Three Best-in-Class Solutions Win Robin Hood’s AI Poverty Challenge
Three awardees were selected from almost 200 applications and nine finalists in the AI Poverty Challenge, a national competition announced in 2024 to promote the use of AI as a tool to combat poverty by fueling opportunity. The Challenge has made nearly $4 million in awards across three categories.
NEW YORK – April 21, 2025 – Today, Alexis Ohanian, a Robin Hood board member, announced three winners of the AI Poverty Challenge, a national competition launched in February 2024 to advance effective, responsible, and equitable uses of AI that broaden opportunity and support upward mobility for people living in poverty. The awardees are Beyond 12 from California in the category of Education, The Legal Aid Society from New York in the category of Financial Empowerment, and CodePath from California in the category of Workforce Development. Each awardee receives the $1 million grand prize. Hear from Alexis Ohanian and our awardees here (two-minute video).
The three grand prize awardees emerged from a competitive field of nearly 200 applicants across 21 states and were among the Challenge’s nine finalists named in September 2024, each receiving $100,000 awards. Their AI solutions are making a college education more attainable for low-income students, opening pathways for in-demand jobs that require fluency in computer science, and increasing the capacity to deliver legal services for housing, public benefits, immigration, and beyond.
“Last year, I stood alongside Robin Hood founder Paul Tudor Jones as we launched the AI Poverty Challenge, a bold initiative to find and fund AI-driven solutions to fight poverty—inspired by real people, their challenges, and their potential. In my experience as a founder, community voice often differentiates successful ventures from flailing ones. In the case of the AI Poverty Challenge, that means bringing people who live in, or near poverty closer to decision-making and product development. Today, I’m thrilled to celebrate three game-changing champions, who have literally risen to the challenge, each receiving $1 million to scale their work. They represent the best and brightest ideas harnessing AI for good,” said Alexis Ohanian, Founder of Reddit & Seven Seven Six, and Robin Hood Board Member.
The Challenge is made possible through a partnership with the GitLab Foundation, the Bezos Family Foundation and Deloitte. It was originally announced by Paul Tudor Jones II, Robin Hood’s founder, and Alexis Ohanian, at its February 2024 Robin Hood Opportunity x AI Summit.
“Today’s grand prize awardees are leveraging the AI revolution as a force to increase upward mobility from poverty and ensure that those already excluded from opportunity are not left further behind. Each entrepreneur has brought their tech solutions to life with the direct input of communities and users who will benefit from the products – demonstrating that AI is something people experiencing poverty can do, rather than something that is done to them,” said Richard R. Buery, Jr., CEO of Robin Hood. “My congratulations to each of the grand prize awardees. Through your ingenuity and talent, we will prove and scale incredible uses of AI for good.”
