Lynn Fritz, who sold his logistics firm to UPS for $450 million, makes new gift to Georgetown’s Center for Digital Ethics

By Helena Thorncroft

WASHINGTON — Lynn C. Fritz, the logistics executive who sold his company to UPS a quarter-century ago, and his wife, Anisya Fritz, have made a new gift to Georgetown University’s Center for Digital Ethics, the university announced Monday. Fritz, a 1964 graduate of the College of Arts & Sciences, called the digital world the biggest issue of the century.

“I think it dwarfs any other social economics issue,” Fritz, who earned a history degree in 1964, said in Georgetown’s announcement. The university described the donation as “a substantial gift” and did not disclose the amount.

The gift funds research on artificial intelligence ethics, cybersecurity and society, and digital wellbeing, according to Georgetown. It also supports field building, public impact work and the Fritz Digital Ethics Forum event series.

From a customs brokerage to a $450 million sale

Fritz began his career at a small customs brokerage in San Francisco and built it into a publicly traded international logistics company with more than 11,000 employees in 120 countries, Georgetown said.

That company, Fritz Companies Inc., agreed in January 2001 to be acquired by UPS for about $450 million in UPS Class B stock, according to the companies’ joint announcement, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The release described Fritz as “one of the world’s leading freight forwarding, customs brokerage and logistics concerns, with $1.6 billion in gross revenue in its most recent fiscal year.”

The filing identified Fritz as chairman and chief executive and said he held about 36% of the company’s outstanding shares. He agreed to vote those shares in favor of the merger. The deal was structured as a tax-free, stock-for-stock exchange at 0.200 UPS shares for each Fritz share, about 7.4 million UPS shares in all. UPS said it would be its first stock acquisition since its initial public offering in November 1999.

The couple also founded the Fritz Institute, a nonprofit focused on disaster response and recovery, according to Georgetown.

A second major gift

This is not the couple’s first major gift to the university. In 2020, they gave $5.4 million for work on ethical technology and on international women’s development and peacekeeping, Georgetown said. Most of that money established the Fritz Family Fellows Program within the Georgetown Initiative on Technology & Society, which launched in the fall of 2019. Fritz has also served two terms on Georgetown’s Board of Directors.

“At that time, AI was somewhat a background issue,” Fritz said in the announcement. He credited then-Provost Bob Groves with bringing together “not just computer science, not just law, but ethics, society, sociology and the rest.”

The Center for Digital Ethics launched in 2021. It describes its work as research, teaching and policy solutions “at the intersection of computer science, philosophy, and public policy.” Its director, Laura DeNardis, holds the university’s inaugural endowed chair in Technology, Ethics and Society.

“The Fritzes’ incredible philanthropy at Georgetown has already built a lasting legacy,” DeNardis said in the release. “We are grateful and honored that they have expanded this generosity into a partnership with the Center for Digital Ethics for research, policy engagement, teaching and public programming.”

The forum series

The first Fritz Digital Ethics Forum, “Social Media, Children, and the Constitution,” was held Sept. 17 in Riggs Library, according to the university. The panel included Laura Marquez-Garrett of the Social Media Victims Law Center, Florida Chief Deputy Attorney General Ryan Newman, Washington University law professor Neil Richards and Ed Whelan of the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Professor Meg Leta Jones moderated, and computer scientist Cal Newport gave opening remarks.

The next forum is set for Nov. 5 in Gaston Hall. It will feature Sherry Turkle, whom Georgetown describes as an expert on the psychology of people’s relationships with technology, discussing her new book, “Artificial Intimacy: Who Do We Become When We Talk to Machines?”, according to the center.

Fritz tied the work to the university’s Jesuit identity. He praised DeNardis’ “commitment to the Ignatian ethos,” which he said “is key to this whole thing.”

The Inquisitor is seeking comment from the Fritz Institute and Georgetown University on the size of the gift. This story will be updated with any response.

Photo: Riggs Library, Georgetown University (cropped). Jack E. Boucher, Historic American Buildings Survey, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.