Melania Trump's Fostering the Future Together has signed up six big names in technology: Adobe, Amazon, Intel, Starlink, Google and Zoom. The White House said on 30 September that the new partners have committed more than $23 million in education funding, tools and expertise for children around the world. It didn't say how that total splits up, and it didn't say what Starlink is putting in.

The First Lady first named the companies at a meeting in New York on 22 September, during the United Nations General Assembly. At the same meeting she said the coalition had grown to 57 member countries.

What each company is putting in

The White House release goes through the pledges one by one. You'll see the letters "SI" in it a lot. That's the White House's own label. It's short for "super intelligence," a phrase the First Lady uses, and the release sticks it on the companies' AI programs.

Photo: Jakub Hałun / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 4.0)

Google committed $4 million to take global what the White House calls Google's SI Educator Series. "Google is proud to support First Lady Melania Trump's vital effort," Google's Maggie Johnson said. "This investment demonstrates our belief in keeping educators in the lead."

Amazon is widening free access to Kiro, its coding assistant, to reach 5 million students through 132 universities. Its AWS Academy will also give free training to more than 2 million students.

Zoom's charity arm, Zoom Cares, will hand out $2.75 million in grants across Europe, Africa, Latin America and the Asia-Pacific.

Intel will roll out its technology in ten countries through three programs. There's one for citizens, one for young people and a Semiconductor Education Pathways Program.

Adobe will give students around the world free tools for studying and making things through Student Spaces.

Starlink is the sixth partner, but the release doesn't say what it's contributing. There's no dollar figure, no product and no program. Starlink is SpaceX's satellite internet service, which ended June with 12 million subscribers. What it'll actually do for the coalition hasn't been announced.

What the coalition is

Fostering the Future Together calls itself "a global coalition of nations unified to empower children through technology and education." Melania Trump launched it at the 80th UN General Assembly in September 2025.

In spring 2026 she held a two-day summit in Washington. It started at the State Department and finished at the White House. The White House says it was the biggest gathering of first spouses ever held there for diplomatic purposes. Its own video from that summit described "an unprecedented meeting with 45 nations and 28 tech companies."

"When I established Fostering the Future Together, the mission was clear: empower children through technology and education," the First Lady said in the 30 September release. "Delivering on that mission demands alliances between best-in-class innovators and global leaders, especially as super intelligence transforms how the next generation learns."

"I deeply value the commitment of these technology companies and welcome them to the Fostering the Future Together movement as we scale across continents," she added.

The New York meeting

The 22 September meeting, on the sidelines of the 81st General Assembly, brought in representatives from countries including the United Kingdom, South Korea, the Philippines, Poland, Ukraine, Türkiye, the United Arab Emirates, Panama and Canada, according to the White House account. Apple's Tim Cook and PayPal chief executive Enrique Lores were there too.

In her prepared remarks, the First Lady explained what she meant by empowering a child. "True empowerment begins by giving a child the confidence to believe that their mind has value," she said. She argued that access to technology isn't enough by itself. "But access alone is not empowerment. We must give our children the tools," she said, "and teach them how to use those tools wisely."

She opened by thanking Special Envoy Wallace and Mike Waltz, the US ambassador to the UN. She said the coalition now "unites nearly 60 nations," and named delegations from Panama, South Korea, Kenya, Albania, Estonia, the Dominican Republic and Guatemala among those in the room.

A lot of the speech was about how fast technology is moving. "Today, we can converse with AI, video call our families from any place on the planet, hold an entire computer in the palm of our hand, use self-driving cars, enter virtual worlds, and use biometric ID to access our bank accounts, airport terminals, and homes," she said. "Artificial intelligence is transforming entire business sectors and expanding how humanity accesses the largest corpus of information ever available to humanity."

She thanked the six companies by name from the stage. "Thank you for empowering children with access to technology, all over the planet," she said.

She also gave the coalition four goals. She wants to help young people "bend the boundaries of imagination," "explore new frontiers of intellect," "have the courage to take calculated risks," and "build toward advancement of society."

And she pitched the coalition as something that'll outlast the people who started it. "Our success as leaders will be measured by what remains after we are gone," she said.

Four new regional events

The coalition's also spreading out around the world. The First Lady announced four new events, each one hosted by a first lady:

  • a G20 event in Miami, Florida, in December, hosted by Melania Trump
  • an event at the ASEAN conference in Manila, hosted by Liza Araneta Marcos of the Philippines
  • a European regional meeting this northern winter, hosted by Marta Nawrocka of Poland
  • a Caribbean regional meeting before the new year, hosted by Diani Prince-Drew of Saint Kitts and Nevis.

"When nations speak with one voice, the world listens," the First Lady said in New York. "Our collective influence is profound. Together, we can open doors, move markets, shape policy. And most importantly, we can change lives for the better."

What to watch

The pledges are a start, and some of them are concrete. Google and Zoom gave dollar figures, Amazon gave a student count and Intel gave a country count. What's still missing is the detail. We don't know Starlink's contribution, we don't know which countries Intel will work in, and we don't know how the money and tools will actually reach classrooms.

The December G20 event in Miami will be the first big test of whether the coalition's growing list of members and partners turns into programs kids can actually use. For now, it's got six more companies on board, more than $23 million pledged according to the White House, and 57 countries signed up.