SHANGHAI, China, Far from the Chicago area where he grew up, American tech billionaire Neville Roy Singham now lives in Shanghai. In his early 70s, Singham, who sold his IT consulting company Thoughtworks for $785 million in 2017, sits at the center of a widening dispute over foreign influence, political funding, and alleged connections to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
Singham calls himself a socialist and has said he’s admired Maoist ideas since his early years in activist circles. From his base in Shanghai, he runs businesses that critics say overlap with Chinese state interests. A series of investigations, including a widely cited 2023 New York Times report, describes him as a key force behind an international network.
That network is accused of routing hundreds of millions of dollars through U.S. nonprofits to support causes that match Beijing’s view of the world. It also reportedly promotes defenses of China’s positions on human rights, Xinjiang, Taiwan, and global affairs.
