 In 1984, he founded his first Open Society Institute in Hungary with a budget of $3 million.Since the fall of the Soviet Union, Soros' funding has played an important role in the newly independent countries.A 2017 study found that a grant program by George Soros which awarded funding to over 28,000 scientists in the former Soviet republics shortly after the end of the Soviet Union "more than doubled publications on the margin, significantly induced scientists to remain in the science sector, and had long-lasting [beneficial] impacts."