Asana's Dustin Moskovitz is bullish on AI but concerned about risks

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Why billionaire Dustin Moskovitz keeps buying up shares of his software company Asana

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Key Points

- Asana CEO Dustin Moskovitz, who made billions from co-founding Facebook, has long been concerned about the risks of runaway artificial intelligence.
- Moskovitz has been snapping up shares of Asana and is now majority owner, with plans to give away the majority of his wealth to charities.
- He was an early backer of OpenAI and counts “potential risks from advanced AI” as one of the focus areas of his philanthropy.

In this article

- [ASAN+0.15 (+2.37%)![After Hours](https://static-redesign.cnbcfm.com/dist/1b0cc41fb0c34e043aa0.svg)](https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/ASAN)

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![Dustin Moskovitz, Asana's co-founder and CEO.](https://image.cnbcfm.com/api/v1/image/107261741-1687536515915-Handout_Dustin_Moskovitz_2.jpg?v=1687788150&w=1858&h=1045&vtcrop=y)

Dustin Moskovitz, Asana’s co-founder and CEO.

Asana

The typical playbook for a successful tech founder looks something like this.

Start a company with full ownership. Sell off significant chunks to venture investors as the business progresses. Eventually become a minority owner. Take the company public. Sell more stock over time.

Asana’s Dustin Moskovitz took that playbook and completely [rewrote the ending](https://www.cnbc.com/2021/12/17/asana-ceo-dustin-moskovitz-is-buying-the-dip-in-a-roller-coaster-year.html).

Moskovitz, who is still known by many as a co-founder of Facebook, started Asana in 2008 to make work more collaborative through software. By the time he took the company public through a [direct listing](https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/24/work-management-software-maker-asana-files-direct-listing-paperwork.html) in 2020, his ownership stood at about 36%.

Then, he went on a buying spree. Following the purchase of 480,000 Asana shares in June, Moskovitz’s ownership swelled to 111.4 million shares, representing over 51% of outstanding stock. In March, Asana [disclosed](https://s25.q4cdn.com/783494463/files/doc_financials/20

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