phil and Penny Knight Campus for Accelerating Scientific Impact in 2016 and another $500 million to expand its programs in 2021. They gave $400 million to a Portland nonprofit working to revive the Albina neighborhood, a historically Black community that had been neglected for decades. They have given at least $580 million to Stanford University. Their total known philanthropic giving has now crossed $7 billion. Phil Knight founded Nike in 1964 with track coach Bill Bowerman after Knight ran for Bowerman at the University of Oregon and the two began building better running shoes in a garage. The company he built from that partnership became one of the most recognized brands on Earth. The women's hospital being built in Portland with the proceeds of his philanthropy will outlast every shoe.

Source:https://www.cnbc.com/2026/09/15/nike-phil-knight-donation-oregon-medical-center.html