Tag Archives: A message from our CEO

Progress on our racial equity commitments

Editor’s note: In June, our CEO Sundar Pichai shared the company’s commitments to advance racial equity. The following note was sent to employees today, and sets out the progress we’ve made over the last 100+ days.  

Hi everyone, 


In June, we committed to continue building sustainable equity for Google’s Black+ community and making our products and programs helpful in the moments that matter most to Black users. Thanks to the work of hundreds of Googlers, I’m glad to share some of the progress we’ve made over the last 100+ days. I want to acknowledge two things up front: first, this is only a progress report—systems-level change takes time, and we’re invested for the long term. Second, while much of our initial work has been focused on the U.S., we are deeply committed to diversity, equity and inclusion globally, and will continue to work with local leaders to make sure these approaches can benefit Black+ Googlers everywhere.

Increasing supplier diversity 

We rely on thousands of suppliers to help us run our business—from marketing agencies and construction to food and professional services. Today we are setting a goal to spend $100 million with Black-owned businesses, as part of our broader commitment to spend a minimum of $1 billion with diverse-owned suppliers in the U.S., every year starting in 2021. This commitment will bring more business to a diverse set of suppliers, and more importantly, create sustained economic impact for these communities.

Supporting small business, job seekers and students

Increasing the diversity of our suppliers is one example of how we are helping to create economic opportunity for Black communities. Our partnership with Opportunity Finance Network is another: over $9 million in loans and grants for Black-owned businesses have been allocated to local partners out of the $50 million we pledged in June. We’ve also selected 76 founders to receive funding from the $5 million U.S. Black Founders Fund, and we’ve established a $1 million fund in Brazil and a $2 million fund in Europeto support Black founders outside the U.S.


In education, welaunched the Grow with Google HBCU Career Readiness Program in partnership with the Thurgood Marshall College Fund to help equip Historically Black College and University students with digital skills. And, we’ll grant 50 universities an exploreCSR award for the 2020-2021 academic year to help attract and retain underrepresented students in computer science. 

Supporting racial justice organizations

In June, we committed $12 million to support racial justice organizations—almost all of which has been distributed. We’ve also embedded a team of pro-bono engineers in the Center for Policing Equity to help expand its National Justice Database. Globally, Google.org has committed $1 million to support local organizations in Brazil, Europe and sub-Saharan Africa. Today, we’re committing another $1.5 million to support racial justice organizations and empower Black communities across Europe and sub-Saharan Africa, with a particular focus on entrepreneurs and job skilling for Black youth.

Building helpful products

On the product side, we’re continuing to make our products more helpful in the moments that matter most to Black users. Recent activations include a new Black-owned business attribute on Maps, Assistant responses on Black Lives Matter, and new ways marketers can support Black-owned publishers in Display & Video 360—with more to come. We’ve also announced thefirst YouTube Originals to come from our #YouTubeBlack Voices Fund, a $100 million global commitment to acquire and produce programming focused on Black experiences and racial justice education, as well as support Black YouTube creators and artists.

Supporting Black+ Googlers throughout their careers

Meaningful, lasting change needs to come from within our own walls. That means looking across the experience of underrepresented Googlers, including Black+, Latinx, and Indigenous communities, and at all of our internal processes, including recruiting, leveling, performance, promotion, talent assessment and retention practices.


We’ve laid some good groundwork here. Since June, we’ve doubled the Retention & Progression team so that each organization has a designated consultant to support underrepresented Googlers, and we plan to triple our investment in this program by 2022. Meanwhile, we continue to roll out more robust checks for fairness and equity in our Perf process, including this cycle. 


We’ve also taken steps to create a deeper sense of belonging for our Black+ community, from offering relevant and useful benefits to fostering supportive internal communities. For example, last month we introduced a student loan repayment program to address the debt that hinders economic progress for many communities of color. We also increased the percentage of Black+ mental health counselors available to Googlers in the U.S. and are partnering with healthcare providers to create new programs for concerns that disproportionately affect our Black+ community, to be in place by 2022. In EMEA, we've launched a new speaker series—RE:EMEA—to localize the conversation on racial equity and increase our understanding of the region’s unique history. And to create community globally, next year we’ll roll out a six-month onboarding program for Black+ Nooglers to help build networks during those first few months at Google.

Attracting new talent and investing in long-term growth of sites 

In June, we committed to improving representation of underrepresented groups at senior levels by 30 percent by 2025. Today, we’re adding a goal to more than double the number of Black+ Googlers at all other levels by 2025. 


We’ll also invest in the long-term growth of U.S. locations that contribute to a high quality of life for Black+ Googlers. Across our sites in Atlanta, Washington D.C., Chicago and New York we’ll aim to add an additional 10,000 Googlers by 2025, including 1,000 new roles by 2021. In global sites, including London, we will continue to focus on recruiting and hiring Black+ Googlers.

Holding ourselves accountable

We’ll hold ourselves accountable for creating an inclusive workplace. As part of our commitment to anti-racism educational programs, we will integrate diversity, equity and inclusion into all of our flagship employee and manager trainings. And moving forward, all VP+ performance reviews will include an evaluation of leadership in support of diversity, equity and inclusion. 


I’ll be sharing progress with Alphabet’s board regularly through transparency reports covering representation, hiring, retention, performance and promotion equity, and we’ll continue to publish our Diversity Annual Report to share this progress with all of you.

Thank you

These efforts represent a significant body of work to address systemic racism and build equity for Black+ Googlers and users for years to come. They would not have happened without the leadership and guidance of hundreds of Googlers, including Melonie and members of our Black Leadership Advisory Group and Black Googler Network—my deepest thanks to all of you. 


The equity we’re working towards internally will help us build better products and continue to support our users, businesses, and communities. This effort is at the heart of our mission to make information accessible to everyone. 


Thanks for the work thus far; we’ll continue to share progress updates.


- Sundar

Progress on our racial equity commitments

Editor’s note: In June, our CEO Sundar Pichai shared the company’s commitments to advance racial equity. The following note was sent to employees today, and sets out the progress we’ve made over the last 100+ days.  

