Google Corporation has doubled its funding for Ukrainian companies as part of its startup support fund in Ukraine in 2022, allocating $10 million, Michał Kramarz, head of Google for Startups, CEE, said at the Tech Emerging Europe Advocates Meeting 2023 conference in Warsaw.
“The Ukrainian startups supported by the fund received $10 million in funding during the war and were able to hire 216 additional employees during 2022. But what is also very important: they were able to grow revenue by 200% year over year, which means that even in difficult times, in times of war, in a situation that requires resilience, they were able to achieve incredible results,” he said.
Kramarz reminded that last March Google announced creation of a $5 million fund to support startups in Ukraine, which was supposed to give grants of up to $100 thousand without any participation in the companies’ capital. Selected startups could also count on mentoring from the corporation, product support and Cloud loans.
“We received 1.7 thousand applications from startups in Ukraine, of which 300 were selected. Of that number, in turn, we originally planned to select 50, but the startups were so good that we said: let’s at least try to support more,” he said.
Kramarz did not say exactly how many companies were chosen, but said it could not have been 100 or 200, because if that were the case, the financial support program for each company would have been very low.
The representative of the corporation also reported on the launch of an online training program from Google for people who lost their jobs because of the war, but who remained in Ukraine and were willing to work. In three weeks, 32,000 people have gone through the program, and 10% of them have received positive feedback.
Google also supports women with its Founders Fund, which aims to level the playing field for everyone.
In addition, 60 startup founders from Ukraine and Belarus are hosted by Startups Campus Google in Warsaw.
Kramarz said he hopes the ecosystems of Poland, Ukraine and Britain will work even more together after the war than they do now.
“We have amazing skills. We have wonderful people. Let’s try to work more closely,” he said.
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