Google pledged to invest $1 billion in Africa over the next five years, covering a range of initiatives including a drive to improve connectivity, small business investment and support digital transformation initiatives.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai (pictured) announced the investment plans at the company’s first Google for Africa event, stating it was increasingly seeing innovation begin in the continent, and then spread throughout the world.
Pichai is confident that this momentum will continue, with an estimated 300 million people accessing the internet and going “online” over the next half a decade.
He noted that since the company opened its first office in Africa, it had enabled 100 million Africans to access the internet for the first time, while it has further worked to train developers, open an AI research centre and build products specific for Africans’ needs, like Android Go.
With its $1 billion pledge, Pichai said “we’ve made huge strides together over the past decade – but there’s more work to do to make the internet accessible, affordable and useful for every African”.
Specifically, the company will put the cash towards projects across countries in the continent, including Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda and Ghana, with a major portion of it going to a subsea cable across South Africa, Namibia, Nigeria and St Helena, connecting Africa and Europe.
$50 million of the sum will be earmarked for the newly formed Africa Investment Fund, to help start-ups, providing access to Google employees, networks and technologies.
In addition, Google said it will distribute $10 million to low-interest loans to small businesses to Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya and South Africa, helping to alleviate the impact of Covid-19. $40 million will go to non-profits in the region.
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