Hi everyone, 


In June, we committed to continue building sustainable equity for Google’s Black+ community and making our products and programs helpful in the moments that matter most to Black users. Thanks to the work of hundreds of Googlers, I’m glad to share some of the progress we’ve made over the last 100+ days. I want to acknowledge two things up front: first, this is only a progress report—systems-level change takes time, and we’re invested for the long term. Second, while much of our initial work has been focused on the U.S., we are deeply committed to diversity, equity and inclusion globally, and will continue to work with local leaders to make sure these approaches can benefit Black+ Googlers everywhere.

Increasing supplier diversity 

We rely on thousands of suppliers to help us run our business—from marketing agencies and construction to food and professional services. Today we are setting a goal to spend $100 million with Black-owned businesses, as part of our broader commitment to spend a minimum of $1 billion with diverse-owned suppliers in the U.S., every year starting in 2021. This commitment will bring more business to a diverse set of suppliers, and more importantly, create sustained economic impact for these communities.

Supporting small business, job seekers and students

Increasing the diversity of our suppliers is one example of how we are helping to create economic opportunity for Black communities. Our partnership with Opportunity Finance Network is another: over $9 million in loans and grants for Black-owned businesses have been allocated to local partners out of the $50 million we pledged in June. We’ve also selected 76 founders to receive funding from the $5 million U.S. Black Founders Fund, and we’ve established a $1 million fund in Brazil and a $2 million fund in Europeto support Black founders outside the U.S.


In education, welaunched the Grow with Google HBCU Career Readiness Program in partnership with the Thurgood Marshall College Fund to help equip Historically Black College and University students with digital skills. And, we’ll grant 50 universities an exploreCSR award for the 2020-2021 academic year to help attract and retain underrepresented students in computer science. 

Supporting racial justice organizations

In June, we committed $12 million to support racial justice organizations—almost all of which has been distributed. We’ve also embedded a team of pro-bono engineers in the Center for Policing Equity to help expand its National Justice Database. Globally, Google.org has committed $1 million to support local organizations in Brazil, Europe and sub-Saharan Africa. Today, we’re committing another $1.5 million to support racial justice organizations and empower Black communities across Europe and sub-Saharan Africa, with a particular focus on entrepreneurs and job skilling for Black youth.

Building helpful products

On the product side, we’re continuing to make our products more helpful in the moments that matter most to Black users. Recent activations include a new Black-owned business attribute on Maps, Assistant responses on Black Lives Matter, and new ways marketers can support Black-owned publishers in Display & Video 360—with more to come. We’ve also announced thefirst YouTube Originals to come from our #YouTubeBlack Voices Fund, a $100 million global commitment to acquire and produce programming focused on Black experiences and racial justice education, as well as support Black YouTube creators and artists.

Supporting Black+ Googlers throughout their careers

Meaningful, lasting change needs to come from within our own walls. That means looking across the experience of underrepresented Googlers, including Black+, Latinx, and Indigenous communities, and at all of our internal processes, including recruiting, leveling, performance, promotion, talent assessment and retention practices.


We’ve laid some good groundwork here. Since June, we’ve doubled the Retention & Progression team so that each organization has a designated consultant to support underrepresented Googlers, and we plan to triple our investment in this program by 2022. Meanwhile, we continue to roll out more robust checks for fairness and equity in our Perf process, including this cycle. 


We’ve also taken steps to create a deeper sense of belonging for our Black+ community, from offering relevant and useful benefits to fostering supportive internal communities. For example, last month we introduced a student loan repayment program to address the debt that hinders economic progress for many communities of color. We also increased the percentage of Black+ mental health counselors available to Googlers in the U.S. and are partnering with healthcare providers to create new programs for concerns that disproportionately affect our Black+ community, to be in place by 2022. In EMEA, we've launched a new speaker series—RE:EMEA—to localize the conversation on racial equity and increase our understanding of the region’s unique history. And to create community globally, next year we’ll roll out a six-month onboarding program for Black+ Nooglers to help build networks during those first few months at Google.

Attracting new talent and investing in long-term growth of sites 

In June, we committed to improving representation of underrepresented groups at senior levels by 30 percent by 2025. Today, we’re adding a goal to more than double the number of Black+ Googlers at all other levels by 2025. 


We’ll also invest in the long-term growth of U.S. locations that contribute to a high quality of life for Black+ Googlers. Across our sites in Atlanta, Washington D.C., Chicago and New York we’ll aim to add an additional 10,000 Googlers by 2025, including 1,000 new roles by 2021. In global sites, including London, we will continue to focus on recruiting and hiring Black+ Googlers.

Holding ourselves accountable

We’ll hold ourselves accountable for creating an inclusive workplace. As part of our commitment to anti-racism educational programs, we will integrate diversity, equity and inclusion into all of our flagship employee and manager trainings. And moving forward, all VP+ performance reviews will include an evaluation of leadership in support of diversity, equity and inclusion. 


I’ll be sharing progress with Alphabet’s board regularly through transparency reports covering representation, hiring, retention, performance and promotion equity, and we’ll continue to publish our Diversity Annual Report to share this progress with all of you.

Thank you

These efforts represent a significant body of work to address systemic racism and build equity for Black+ Googlers and users for years to come. They would not have happened without the leadership and guidance of hundreds of Googlers, including Melonie and members of our Black Leadership Advisory Group and Black Googler Network—my deepest thanks to all of you. 


The equity we’re working towards internally will help us build better products and continue to support our users, businesses, and communities. This effort is at the heart of our mission to make information accessible to everyone. 


Thanks for the work thus far; we’ll continue to share progress updates.


- Sundar

Progress on our racial equity commitments

Editor’s note: In June, our CEO Sundar Pichai shared the company’s commitments to advance racial equity. The following note was sent to employees today, and sets out the progress we’ve made over the last 100+ days.  

