James Chen’s Moonshot Journey: HSBC Private Banking

In 2021, James Chen was profiled on HSBC Private Banking’s website, in an interview and video which explored his work and advocacy of moonshot philanthropy – a model of audacious leadership, calling on high-net-worth individuals to invest capital, time and expertise into early-stage ideas in order to achieve disruptive impact.

The moonshot approach requires taking risks, something that James believes today’s philanthropists are in a unique position to do in order to drive real social change. Through leveraging their wealth, the high-net-worth community is able to fund high-risk, out-of-the-box ideas in the search for scalable solutions. James believes this is a true superpower – private philanthropists are not bound to voters or stakeholders, meaning they can privatise failures and socialise success.

The interview also covers James’ philanthropic journey, from being inspired by his father’s approach to giving, to his deep passion for tackling poor vision and the establishment of his NGOs, Vision for a Nation and Clearly.

Read the video transcript below.

Wealth as a superpower: Video transcript

The essence of moonshot philanthropy is to leverage wealth as the unique superpower of the high-net-worth community to fund high-risk out-of-the-box ideas in the search for scalable solutions.

I’m James Chen and I’m the founder of Vision for a Nation and Clearly, two NGOs in the vision sector.

I have spent the past 17 years focused on a moonshot journey to ensure everyone everywhere has access to vision correction and glasses.

While my moonshot journey is not complete, the milestones we have achieved far exceeds what I could have imagined was possible in the beginning.

I am hopeful that glasses, 700 years after it was invented, can finally become available to anyone who needs them to see clearly within this generation.

And if my moonshot adventure can inspire a few others to step out of their philanthropic comfort zone to persevere in their own moonshot journeys, I can think of no greater purpose for the privilege of wealth.

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