Thom Ruhe

Thom Ruhe currently serves as the President and Chief Executive Officer of NC IDEA, a private foundation based in Durham, North Carolina, that supports entrepreneurial economic development. Prior to this executive role, he spent seven years at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, where he served as Vice President of Entrepreneurship and directed global initiatives for the $2 billion asset organization. Ruhe also co-founded the Entrepreneurial Learning Initiative and has held prominent leadership or advisory positions with the Global Entrepreneurship Network and the World Economic Forum. Under his strategic direction, NC IDEA has distributed over $15 million in non-dilutive grants to more than 200 early-stage companies across the state to accelerate startup growth. His career focuses on deploying philanthropic capital and developing programmatic infrastructure to foster equitable entrepreneurial ecosystems and regional economic expansion.