Hi everyone, 


In June, we committed to continue building sustainable equity for Google’s Black+ community and making our products and programs helpful in the moments that matter most to Black users. Thanks to the work of hundreds of Googlers, I’m glad to share some of the progress we’ve made over the last 100+ days. I want to acknowledge two things up front: first, this is only a progress report—systems-level change takes time, and we’re invested for the long term. Second, while much of our initial work has been focused on the U.S., we are deeply committed to diversity, equity and inclusion globally, and will continue to work with local leaders to make sure these approaches can benefit Black+ Googlers everywhere.

Increasing supplier diversity 

We rely on thousands of suppliers to help us run our business—from marketing agencies and construction to food and professional services. Today we are setting a goal to spend $100 million with Black-owned businesses, as part of our broader commitment to spend a minimum of $1 billion with diverse-owned suppliers in the U.S., every year starting in 2021. This commitment will bring more business to a diverse set of suppliers, and more importantly, create sustained economic impact for these communities.

Supporting small business, job seekers and students

Increasing the diversity of our suppliers is one example of how we are helping to create economic opportunity for Black communities. Our partnership with Opportunity Finance Network is another: over $9 million in loans and grants for Black-owned businesses have been allocated to local partners out of the $50 million we pledged in June. We’ve also selected 76 founders to receive funding from the $5 million U.S. Black Founders Fund, and we’ve established a $1 million fund in Brazil and a $2 million fund in Europeto support Black founders outside the U.S.


In education, welaunched the Grow with Google HBCU Career Readiness Program in partnership with the Thurgood Marshall College Fund to help equip Historically Black College and University students with digital skills. And, we’ll grant 50 universities an exploreCSR award for the 2020-2021 academic year to help attract and retain underrepresented students in computer science. 

Supporting racial justice organizations

In June, we committed $12 million to support racial justice organizations—almost all of which has been distributed. We’ve also embedded a team of pro-bono engineers in the Center for Policing Equity to help expand its National Justice Database. Globally, Google.org has committed $1 million to support local organizations in Brazil, Europe and sub-Saharan Africa. Today, we’re committing another $1.5 million to support racial justice organizations and empower Black communities across Europe and sub-Saharan Africa, with a particular focus on entrepreneurs and job skilling for Black youth.

Building helpful products

On the product side, we’re continuing to make our products more helpful in the moments that matter most to Black users. Recent activations include a new Black-owned business attribute on Maps, Assistant responses on Black Lives Matter, and new ways marketers can support Black-owned publishers in Display & Video 360—with more to come. We’ve also announced thefirst YouTube Originals to come from our #YouTubeBlack Voices Fund, a $100 million global commitment to acquire and produce programming focused on Black experiences and racial justice education, as well as support Black YouTube creators and artists.

Supporting Black+ Googlers throughout their careers

Meaningful, lasting change needs to come from within our own walls. That means looking across the experience of underrepresented Googlers, including Black+, Latinx, and Indigenous communities, and at all of our internal processes, including recruiting, leveling, performance, promotion, talent assessment and retention practices.


We’ve laid some good groundwork here. Since June, we’ve doubled the Retention & Progression team so that each organization has a designated consultant to support underrepresented Googlers, and we plan to triple our investment in this program by 2022. Meanwhile, we continue to roll out more robust checks for fairness and equity in our Perf process, including this cycle. 


We’ve also taken steps to create a deeper sense of belonging for our Black+ community, from offering relevant and useful benefits to fostering supportive internal communities. For example, last month we introduced a student loan repayment program to address the debt that hinders economic progress for many communities of color. We also increased the percentage of Black+ mental health counselors available to Googlers in the U.S. and are partnering with healthcare providers to create new programs for concerns that disproportionately affect our Black+ community, to be in place by 2022. In EMEA, we've launched a new speaker series—RE:EMEA—to localize the conversation on racial equity and increase our understanding of the region’s unique history. And to create community globally, next year we’ll roll out a six-month onboarding program for Black+ Nooglers to help build networks during those first few months at Google.

Attracting new talent and investing in long-term growth of sites 

In June, we committed to improving representation of underrepresented groups at senior levels by 30 percent by 2025. Today, we’re adding a goal to more than double the number of Black+ Googlers at all other levels by 2025. 


We’ll also invest in the long-term growth of U.S. locations that contribute to a high quality of life for Black+ Googlers. Across our sites in Atlanta, Washington D.C., Chicago and New York we’ll aim to add an additional 10,000 Googlers by 2025, including 1,000 new roles by 2021. In global sites, including London, we will continue to focus on recruiting and hiring Black+ Googlers.

Holding ourselves accountable

We’ll hold ourselves accountable for creating an inclusive workplace. As part of our commitment to anti-racism educational programs, we will integrate diversity, equity and inclusion into all of our flagship employee and manager trainings. And moving forward, all VP+ performance reviews will include an evaluation of leadership in support of diversity, equity and inclusion. 


I’ll be sharing progress with Alphabet’s board regularly through transparency reports covering representation, hiring, retention, performance and promotion equity, and we’ll continue to publish our Diversity Annual Report to share this progress with all of you.

Thank you

These efforts represent a significant body of work to address systemic racism and build equity for Black+ Googlers and users for years to come. They would not have happened without the leadership and guidance of hundreds of Googlers, including Melonie and members of our Black Leadership Advisory Group and Black Googler Network—my deepest thanks to all of you. 


The equity we’re working towards internally will help us build better products and continue to support our users, businesses, and communities. This effort is at the heart of our mission to make information accessible to everyone. 


Thanks for the work thus far; we’ll continue to share progress updates.


- Sundar

Our third decade of climate action: Realizing a carbon-free future

A few years ago flooding devastated Chennai, where I grew up. Seeing the images of the city—which had experienced extreme drought for so many years of my life—covered in flood waters, really made the impacts of climate change feel much closer to home. Last week, many of us woke up to orange skies in Northern California as wildfires continue to rage up and down the West Coast. I know others in Australia and Brazil have recently experienced similar events, and sadly they won’t be the last. 


