"OK, Now What?" How a Former CEO Decided to Give Millions for Big Cats
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FoRMER IDEXX CEO Jonathan Ayers at his home IN FLORIDA. credit: Hejung Kim
For nearly 20 years, Jonathan W. Ayers was CEO of IDEXX Laboratories, headquartered in Maine. The S&P 500 corporation emerged as a leader in veterinary diagnostics under Ayers’s leadership, boasting a market value of some $23 billion in October 2019.
One source puts the businessman’s net worth close to a half-billion.
Ayers was drawn to pet cats from a young age, making IDEXX a natural fit for the longtime animal lover. And his emerging philanthropy through Ayers Wild Cat Conservation Trust also makes animals a priority—not housebound felines this time, but big cats.
Ayers recently announced a $20 million commitment over the next 10 years to Panthera’s Global Alliance for Wild Cats, a large-scale initiative to protect the world’s most threatened wild cats. Global Alliance’s work includes the stabilization and recovery of critically endangered tiger populations in Asia and expansion of anti-poaching units and site security strategies to protect Africa’s lions, leopards and cheetahs.
“This commitment is, I think, just the completion of something that was well under way for the last year,” Ayers told me in a recent interview.
This is not just a philanthropic story about an animal lover making wildlife the focus of his giving. While that’s certainly part of it, Ayers’ story is also about a life-changing event that guided him in a new direction.
A new path forward
Twenty-one months ago, Ayers, an avid cyclist, was on another routine ride with his morning cycling group when he suffered a serious accident. A severe spinal cord injury left him a quadriplegic. After four months of medical leave, he stepped down as chairman and CEO of IDEXX in November 2019.
Ayers and his wife Helaine started a new life in Florida and had to adjust to a reality where even basic things—like brushing teeth and clipping fingernails—could no longer be taken for granted. Philanthropic stories come in all shapes in sizes, but Ayers’s deeply personal experiences set him on a path that created new meaning.
“All of a sudden it was like, OK, now what?” he says. “I had all this business success, but that was over, now. I really couldn’t take on another full-time job. I made more money than I ever dreamed I would make and certainly more than I needed.”
As Ayers came up in business, the couple initially focused on organizations like the United Way, as well as medical and cultural institutions in their backyard. Helaine Ayers, who has a finance background, was on the investment committee of their local hospital.
Jon Ayers became involved with Panthera in 2017, and began ramping up support as he was going through early rehabilitation, inspired by the work of the Mohamed bin Zayed Species Conservation Fund, which supports on-the-ground species conservation projects for the world’s most threatened species.
“Small” Big Cats
“I’ve always loved cats. I’ve always loved nature. One day, I asked myself, what kind of cats are in nature?” Ayers says.
He narrowed his focus to what he calls “small” big cats. Most people are familiar with the big and medium-sized wild cats—your lions and tigers—but few people know about the many smaller species found in Africa, Asia, Europe and the Americas, including the clouded leopard of Asia, the Andean cat of South America, and the tree-loving margay.
Ayers makes it clear that all of these cats are flagship species for their ecosystems, even these smaller, lesser-known cats found in remote parts of the world.
But this isn’t just about animal conservation. It’s also about the people who live in their midst, so part of Ayers’s work through Panthera and elsewhere is helping people who live adjacent to and inside these landscapes.
“If a cat kills a chicken, then you got a dead cat. So we help people build chicken coops so chickens are protected from wildlife,” he says.
While the field has some big benefactors, the environmental conservation sector is still a relatively small slice of overall philanthropic funding. According to Charity Navigator, U.S. animal rights and environmental groups received $11.83 billion in 2017, representing just 3% of the total amount given to charities that year.
And that sliver for Ayers’s niche is even smaller. “People understand the threat that tigers, lions, cheetahs are under. But prior to my getting involved, only 1% of the funding going to wildlife conservation was going to the 33 species of these small wild cats. Not much is known about these cats. They make themselves scarce. So we wanted to bring an awareness to them,” he says.
As lean as you can get
In 2019, the couple launched the Ayers Wildcat Conservation Trust, through which they support Panthera as well as Wildlife Conservation Network, and others. And while Ayers does think other environmental issues like climate change and marine conservation are important, as the charity’s name suggests, the couple are squarely focused on cats.
“I didn’t want to spread myself thin. When I do things, I try to do them in a big way,” he says.
The Ayerses plan on staying very lean with the foundation going forward, as well. He tells me their foundation overhead is virtually zero. Their three middle-aged daughters, also cat lovers, are now getting involved with family giving, and Ayers expects that they’ll deepen their involvement down the line.
As the family gets settled in Florida, where Ayers receives specialist attention for his condition and is now closer to his brother, he expects to reestablish himself with local community philanthropy, including in the realm of healthcare.
Ultimately, though, Ayers hopes to inspire others through his Global Alliance commitment in species conservation. “I’d like to highlight the importance of species conservation and biodiversity. It really is a drop in the ocean, what goes to small cats … but if we can grow that to two drops or three drops, that would be great.”
