While Melinda French Gates, 60, prides herself on being a good mother, she has limits to what she will give her children. Her daughter, Phoebe, 22, who she shares with philanthropist Bill Gates, 69, recently started her own business.
While chatting with tennis legend Billie Jean King at the Power of Women's Sports Summit, Melinda explained: "[Phoebe] got capitalized, but not because of my contacts, not because of me."
The daughter of the billionaires didn't get money from her mom.
Phoebe launched an AI-powered fashion app called Phia with her friend and former Stanford University roommate, Sophia Kianni. The app is designed to help shoppers compare prices for items across different sites.
While Melinda Gates didn't invest in Phia, there are a few famous supporters. Kris Jenner confirmed to The Burnouts podcast hosted by Phoebe and Sophia that she was an investor. Spanx founder Sara Blakely is an advisor of the company.
The Phia founders recently appeared on Call Her Daddy to chat about their podcast which sits under Alex Cooper's Unwell Network.
During the podcast, Alex asked Phoebe: "Did you ever feel like it's been difficult to make a name for yourself and really carve your path and not just be Bill Gates' daughter?"
"Yeah, I think 100%" Phoebe responded. "But the tough thing is it's like, yeah. That's difficult, but it comes with so much privilege, right? I didn't have to fight for a scholarship in college. I knew my college was gonna be paid for. I had incredible opportunities because of my parents. If I didn't have my parents as my rock, I wouldn't have been able to have these incredible opportunities, so yes."
While she acknowledged that it is hard to make a name for herself, Phoebe called out the privilege of being Bill and Melinda's daughter.
"I think all in all, I have an incredibly privileged life," Phoebe explained. "So I think saying that it's a hardship, it isn't really for me because it's like I've been so blessed with what I've been given by my parents and I'm never gonna pretend I haven't been."
Melinda and Bill co-parent after divorce
The couple married in 1994 at a small ceremony in Lanai, Hawaii. Together, they have three children – Jennifer, 29, Rory, 26, and Phoebe. But in 2021, after almost 30 years of marriage, the two announced their divorce. In the years since they separated, Melinda has been frank about their relationship.
"When that voice would come – and it would come at different times because of things that had happened outside the marriage that I would later come to learn about – I kept pushing it away," she explained to Elizabeth Daly on the How to Fail podcast.
Melinda didn't leave the relationship for years due to her children and her shared foundation, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, she stayed.
"I believed in that work,” she said of the foundation, adding. "I still believe in the work of the foundation," and "it wasn't just two of us involved, it was five of us."
Bill reflected on the divorce in an interview with The Times, saying: "That was the mistake I most regret. There is a certain wonderfulness to spending your entire adult life with one person because of the memories and depth of things you have done and having kids together."
Melinda released her memoir The Next Day in April, sharing: "You don't get to be my age without navigating all kinds of transitions. Some you embraced and some you never expected. Some you hoped for and some you fought as hard as you could."