The science is clear: The world must act now if we’re going to avert the worst consequences of climate change. 


We are committed to doing our part. Sustainability has been a core value for us since Larry and Sergey founded Google two decades ago. We were the first major company to become carbon neutral in 2007. We were the first major company to match our energy use with 100 percent renewable energy in 2017. We operate the cleanest global cloud in the industry, and we’re the world’s largest corporate purchaser of renewable energy. 


In our third decade of climate action, we are going even further to help build a carbon-free future for everyone. Here’s how:


  • We’re eliminating our entire carbon legacy, effective today.

  • We are the first major company to make a commitment to operate on 24/7 carbon-free energy in all our data centers and campuses worldwide. This is far more challenging than the traditional approach of matching energy usage with renewable energy, but we’re working to get this done by 2030. 

  • We’re investing in technologies to help our partners and people all over the world make sustainable choices. For example, we are investing in manufacturing regions to enable 5 GW of new carbon-free energy, helping 500 cities reduce their carbon emissions and finding new ways to empower 1 billion people through our products.

  • We estimate that the commitments we’re making today will directly generate more than 20,000 new jobs in clean energy and associated industries, in America and around the world, by 2025.

Here’s more about what we’re announcing today.

Eliminating our carbon legacy

As of today, we have eliminated Google’s entire carbon legacy (covering all our operational emissions before we became carbon neutral in 2007) through the purchase of high-quality carbon offsets. This means that Google's lifetime net carbon footprint is now zero. We’re pleased to be the first major company to get this done, today.

Operating on carbon-free energy 24/7 by 2030

Since 2017 we’ve been matching all of our annual electricity consumption with 100 percent renewable energy. Now we’re going even further: By 2030 Google is aiming to run our business on carbon-free energy everywhere, at all times. 


This is our biggest sustainability moonshot yet, with enormous practical and technical complexity. We are the first major company that's set out to do this, and we aim to be the first to achieve it. 


We’ll start by working towards 24/7 carbon-free energy at all of our data centers and campuses around the world. Our data centers power the products and services you’ve come to rely on every day. This will mean every email you send through Gmail, every question you ask Google Search, every YouTube video you watch, and every route you take using Google Maps, is supplied by clean energy every hour of every day.


Not long ago, it was hard to imagine a 24/7 carbon-free electricity supply—at a simple level, the wind doesn’t always blow, and the sun doesn’t shine at night. But thanks to trends in technology, and with the right government policies, the promise of 24/7 clean energy will soon be within reach. To get there, Google will invest in approaches that make it possible for us to source reliable carbon-free energy in all locations, at all times of day. We’ll do things like pairing wind and solar power sources together, and increasing our use of battery storage. And we’re working on ways to apply AI to optimize our electricity demand and forecasting. These efforts will help create 12,000 jobs by 2025. Importantly, we think our work can accelerate the availability of clean energy in communities worldwide, and help to solve challenges that have held back its ability to become an around-the-clock source of energy.


Read more in our white paper. 

Helping enable 5 GW in carbon-free energy investments

We’ll enable 5 GW of new carbon-free energy across our key manufacturing regions by 2030 through investment. We expect this to spur more than $5 billion in clean energy investments, avoid the amount of emissions equal to taking more than 1 million cars off the road each year, and create more than 8,000 clean energy jobs.

Helping 500+ cities reduce 1 gigaton of carbon emissions annually by 2030

Cities create 70 percent of the world’s emissions. Our Google Environmental Insights Explorer helps more than 100 cities to track and reduce their building and transportation carbon emissions and maximize their renewable energy use, by  informing them of their solar potential. Today, we’re expanding this tool to 3,000 cities worldwide.  


We’re also committing to help more than 500 cities and local governments globally reduce a total of 1 gigaton of carbon emissions annually by 2030—that’s the equivalent of the annual carbon emissions of a country the size of Japan. Read more about our efforts to help cities like Hamburg and Houston accelerate their climate action.

Helping our partners reduce carbon emissions

We are introducing a number of initiatives to help partners and organizations reduce their carbon usage and remove carbon from the atmosphere.

More than 10 percent of energy use in the U.S. comes from the heating and cooling of commercial buildings. Machine learning has reduced the energy used for cooling Google data centers by 30 percent, and now DeepMind and Google Cloud are making this Cloud technology solution available globally for use by airports, shopping malls, hospitals, data centers and other commercial buildings and industrial facilities. You can read more details on our Cloud blog. 

Nonprofits, civil society organizations, and universities also play a critical role. We’re working with a network of environmental organizations, such as Crowther Lab, on a science-based approach to reforestation and restoration. We’re also launching a €10 million Google.org Impact Challenge in Europe to support promising ideas and projects to support sustainability, selected by independent experts.

Helping 1 billion people through our products

Finally, Google’s products are already helping people make more sustainable choices in their daily lives, whether it’s using Google Maps to find bike-shares and electric vehicle charging stations, or in many European countries, using Google Flights to sort the least carbon-intensive option flights.


There’s more tools and information we can provide, and our goal is to find new ways that our products can help 1 billion people make more sustainable choices by 2022.

Our next decade of climate action

We’re optimistic that by harnessing new technologies, investing in the right infrastructure and tools, and empowering partners, nonprofits and people, this can be the most decisive decade for climate action yet. We’re proud to do our part, and to help move the world closer to a carbon-free future for all. 

Our commitments to racial equity

Editor’s Note: CEO Sundar Pichai sent the following note to the company today.

Hi everyone, 

Over the past several weeks, violent and racist attacks against the Black community have forced the world to reckon with the structural and systemic racism that Black people have experienced over generations. My own search for answers started within our own walls. Listening to the personal accounts of members of our Black Leadership Advisory Group and our Black+ Googlers has only reinforced for me the reality our Black communities face: one where systemic racism permeates every aspect of life, from interactions with law enforcement, to access to housing and capital, to health care, education, and the workplace.

