For the fifth year, Google is funding 20 companies through the Google for Startups Founders Funds which provides equity-free capital and hands-on support to Black and Latino-led startups using AI to innovate responsibly and drive meaningful change.
These companies are pushing the boundaries of what’s achievable with AI, from developing innovative solutions to prevent wildfires (Improving Aviation), to diverting millions of tons of fast fashion from landfills (Sortile), and to helping millions of helping millions of community college learners successfully transfer and acquire four-year degrees (EdVisorly). These are just a few examples of the groundbreaking innovations that are emerging from this group of exceptional founders.
Each startup will receive $150,000 in non-dilutive cash awards, $100,000 in Google Cloud credits, and hands-on mentorship from Google experts across AI, sales and more to help build and scale their companies and innovate responsibly with AI.
This year marks the fifth year of the Google for Startups Founders Funds, which started in the United States. To date, the company has given more than $50 million dollars to more than 570 Black and Latino founders around the world. Those founders have gone on to raise more than $590 million in follow-on funding to continue scaling their businesses and AI solutions.
Here are this year’s 2024 Founders Fund recipient startups in the United States:
- Akeptus (Glenwood, MD) provides a smart home energy management system that helps homeowners optimize their energy usage and reduce costs.
- Beta Financial Services (Chicago, IL) removes bias in financial services through tools like BetaScore, a proprietary credit model designed to help SMBs obtain loans.
- Bountiful (San Francisco, CA) helps farmers and food industry professionals with forecasts and critical insights for specialty crops.
- Cambio AI (New York, NY) provides software that helps commercial landlords and corporate tenants reach their net zero goals by decarbonizing their facilities.
- EdVisorly (Los Angeles, CA) helps community college students explore and apply to public and private universities.
- Elis (Pound Ridge, NY) helps product and marketing teams efficiently collect rich insights from their customers via interviews.
- HacWare (Frisco, TX) helps businesses combat phishing attacks through experiential learning.
- Hire Henry (St Louis, MO) develops industrial robotic mowers for large greenspaces.
- Hue (Boston, MA) helps brands source and integrates authentic customer testimonials on their marketing channels.
- Improving Aviation (Tampa, FL) provides AI and emerging vehicle technologies to enhance public safety, aviation and wildfire management operations.
- InOrbit, Inc. (Mountain View, CA) helps developers and operators virtually manage and scale their robotics fleets.
- JustAir (Detroit, MI) equips community leaders with health and environmental insights through air quality monitoring networks.
- Maverick (San Francisco, CA) helps ecommerce stores create personalized customer experiences with generative AI.
- Pagedip (Boulder, CO) is a no-code content publishing app that helps teams work more effectively and efficiently.
- Raincoat (San Juan, PR) provides governments, financial institutions and insurers with automated and scalable climate insurance tools.
- Sensagrate (Scottsdale, AZ) aims to reduce traffic and decrease traffic related fatalities with cutting edge computer vision and AI solutions.
- Sortile (New York, NY) is a waste management system that uses AI to identify, sort and trace textiles.
- TackleAI (Schaumburg, IL) turns unstructured documents and datasets into intelligible and immediately accessible data.
- Trustible (Arlington, VA) helps companies surface hidden AI risks, check compliance requirements and accelerate responsible AI development.
- Waterplan (San Francisco, CA) is a water sustainability platform which helps organizations gather, report and act on water related risks.
