Google announced an $800+ million commitment to fight the devastating effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Small and medium-sized businesses, health organizations and governments, and health workers will be able to apply for it.
Google’s commitment includes:
- $250 million in ad grants to help the World Health Organization (WHO) and more than 100 government agencies globally provide critical information on how to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and other measures to help local communities.
- A $200 million investment fund that will support NGOs and financial institutions around the world to help provide small businesses with access to capital. As one example, Google is working with the Opportunity Finance Network in the U.S. to help fill gaps in financing for people and communities underserved by mainstream financial institutions.
- $340 million in Google Ads credits available to all SMBs with active accounts over the past year. Credit notifications will appear in their Google Ads accounts and can be used at any point until the end of 2020 across our advertising platforms.
- A pool of $20 million in Google Cloud credits for academic institutions and researchers to leverage our computing capabilities and infrastructure as they study potential therapies and vaccines, track critical data, and identify new ways to combat COVID-19.
- Direct financial support and expertise to help increase the production capacity for personal protective equipment (PPE) and lifesaving medical devices. We’re working with our longtime supplier and partner Magid Glove & Safety, with the goal of ramping up production of 2-3 million face masks in the coming weeks that will be provided to the CDC Foundation.
- In addition to these commitments, Google also increased the gift match Google offers every employee annually to $10,000 from $7,500. That means Google employees can now give $20,000 to organizations in their communities, in addition to the $50 million Google.org has already donated.