As a company, and as individuals who came here to build helpful products for everyone, Google commits to translating the energy of this moment into lasting, meaningful change. Today we are announcing a set of concrete commitments to move that work forward: internally, to build sustainable equity for Google’s Black+ community, and externally, to make our products and programs helpful in the moments that matter most to Black users. 

Building sustainable equity

Creating meaningful change starts within our own company. Strengthening our commitment to racial equity and inclusion will help Google build more helpful products for our users and the world. To that end, we’re announcing several commitments to build sustainable equity for our Black+ community. 

First, we’re working to improve Black+ representation at senior levels and committing to a goal to improve leadership representation of underrepresented groups by 30 percent by 2025. To help achieve this, we’ll post senior leadership roles externally as well as internally, and increase our investments in places such as Atlanta, Washington DC, Chicago, and London, where we already have offices. We'll take the same approach across regions, using site and country-specific plans to recruit and hire more underrepresented Googlers in communities where the social infrastructure already supports a sense of belonging and contributes to a better quality of life. 

Second, we’ll do more to address representation challenges and focus on hiring, retention, and promotion at all levels. To help direct that work, I’m establishing a new talent liaison within each product and functional area to mentor and advocate for the progression and retention of Googlers from underrepresented groups. I’m also convening a task force, including senior members of the Black+ community at Google, to develop concrete recommendations and proposals for accountability across all of the areas that affect the Black+ Googler experience, from recruiting and hiring, to performance management, to career progression and retention. I’ve asked the task force to come back with specific proposals (including measurable goals) within 90 days.

Third, we’re working to create a stronger sense of inclusion and belonging for Googlers in general and our Black+ community in particular. Our internal research shows that feelings of belonging are driven by many aspects of our experiences at work, including the psychological safety we feel among our teams, the support of our managers and leaders, equitable people processes, and opportunities to grow and develop our careers. Across all of these dimensions, we’re committed to building more inclusive practices and policies—and revisiting them when we don’t get them right. 

As one example, we’ve had a security practice of Googlers watching for “tailgaters” in order to reduce instances of unauthorized visitors in offices. We have realized this process is susceptible to bias. So, over the past year, our Global Security and Resilience team partnering with a cross-functional working group, conducted extensive research, listened to Black Googlers’ experiences, and developed and tested new security procedures to ensure we could maintain the safety and security of the Google community without relying on this type of enforcement. Now, as we prepare to return to the office, we will end the practice of Googlers badge-checking each other and rely on our already robust security infrastructure.

Fourth, we’ll establish a range of anti-racism educational programs that are global in view and able to scale to all Googlers.We’ll be welcoming external experts into Google to share their expertise on racial history and structural inequities, and start conversations on education, allyship, and self-reflection. And this week we’ve begun piloting a new, multi-series training for Googlers of all levels that explores systemic racism and racial consciousness, to help develop stronger awareness and capacity for creating spaces where everyone feels they belong. We plan to roll out this training globally by early next year. We’ll also integrate diversity, equity, and inclusion into our mandatory manager trainings.

Fifth, we’re focused on better supporting the mental and physical health and well-being of our Black+ community. For example, over the past year, we’ve worked with our mental health provider in the U.S., to increase their Black network of counselors from 6.6 percent to 9.8 percent. Our global EAP providers are also working to further diversify their network of counselors. Over the next 90 days, our Benefits team will work with the Equity Project Management Office and Black Leadership Advisory Group to identify areas where we could expand our benefits or provide additional support to Googlers and their families. As one example of the kinds of programs that work: we've made the medical second opinion service available to Googlers’ extended family—something that our Black+ community told us was important to supporting a family structure that includes siblings, parents, parents-in-law and grandparents. 

Building products for change

Turning to our external announcements, we want to create products and programs that help Black users in the moments that matter most. Two weeks ago, I put out a call for ideas, and Googlers from all over the world have submitted more than 500 suggestions. We’ve assembled a product task force to prioritize and implement these ideas in partnership with our Black Leadership Advisory Group and members of our Black Googler Network. 

Some activations have already launched, including the Assistant’s responses to questions related to Black Lives Matter and—as of this week—Juneteenth. We're also working quickly to give merchants in the U.S. the option of adding a “Black-owned” business attribute to their Business Profile on Google to help people find and support Black-owned local businesses by using Search and Maps. This opt-in feature is in development and will roll out to Business Profiles in the coming weeks.

Creating products for everyone is a core principle at Google, so our product teams will work to ensure that all users, and particularly Black users, see themselves reflected in our products. In addition, building on YouTube's announcement last week, our Trust and Safety team will work to strengthen our product policies against hate and harassment. 

Helping create economic opportunity

Beyond our products, we know that racial equity is inextricably linked to economic opportunity. So today we are announcing a $175 million+ economic opportunity package to support Black business owners, startup founders, job seekers and developers, in addition to YouTube’s $100 million fund to amplify Black creators and artists. This new commitment includes:

  • $50 million in financing and grants for small businesses, focused on the Black community and in partnership with Opportunity Finance Network. This commitment builds on our recent $125 million Grow with Google Small Business Fund that is helping underserved minority and women-owned small businesses across the U.S.

  • $100 million in funding participation in Black-led capital firms, startups and organizations supporting Black entrepreneurs, including increased investments in Plexo Capital and non-dilutive funding to Black founders in the Google for Startups network.

  • $15 million in training, through partners like the National Urban League, to help Black jobseekers grow their skills. 

  • $10 million+ to help improve the Black community’s access to education, equipment and economic opportunities in our developer ecosystem, and increase equity, representation and inclusion across our developer platforms, including Android, Chrome, Flutter, Firebase, Google Play and more.

Mentorship is also critical to growing networks and successful businesses. Today, we are launching our Google for Startups Accelerator for Black Founders, a three-month digital accelerator program for high potential Seed to Series A startups and announcing an expansion of our Digital Coaches program to 8 new cities, including Memphis, Birmingham, and Cleveland, to provide 50K Black-owned businesses in the U.S. with the mentorship, networking and training they need to grow.

