The news made little noise on Tuesday, but the announcement was nevertheless immense. The University of Montreal has received a donation of 159 million from the Jacques Courtois Foundation for the creation of a new institute devoted to fundamental research in science. This is the largest donation to the institution in history and the third largest donation ever made to a Canadian university, no less.
Posted at 6:30 a.m.
“A donation like the great Harvard or Oxford universities can receive and which sends an important signal. We hope that this announcement will have an emulation effect,” exclaimed Daniel Jutras, rector of the Université de Montréal, on the phone.
The rector was all the more delighted by this announcement since the university had just been offered a few weeks ago a historic donation of 40 million from Quebecor and the Chopin-Péladeau Foundation, from Pierre Karl Péladeau.
This $40 million bequest will enable the creation of the Millénium Québecor program to train the next generation of entrepreneurs in Québec and the construction of an innovation centre, the new Pierre-Péladeau pavilion, in honor of the founder of Québecor.
“We are living in good times. In a few weeks, we have just received two historic donations. We still have a lot of things to do and this gives us the resources to achieve them.
“The donation of 159 million from the Courtois Foundation will allow the University of Montreal to push fundamental research in science much further and to carry out phase II of the Science Complex and the creation of the Courtois Institute”, underlines the rector Daniel Jutras.
PHOTO ÉRIC Carrière, PROVIDED BY THE UNIVERSITY OF MONTREAL
Illustration of phase II of the UdeM Science Complex
While this philanthropic fever is very welcome, it is to be hoped that it will become more contagious in order to reach an ever-increasing number of donors within the community of wealthy people in Quebec.
The $159 million donation from the Courtois Foundation is the third largest donation in the history of Canadian university philanthropy.
Three years ago, the John and Marcy McCall MacBain Foundation donated $200 million to McGill University to launch a graduate scholarship program.
Two years ago, the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Toronto received a $250 million gift from the Temerty Foundation, for research, innovation and the construction of a building dedicated to teaching and research. .
The donation from the Courtois Foundation is therefore in line with this high-flying patronage that has historically been practiced for a long time in English Canada.
But there is still a long way to go before we can one day reach the size of the endowment funds of English-Canadian universities. Thus, the endowment fund of McGill University is today in the order of 1.4 billion, that of the University of Toronto exceeds the mark of 4 billion, while that of the University of Montreal does not total than 350 million.
The Courtois Foundation
Little known in Quebec, Jacques Courtois, who set up the Courtois Foundation in 2011, made his fortune in Latin America where he co-founded Quala, a South American leader in the manufacture and distribution of mass consumption products (drinks , personal care, food, snacks…).
Son of well-known Montreal lawyer Jacques Courtois, who was notably president of the Montreal Canadiens from 1972 to 1979 and winner of five Stanley Cups, the financial entrepreneur has resolutely decided to give back to the community.
American universities like Harvard can count on endowment funds of 50 billion. Even though I studied at McGill, I wanted to give back to the University of Montreal so that French-speaking students could have access to funds to go further.
Jacques Courtois
Fact to be specified, Jacques Courtois was accused and sentenced in the United States, at the beginning of the 1980s, to six months in prison for insider trading, committed between 1975 and 1978, when he was vice-president of the department mergers and acquisitions of Morgan Stanley.
In an interview, Mr. Courtois did not want to comment on these events that occurred more than 40 years ago and the University of Montreal confirms that it was aware of these facts from the beginning of its relationship with the philanthropist more than two years.
His foundation was created 11 years ago and grew significantly between 2016 and 2019, going from 7.8 million to 23 million, then 41 million to reach 190 million in 2019.
“In 2018, we sold one of our mass product divisions to the multinational Unilever, which had been looking to acquire us for a long time. I still receive dividends from this transaction and that is why we have more than 300 million today.
“Quala is still very active, our personal care division in particular. Shampoos are still number 1 in Mexico and in several Latin American countries,” emphasizes Jacques Courtois.
For basic research
Although the co-founder of Quala has been managing his business from Montreal for several years, he has become increasingly interested in environmental issues and has forged ties with scientists from several disciplines.
I am for basic research. Governments dare not fund this research because we are not sure of the results. I can take risks and that’s why I wanted to make a significant donation. There will be others.
Jacques Courtois
The Courtois Foundation has decided to grant 100 million for the construction of a new research institute and 59 million for the creation of six chairs in the fields of chemistry, artificial intelligence, new materials and physics and quantum computing.
Business people finance art and culture, but science is part of culture, so I decided to get involved in it to allow young researchers to develop their projects and not wait to be recognized. to be able to benefit from research funds, specifies the 74-year-old philanthropist
Also involved in funding university projects at McGill and UQAM, Jacques Courtois intends to continue making donations to make the world of tomorrow more livable. Obviously, he decided to give back.