Nesta (formerly NESTA, National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts) is a British foundation, registered as a charity, which supports innovation. Nesta was originally funded by a £250 million endowment from the UK National Lottery. The endowment is managed through a trust, and Nesta uses the interest from the trust to meet its charitable objects and to fund and support its projects.

History

NESTA was set up in 1998 by an independent endowment established by an Act of Parliament, the National Lottery Act 1998. It had been a Labour Party manifesto promise. Lord Puttnam was the first Chair. In 2002 it was awarded £95 million. In October 2010, the government announced that it would transfer NESTA's status from an executive non-departmental public body to a new charitable body. In April 2012, following the appointment of chief executive Geoff Mulgan, the body became an independent charity, shortening its name to Nesta. With this change, Nesta shifted its focus to innovation for public benefit. In 2016, Nesta received a $300,000 grant from the Global Innovation Fund to carry out research on market failures in aquaculture in Bangladesh and India. Following the arrival of Nesta's new chief executive Ravi Gurumurthy in December 2019, Nesta announced their new 10-year strategy in March 2021 which focuses on three core missions: sustainability, health inequalities and the education attainment gap.

Operations

Nesta and the Nesta Trust are registered as charities in England and Wales, and Nesta is registered in Scotland. Following Nesta’s new 2030 strategy, Nesta primarily operates in the following three areas:

Management

Sir John Gieve chairs the organisation. Ravi Gurumurthy is the organisation's chief executive.