Improving education

We’re also committing nearly $3 million to help close the racial equity gaps in computer science education and increase Black+ representation in STEM fields. This starts with making sure Black students have access to opportunities early on in their education. To that end, we’re expanding our CS First curriculum to 7,000 more teachers who reach 100,000+ Black students, scaling our Applied Digital Skills program to reach 400,000 Black middle and high school students, and making a $1 million Google.org grant to the DonorsChoose #ISeeMe campaign, to help teachers access materials to make their classrooms more inclusive. 

Beyond the classroom, we’re increasing our exploreCSR awards to 16 more universities to address racial gaps in CS research & academia, and we’re also supporting Black in AI with $250,000 to help increase Black representation in the field of AI. 

These efforts build on our other education initiatives, including CodeNext, focused on cultivating the next generation of Black and Latinx tech leaders, and TechExchange, which partners with historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) and Hispanic-serving Institutions (HSIs) to bring students to Google’s campus for four months to learn about topics from product management to machine learning.

Supporting racial justice organizations

We also continue to support organizations working to advance criminal justice reform. Earlier this month, Google.org pledged another $12 million, in addition to the $32 million we’ve already contributed since the Charleston shooting five years ago today. We’re announcing the next round of grants—at $1 million each—to the Leadership Conference Education Fund, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund’s Policing Reform Campaign and the Movement for Black Lives. We’ve also created a public donation page to help raise even more for organizations fighting against racism and inequality. Recognizing that racism is a problem the world over, looking ahead, we will focus on more global solutions, and will be giving grants to local community organizations tackling these issues in Brazil, and across Europe and Africa.

Let me close by simply saying thank you to the many Googlers who have come together to drive these efforts. That includes our Chief Diversity Officer Melonie Parker and the Employee Engagement team, our Equity Project Management Office working in partnership with our Black Leadership Advisory Group and members of our Black Googler Network, and everyone who has stepped up with ideas on how we can build a better workplace, and, in turn, better products for the world. 

-Sundar

Standing with the Black community

Sundar sent the following email to Google employees today.

Hi Googlers,

I realize that nothing about this week feels like business as usual—and it shouldn’t. Our Black community is hurting, and many of us are searching for ways to stand up for what we believe, and reach out to people we love to show solidarity. Yesterday, I met with a group of our Black leaders to talk about where we go from here and how we can contribute as Google. We discussed many ideas, and we are working through where to put our energy and resources in the weeks and months ahead—I’ll share more on that below. 

In the meantime, I wanted to provide space for us to come together as a community. Today at 1:00pm PDT we’ll be standing together to honor the memories of Black lives lost in an 8 minute and 46 second moment of silence.  

The length of the moment of silence represents the amount of time George Floyd suffered before he was killed. It's meant to serve as a visceral reminder of the injustice inflicted on Mr. Floyd and so many others. We acknowledge that racism and violence may look different in different parts of the world, so please use this as a moment to reflect on those who have been lost in your own country or community at a time that works for you. If you would like to share this silent space with your fellow Googlers, join thelive stream at 1:00 pm PDT today. 

Coming together as a community and showing support is important, but it isn’t enough. So today, we are announcing a few initial commitments to meet the urgency of the moment. 

  • We’ll be giving $12 million in funding to organizations working to address racial inequities. Our first grants of $1 million each will go to our long-term partners at the Center for Policing Equity and the Equal Justice Initiative. And we’ll be providing technical support through ourGoogle.org Fellows program. This builds on the $32 million we havedonated to racial justice over the past five years. We’ll also offer $25 million in Ad Grants to help organizations fighting racial injustice provide critical information.

  • As a result of last week’s internal giving campaign, I‘m pleased to share that you all have contributed an additional $2.5 million in donations that we’re matching. This represents the largest Googler giving campaign in our company’s history, with both the largest amount raised by employees and the broadest participation.  

Supporting worthy organizations is a step in the right direction, but it is not a replacement for doing the harder work ahead both within and outside of Google. The events of the past few weeks reflect deep structural challenges. We’ll work closely with our Black community to develop initiatives and product ideas that support long-term solutions—and we’ll keep you updated. As part of this effort, we welcome your ideas on how to use our products and technology to improve access and opportunity.

-Sundar

Working from home and the office

Sundar sent the following email to Google employees earlier today.

Hi Googlers, 

As mentioned in our last TGIF, we’ll be approaching the return to office with a gradual, phased approach, taking both team and individual needs and preferences into account: we are taking slow, deliberate steps to begin re-opening offices in areas where they still remain largely closed. We’re also investing more in your work-from-home setup to make sure you have what you need to be productive and comfortable. 

Beginning July 6, assuming external conditions allow, we’ll start to open more buildings in more cities. This will give Googlers who need to come back to the office—or, capacity permitting, who want to come back—the opportunity to return on a limited, rotating basis (think: one day every couple of weeks, so roughly 10 percent building occupancy). We’ll have rigorous health and safety measures in place to ensure social distancing and sanitization guidelines are followed, so the office will look and feel different than when you left. Our goal is to be fair in the way we allocate time in the office, while limiting the number of people who come in, consistent with safety protocols. 

In the September timeframe (again, assuming conditions allow), we will further scale the rotation program, building over time to 30 percent capacity (which would mean most people who want to come in could do so on a limited basis, while still prioritizing those who need to come in). 

There are a limited number of Googlers whose roles are needed back in office this calendar year. If this applies to you, your manager will let you know by June 10. For everyone else, returning to the office will be voluntary through the end of the year, and we encourage you to continue to work from home if you can. 

While some of you have expressed interest in coming back to the office, others have asked whether it’s okay to temporarily relocate to another place to be closer to family while you’re working from home. Please talk with your manager if you are considering this, and review the guidelines, which include important information about a number of personal factors you should consider (such as your tax filings and health coverage/eligibility).

