When it comes to family offices, the usual playbook is patience: build wealth for generations, let compounding work its magic, keep the capital locked up for decades. Giorgos Tsetis is flipping that model. Through his family office, Great Things, the co-founder of hair-growth supplement brand Nutrafol is deliberately moving fast — and giving away a big chunk of what he makes.
Over the past 18 months, Great Things has invested nearly $40 million in high-flying startups and committed about $7 million to nonprofits through gifts and pledges, according to Tsetis. The firm allocates at least 20% of annual net realized profits to philanthropy, a structure that Tsetis and his team hope becomes a blueprint for other wealthy families who want to give back now rather than defer it to some indefinite future.
“I’ve got kids, and obviously I think about the future. But what I think more about is we need to solve problems together as we speak,” Tsetis, 41, told CNBC. “As innovation is creating this extraordinary amount of wealth, what we’re designing is a model to share those windfalls. And there’s restlessness with that. It’s like we need to do it now.”
A second act built on speed
Tsetis launched Great Things nearly a year ago, after selling his remaining stake in Nutrafol to Unilever at a $3.5 billion valuation. He knew his next chapter had to include substantial philanthropy. The family office’s investment style is anything but traditional. Tsetis moves quickly into high-growth startups, capitalizing on the artificial intelligence boom that has produced rapid returns. He said he realized a seven-times return on an Anthropic investment in 18 months through a secondary exit.
The 20% giving minimum is no accident. Gabriel Cooperman, Tsetis’ financial advisor and a managing director at UBS Wealth Management who helped structure Great Things, said the formula was inspired by the economics of venture capital and private equity. “Basically what he’s done is just turned the profit-sharing interest into a charitable-sharing interest,” Cooperman said. “We know it works. We know it’s very sustainable.”
To buffer against years when investment profits don’t cover charitable commitments, Great Things uses a donor-advised fund. The firm typically makes three- to five-year pledges to nonprofits, including an after-school boxing academy in the Bronx and Every Cure, which works to repurpose existing drugs for rare diseases.
Caution ahead in AI
While Great Things is known for its pace, Tsetis and his one partner, Roman Kalantari, are cooling on AI startups. The firm is focusing more on late-stage rounds to prioritize liquidity, and it’s looking for companies with a durable value proposition that build on their own technology rather than that of AI giants like OpenAI or Anthropic. Kalantari, the former chief experience and technology officer at Nutrafol who started his career during the dot-com bubble, is wary of the hype.
“Anyone who tells you there’s not going to be a slowdown or a correction of some kind has really bought into the hype machine,” Kalantari said. “When I look at these AI companies, I really try to think about who’s going to survive that correction.”
One recent investment that fits the new criteria is Lila Sciences, a three-year-old startup with its own AI model and automated robotic labs that aim to make scientific research faster and cheaper. Great Things recently reinvested in the company.
Balancing returns and impact
Still, the family office is wrestling with how to square its fast-returns philosophy with its stated commitment to doing good. Its portfolio includes Polymarket, the controversial prediction-market startup. Tsetis acknowledged the tension, framing it as a conscious choice. “This was a conscious decision to participate and see if we can generate significant returns and do what we believe is right with those returns,” he said, “and at the same time, continue to monitor the situation and see how it evolves.”
Because Great Things doesn’t plan to hold assets for the long term, it can exit Polymarket through the secondary market relatively quickly, he added. Adding a strict impact-investing lens, Tsetis said, could make the model harder to scale. “We’re just trying to do what’s right for us so we can make the model sustainable and make it work in an extraordinary way for others as well.”
If the current investment pace holds, Tsetis expects to deploy another $60 million within the next two years. With no outside investors to answer to, decisions can be made quickly by Tsetis and Kalantari alone. The firm’s take on philanthropy is equally direct: ‘We need to do it now,’ Tsetis said. — CNBC’s Robert Frank contributed reporting.
Source: www.cnbc.com — https://www.cnbc.com/2026/08/13/family-office-giorgos-tsetis-nutrafol.html
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