Aldevron is headquartered in North Dakota and maintains facilities in Nebraska and Wisconsin — states that are home to academic institutions that have performed key mRNA research — and also states where Gates has significant investments.
North Dakota State University (NDSU) is actively engaged with mRNA research, including research funded by the National Science Foundation.
According to the NDSU Foundation, Aldevron was founded at NDSU in the late ’90s and all of its founders are NDSU alumni. NDSU is also home to Aldevron Tower, an R&D facility.
Gates is connected to North Dakota governor and former Republican presidential candidate Doug Burgum. A tech billionaire, Burgum founded Great Plains Software in the 1980s, which Microsoft bought for $1.1 billion in 2001. He served as senior vice president of the Microsoft Business Solutions Group until 2007.
Gates donated $107,000 to Burgum’s 2016 gubernatorial campaign — the largest single contributor. Burgum and Gates were pictured together during the latter’s 2017 visit to North Dakota and during 1998 congressional testimony, while both attended a dinner party thrown by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos at Washington, D.C.’s Alfalfa Club — founded by Robert E. Lee — in January 2020.
Burgum has repeatedly defended Gates in interviews.
In a 2017 interview, Burgum said “[Bill] and Melinda [Gates] are doing so many amazing things on education in the United States, on global health.”
In a November 2023 interview with The Atlantic, Burgum said the Gates’ have saved more lives than anyone “probably in the history of the planet” and that Gates is “one of the most misunderstood people that we have in America right now.”
According to Fox Business, in 2022, Gates expanded his footprint in North Dakota through the controversial purchase of 2,100 acres of farmland — spanning two counties. The deal was completed “despite backlash from the community.”
According to North Dakota attorney Sarah Vogel, the purchase was completed via the Red River Trust — described as a “corporate shell” connected to Gates — despite the state’s anti-corporate farming law, which protects family farmers by largely prohibiting corporate farm buyouts.
Vogel noted that North Dakota Attorney General Drew Wrigley — a Burgum appointee — approved the purchase.
Gates bought farmland in mRNA research hubs Nebraska, Wisconsin
Along with North Dakota, Nebraska and Wisconsin are home to Aldevron facilities, to universities conducting significant mRNA research and to Gates-owned farmland.
For instance, University of Nebraska researchers have conducted multiple research studies involving mRNA — including hosting two Moderna clinical trials, and other mRNA research dating back to the 1990s.
Gates completed controversial farmland purchases in Nebraska, using 20 shell companies to buy over 20,000 acres of farmland in the state at over $113 million. According to state Sen. Tom Brewer, If the land was given to a nonprofit — possibly exempting it from property taxes — it would “decimate” the counties involved.
Wisconsin is also home to significant mRNA research, with the University of Wisconsin known as one of the pioneers in the field. According to Biocompare, researchers at the university launched mRNA research in 1990. The university continues to actively pursue mRNA research, including hosting mRNA clinical trials.
While Wisconsin is one of the states where Gates is known to own farmland, little public information is available about Gates’ holdings in the state. However, in 2023, Microsoft completed a $76 million purchase of 420 acres of farmland in the state.
Aldevron maintains research sites on the campuses of the University of Nebraska and the University of Wisconsin.
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