Moving ahead, we are looking to develop more overall flexibility in how we work. Our campuses are designed to enable collaboration and community—in fact, some of our greatest innovations were the result of chance encounters in the office—and it’s clear this is something many of us don’t want to lose. At the same time, we are very familiar with distributed work as we have many offices around the world and open-minded about the lessons we’ll learn through this period. We continue to study all the data and feedback you’re sharing on your current experience. I believe that ultimately these insights will lead to more flexibility and choice for employees as they consider how to work in the future. 

Because we still expect that most Googlers will be largely working from home for the rest of this year, we’ll be giving each Googler an allowance of $1,000 USD, or the equivalent value in your country, to expense necessary equipment and office furniture.

Finally, we continue to experiment with sharing more of our in-office experiences virtually, with a focus on health, wellness, and fun. A couple of examples: fitness with gFit instructors, cooking and nutrition lessons from Google chefs, and Kids@Home Storytime.

We’ll share more specifics on the return to office plan and answer questions on this topic at upcoming forums. Thank you for everything you are doing to support our users and partners. It’s important work that is making a big difference.

Please continue to take good care of yourselves and one another.

Alphabet’s Q1 2020 earnings call

Note: These are Sundar Pichai's full remarks from today's Alphabet Q1 2020 earnings call. See below for an email to employees Sundar sent following the call. 

When I last spoke with you in early February, no one could have imagined how much the world would change, and how suddenly.

Our thoughts are with everyone who has been impacted by COVID-19, especially those who’ve lost loved ones or their livelihoods. It’s a challenging moment for the world. 

Through it all, we’re incredibly grateful for all of the essential workers on the front lines of this crisis... from health care workers and first responders... to the grocery store clerks and delivery workers...to teachers grappling with new technology to help children learn remotely...to all of the scientists and researchers working hard to develop vaccines and treatments...and many others who are leading through these difficult times. Thank you.

These people fill us with hope and show us the power of human resilience. We’ll need that energy and resolve in the months and years ahead. 

Today, there is still a great deal of uncertainty regarding the path to recovery. But there are some things that we can understand better with the patterns we are seeing.

  • For example, it’s clear from data that people are being more cautious and are seeking authoritative advice and guidance to protect their families’ health and safety. A return to normal economic activity depends on how effectively societies manage the spread of the virus. There’s no one size fits all and the timing and pace of recovery will vary from location to location. This is a long-term effort.

  • It’s also clear that this is the first major pandemic taking place in a digital world.Many parts of the economy are also able to continue with some semblance of normalcy, thanks to advances in remote work, online shopping, delivery options, home entertainment and telemedicine. At the same time, newer technologies like AI, Bluetooth exposure notifications and 3D printing are being used to help fight the disease head on. 

  • It’s now clear that once the emergency has passed, the world will not look the same.Some social norms will change, and many businesses are speaking to us, looking to reinvent their operations. We have seen that the most pressing concern of small and large businesses right now is business continuity, solving for issues like employee safety, dramatic falls or surges in demand, supply chains and managing a remote workforce. Ultimately, we’ll see a long-term acceleration of movement from businesses to digital services, including increased online work, education, medicine, shopping and entertainment. These changes will be significant, and lasting.

Given the depth of the challenges so many are facing, it’s been a huge privilege to be able to help people and businesses at this moment. In today’s call, I’ll cover four areas:

  • First, I’ll mention some of the ways we have marshalled our resources and product development to help.

  • Second, I’ll talk about how people are using our products at this unprecedented moment. 

  • Third, I’ll talk about our business—especially our advertising business which was significantly impacted in the last few weeks of the quarter.

  • And I’ll close with our investment plans and focus for the rest of the year. 

In the early days of the crisis, we were able to put in motion a number of efforts quickly. This is a testament to strategic areas where we have invested over recent years: products that people trust; our technical leadership and innovation; deep partnerships; a highly skilled workforce; and the scale and resilience of our operations. 

I’ve been proud of all of these efforts and what they say about our company. I’ll give just a few examples.

First, we’ve been working with healthcare providers, researchers, authorities and communities to help combat the virus.

  • Our community mobility reports help authorities see, in aggregate, how social distancing requirements are working. 

  • Verily has tested thousands of people in California and has partnered with Rite Aid to bring free testing to eight additional states.

  • Google Cloud is forming deep partnerships, such as with leading health care provider HCA Healthcare, to understand data around ICU bed availability, ventilator supplies and test results. 

  • And you may have read about our exposure notification partnership with Apple, designed specifically and carefully to protect users’ privacy while helping public health authorities and governments manage countries’ re-opening.

Second, we are working hard to provide accurate and authoritative information to people using our services. 

  • In Search, we've launched a number of features such as up-to-date answers from health authorities, and remote medical care options. 

  • On YouTube, we are quickly removing content that violates policy, and raising authoritative content from news organizations and experts. Up to last week, our COVID-19 info panels have had 20 billion impressions.

Third, we’re playing a role in supporting businesses and workers that are hurting because of the downturn. 

  • In March, we made a commitment upwards of $800 million to support small businesses and crisis response efforts, through a combination of grants, small business loans and ad credits. 

  • And the Google News Initiative is offering financial support to thousands of small, medium and local news publishers through a Journalism Emergency Relief Fund. We’ve also waived ad serving fees for news publishers globally on Ad Manager for the next five months.

Turning to the way people are using our products... 

People are relying on Google’s services more than ever. This is a strong recognition of the value of our products, particularly in important and urgent moments. As a few examples: 

  • We’ve seen a significant rise in search activity. To put it into perspective, in the U.S., coronavirus-related search activity at its peak was four times greater than during the peak of the Super Bowl. 

  • People are spending significantly more time on their Android apps, with downloads of apps from Google Play rising 30 percent from February to March.

  • YouTube watchtime has also significantly increased. One area in particular is livestreams. I hope you saw Andrea Bocelli on YouTube Live on Easter, which has had over 39 million views. It was truly beautiful.

  • 100 million students and educators are using Google Classroom, double the number from the beginning of March. 

