About
Our Story
PSFC is a community of philanthropists dedicated to enabling access to psychedelic healing for all who can benefit.
Our History
PSFC was founded in 2017 to bring together forward-thinking philanthropists who shared a passion for expanding access to psychedelic healing, at a time when there was significant stigma around psychedelics and low awareness of their potential benefits. Our belief was that by working together and combining our resources, relationships, and expertise, we could overcome challenges, find new opportunities, and ultimately have greater impact than would be possible if we worked individually.
Our first major undertaking was the Capstone Campaign, which raised $30M to fund the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS) to complete its Phase 3 program studying MDMA-assisted therapy for treating PTSD. We saw this as the thin end of the wedge – securing FDA approval for medical use of MDMA could unlock broader change around psychedelics, and MAPS was furthest along in a small but growing field of pharmaceutical companies taking psychedelic molecules through the FDA process. Although the FDA declined to approve the application eventually submitted by Lykos (the independent pharmaceutical company established by MAPS) in 2024, this pioneering application significantly advanced the field of psychedelic research and demonstrated the power of coordinated philanthropic investment.
Since then, the psychedelic field has grown and matured significantly, with dozens of nonprofit organizations now working in different domains of psychedelic science and healing. Our membership has grown as well, with PSFC providing a platform for learning, collaboration, and innovation. Many members now have deep experience with the psychedelic field and sophisticated perspectives on how to drive change and advance access to psychedelic healing.
As the field and our membership have evolved, so has our approach, which has shifted from coordinating around a single major initiative to enabling members to pursue diverse strategies aligned with their individual passions and expertise. Through this evolution, our theory of change remains centered on collaboration. By enabling members to pursue their work in the psychedelic field with a group of peers, PSFC helps them to achieve greater impact on the psychedelic field than they could on their own.
Our Role in the Field
PSFC plays a connective role in the psychedelic field. We bring together a community of aligned philanthropists, help them stay informed, and support them in directing resources toward the organizations and initiatives most likely to create lasting change. The impact of our work is felt through the collective action of our members, not through PSFC itself as a grantmaker.
Because PSFC members collectively represent a significant share of philanthropic giving in this ecosystem, people sometimes assume that PSFC is itself a major funder. In practice, support for the field flows primarily through members giving directly to nonprofit organizations, informed by and often in collaboration with their PSFC peers. PSFC does sometimes serve as an administrative and fiscal intermediary for collaborative, member-directed funding of a shared priority area, but this is a support function, not a primary one.
More broadly, PSFC serves as a bridge: between philanthropy and the field, between individual funders and collective strategy, and between what is happening now in psychedelic science and what our members need to know to give effectively.
Our Structure
PSFC is a registered 501c3 nonprofit organization. Our operations are funded primarily by philanthropic contributions from members.