Google announced launching the second stage of financing of the special Startup Support Fund in Ukraine in the amount of $10 million to allocate grants (not required to be returned if all the conditions are met within a certain period of time) in 2024.
This is an initiative to support startups in Ukraine, the Google for Startups Ukraine Support Fund — A special fund was created in March 2022. At that time, Google allocated the first 5 million — under the grant program, and 58 domestic startups received various types of support, selected in several rounds during 2022-2023. Among the grantees of the Google program are Liki24.com, a well-known drug search and delivery service, Esper Bionics, a developer of bionic prostheses, and Cardiolyse, a developer of a remote heart monitoring service. The startups, supported by the Ukraine Support Fund, have received $15.8 million in further funding, increased revenue by 100%, and significantly increased the number of jobs despite the war and economic challenges.
Recently, Google announced the launch of the second stage of funding and doubled the amount of funding to $10 million. As in the first stage, selected Ukrainian startups (to be announced gradually over the course of the year) will receive up to $100K in equity funding
The application process will start later this year (the exact date has not been announced) on the initiative’s website Google for Startups Ukraine Support Fund — There is also a FAQ section where you can find answers to all the basic questions about the initiative.
Since the beginning of the devastating war in Ukraine, Google has donated more than $45 million in cash and $7 million in in-kind support to humanitarian efforts in Ukraine and those fleeing the war waged by the Russians. Other recent initiatives of Google in support of Ukrainians and Ukraine include assistance in cyber defense (Project Shield), Combating disinformation spread by Russian propaganda, 50 thousand Chromebooks for Ukrainian teachers and 50 thousand Workspace licensesThe program allows civil servants to use corporate email, cloud storage and other Google Workspace services free of charge.
This is all very cool, and Ukrainians are incredibly grateful to Google for their help. At the same time, we are all still waiting for a future without russia a normal Ukrainian-language search and a well-functioning recommendation system on YouTube, because how much longer can Russian-language content from Russian-language sources be shamelessly imposed?.