MakeSpace Founder and CEO Sam Rosen was recently elected to the Gift of Life Board of Directors at the organizational year-end meetings held in Boca Raton. 

 

Rosen  joins ten other directors and brings a vast array of skills to Gift of Life’s board, among them entrepreneurial expertise, a highly innovative mindset, and networking finesse.

 

“We at Gift of Life are very excited to have Sam on the Board, sharing his great expertise and passion for our mission on behalf of the patients we serve each day,” said Jay Feinberg, Gift of Life’s Founder and CEO.

 

Rosen’s involvement with Gift of Life began more than ten years ago. He joined the Gift of Life registry while attending the University of Virginia, at a donor drive organized by the college’s Hillel chapter. Four years later, in 2008, he was called as a backup donor for a 57-year-old man suffering from acute lymphoblastic leukemia—a patient the same age as his father at the time. He did not have any doubts about moving forward, but in the end, Rosen was not selected to proceed with the donation. Nonetheless, he was so inspired by the experience that he wanted to become further involved with Gift of Life. 

 

Rosen has made it his mission to find matches for all patients in need—multiple matches, so that every patient has options. It is this goal that he had in mind when he helped establish the organization’s Young Professionals Committee (YPC) in New York City. YPC members organized recruitment drives and fundraised for Gift of Life. And, since the chapter consisted of individuals in their 20s and 30s, Rosen saw the YPCs as a valuable resource—to get swabbed for Gift of Life’s registry and to motivate peers to join. Moving forward, he plans to establish similar initiatives targeting people aged 18–25, the group most requested by physicians for transplants. 

 

“The same way that Google helps index information so you can find what you’re searching for on the Internet, Gift of Life indexes people who are available to help others who desperately need a genetic match in order to facilitate a lifesaving bone marrow donation,” said Rosen. “I see this as a solvable information problem. Who wouldn’t want to help save another person’s life if they only knew they could?”

 

Rosen was named one of Forbes’ 2015 30 under 30 in its consumer technology category. His company MakeSpace takes the “self” out of self-storage by picking up items customers want to put in storage. They then catalog those items into an online account, from which the customers can request redelivery. Touted as “a Dropbox for real-life storage,” the company has truly revolutionized the storage industry. Customers “never have to visit a storage unit again.”

 

Given the young CEO’s track record of success and dedication, Gift of Life is proud to welcome him to the board roster and looks forward to advancing the cause together!