After 25 years with the Early Childhood Mental Health Program (ECMHP), Executive Director Arlette Merritt knows the value of technology. Her organization relies on a strong infrastructure to help provide comprehensive mental health services to children from birth to six years old. 

As the county’s only such provider for this age group, ECMHP needed a better solution for processing medical documentation quickly and accurately--so therapists could focus on children and families. Merritt turned to TechSoup Globral (TSG) for the help she needed.

“TechSoup Global has been magical for us, and we could not possibly afford the technology we need without them,” says Ms. Merritt.

Founded in 1987 as CompuMentor, TSG began as a local nonprofit technical assistance provider delivering near-term benefits to Bay Area nonprofits.  Today, it brings technological empowerment to thousands of community service organizations across the world.

As a long-standing supporter, the Surdna Foundation played a catalytic role in TechSoup Global’s transformation from a well-repected, regional technical assistance provider to an international resource for nonprofits. The foundation made a series of grants to enable business planning and the development of a sustainable social enterprise. The resulting TechSoup.org platform has spawned a successful philanthropy service, various community networks, and innovative programs all committed to advancing the use of technology within the sector.

On TechSoup.org, 400,000 unique monthly visitors access tailored technology information and a vivid community of peers. In 2008, a quarter of website traffic came from 190 countries outside of the United States.

TSG has distributed over 4 million technology donations from 30 major technology corporations to 83,000 nonprofits in North America—an estimated $1.1 billion in direct cost savings for the sector. The rapidly growing TechSoup Global Network extends these offerings to NGOs in 21 countries on 6 continents.

Surdna continues to shape TSG’s evolution with ongoing support for programs such as NetSquared, its most innovative endeavor yet. Launched in 2005, NetSquared is dedicated to helping social innovators use web-based tools to extend their impact, and has fostered get-togethers in over 25 cities worldwide, supported hundreds of social action projects in various stages of development, and awarded over $240,000 through prized-based challenges.

After 22 years, TechSoup Global continues to be a nimble and pioneering organization--and retains its commitment to extend the benefits of technology to the nonprofit sector to support its mission and values.