Google on June 14 announced a startup accelerator program for women founders which will help them address challenges such as fundraising and hiring.
The inaugural batch of the ‘Google for Startups Accelerator – India Women Founders’ will accept up to 20 women-founded co-founded startups in the country, and support them through a three-month program.
Improve participation of women in India’s digitally skilled workforce
According to Google, the programme is part of a bigger push by the company to improve the participation of women in many sectors of India’s digitally skilled workforce, including entrepreneurship, professional upskilling, and young graduates looking for a head start. It went on to say that the ultimate goal is to make technology broadly relevant and useful.
Focus on helping female founders overcome obstacles
Google said, “we are thrilled to launch the Google for Startups Accelerator – India Women Founders, focusing at helping women founders overcome obstacles that are particular to their experience, such as funding, hiring, and many others.” India ranks third in the world for startup financing, behind only the United States and China.
Only 15% of Indian unicorns have one or more female founders
It now has over a hundred unicorns, with 22 new ones created in 2022 alone, encompassing industries such as e-commerce, healthtech, fintech, and others. Only 15% of these Indian unicorns, however, have
one or more female founders.
“As Indian companies strive to use technology to reinvent more sectors of the economy, equal representation of women at the helm is vital to ensuring that the promised changes are universally applicable and useful,” Google added. Access to networks, finance, hiring issues, mentorship, and other areas that, for a variety of social reasons and poor representation, prove challenging for female founders will be highlighted in the workshop.
Feature workshops and support in many areas
Aside from these, the curriculum will feature workshops and support in areas like as AI/ML (artificial intelligence/machine learning), cloud, android, online, product strategy and growth, as well as access to a worldwide community of female founders.
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