San Francisco Chronicle Profiles Dan Pallotta, Founder of Controversial AIDS Rides
The San Francisco Chronicle on Friday profiled Dan Pallotta, CEO of Pallotta Teamworks, a marketing and event design firm that has drawn criticism for poor financial returns on bicycle rides designed to raise funds for HIV/AIDS services and vaccine research. Pallotta Teamworks, a for-profit, private company, has raised more than $222 million since 1994 for charities dealing with HIV/AIDS and breast cancer, but critics contend that although the firm started with altruistic aims, it has become "increasingly profit-driven" and is now "making a fortune from the plight of terminally ill patients and the volunteers who donate their time, sweat and money for charitable causes." Pallotta says that he is "widely misunderstood" and that "to raise significant amounts of money, enormous sums must be spent." Pallotta Teamworks "is creating a new paradigm," he said, adding, "To respond to the world's problems, you need to respond boldly. You need to do big things that have some hope of solving a problem. What we're doing here is very different from what any other enterprise has attempted" (Doyle, San Francisco Chronicle, 5/3).
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