  • We've seen a massive increase in demand for Chromebooks; analysts have reported a 400 percent increase during the week of March 21 year over year. 

  • And schools and businesses in particular are using our secure video conferencing platform Meet. Last week, we surpassed a significant milestone and are now adding roughly 3 million new users each day, and have seen a 30-fold increase in usage since January. There are now over 100 million daily Meet meeting participants. Stay tuned for much more!

Turning to our business, let me touch on our performance this quarter.

Q1 was in many ways the tale of two quarters. For our advertising business, the first two months of the quarter were strong. 

In March, we experienced a significant and sudden slowdown in ad revenues. The timing of the slowdown correlated to the locations and sectors impacted by the virus and related shutdown orders. 

As the impact of COVID-19 came into view, we delayed some ad launches and prioritized supporting our customers as many adjusted their strategies. 

We're focused on products where we can help most advertisers and merchants during the crisis. For example, under our new leader of Commerce, Bill Ready, last week we announced that merchants can list products in Google Shopping for free. It’s been widely rolled out in the U.S., with more countries to come, and the response has been positive. 

Overall, recovery in ad spend will depend on a return to economic activity. 

There are two key aspects of our business that give us confidence about the future:

  • First, as we saw after 2008, one of the strongest features of Search is that it can be adjusted quickly, so it’s relatively easier to turn off and then back on, and marketers see it as highly cost-effective and ROI based. 

  • Second, our business is more diversified than it was in 2008. 

For example, Cloud:

  • In the public sector, we are helping governments deliver critical health and social services. We’re supporting the State of New York’s new online unemployment application system as it deals with a significant increase in demand. 

  • In retail, we’ve helped Loblaw, one of Canada’s largest food retailers, and Wayfair scale to support exponential traffic increases. 

  • We are helping communication companies adapt to new behavior patterns. Vodafone is using Google Cloud Platform to help it analyze network traffic flows to keep everyone connected and we are helping Unity Technologies keep real-time online games stay up and running. 

  • Institutions like Lloyd's Bank are digitally transforming their businesses and we are helping even more businesses do the same through new partnerships with Accenture, AT&T, and T-Systems.

  • We now have more than 6 million paying G Suite customers. G Suite is helping Netflix and German manufacturer, KAESER Compressors transition quickly to remote work, while Twitter, Shopify, retailer Schnuks and Italian bank Credem are using Meet for things like all hands and customer meetings. 

Elsewhere across the business...

  • YouTube subscriptions continue to grow. The team has launched YouTube Kids in 15 new countries around the world since the beginning of the year, and rolled out new features to make kids-focused channels safer. 

  • Android previewed Android 11, which includes seamless 5G connectivity and a smarter keyboard with a faster messaging experience. And as I mentioned, we’ve seen significant growth in Play. There are now over 2.5 billion monthly active Play devices worldwide. 

  • And in hardware, we saw a decline in device activations in the quarter, due to falling consumer demand globally. But I am excited about the product roadmap ahead for the year—including yesterday’s launch of Pixel Buds 2. 

Finally, moving on to our focus for the rest of the year...

We’re taking a long view and continuing to invest in our long-term priorities, but are being thoughtful in the short term. So we made the decision to slow down the pace of hiring for the remainder of 2020, while maintaining momentum in a small number of strategic areas. We’re also recalibrating the focus and pace of our investments in areas like data centers and machines, and non-business essential marketing and travel. 

We’ll also continue to thoughtfully manage our Other Bets portfolio. Waymo raised $2.25 billion in its first external investment round, a terrific validation of their technology and long-term business model. Wing saw a surge in deliveries and new users, increasing its daily volume fivefold, with great momentum in test programs in Australia and Virginia.

At Google, we’ll continue to be focused on the four key areas that I outlined in the last earnings call. 

  • First, creating the most helpful products for everyone, particularly at a time where people rely on us for information, work, education and entertainment. 

  • Second, providing the most trusted experiences for our users. This includes our efforts to tackle misinformation and digital threats, as well as our work to safeguard consumer privacy.

  • Third, executing at scale. I’ve been proud of how we continue to work so cohesively and productively, even with a distributed workforce. We will continue to build on the internal tools, support systems and infrastructure we have built over the years. 

  • And finally, creating sustainable value. We’ll be optimizing the way our data centers work, and prioritizing strategic areas of investment where we need to support our users and partners. 

Let me express my thanks to our employees for their herculean efforts under these difficult circumstances. While the road ahead for everyone is uncertain, we’ll continue to support our users, communities and partners, and we’ll all emerge, together, from this moment.

Thank you, and please take care, everyone.

The following is an email to employees that Sundar sent today.

Hi everyone, 


Earlier today, Ruth and I wrapped our 2020 Q1 earnings call with investors. I was proud to share some of the ways we’ve come together as a company to help people and businesses during this time—thank you all for your efforts. 


I’ve included my opening remarks from the call below. The TL;DR is that Alphabet’s Q1 was a tale of two quarters. On the one hand, we’ve seen people turning to some of our products for help more than ever. This is reflected in the rise in Search activity, engagement on YouTube, downloads on Google Play and usage of G Suite.


The first two months of the quarter were strong for our Search, network and YouTube businesses. Then, in March, we experienced a significant and sudden slowdown in our advertising revenues, correlated to the locations and sectors impacted by the virus and related shutdown orders. 


As I mentioned on the call, recovery in ad spend will depend on a return to economic activity. That said, there are two key aspects of our business that give us confidence about the future: First, as we saw after 2008, one of the strongest features of Search Ads is they are cost-effective and can be adjusted quickly, so it’s comparatively easy to turn them off and then back on. Second, our business is more diversified than it was in 2008, and we are excited about the momentum in areas like YouTube, Cloud, Google Play and our computing efforts. We’re equally excited about the growth we’re seeing across Chromebooks and G Suite, particularly in Meet and Classroom, as more businesses and schools transition to remote work and learning. All of this will help us emerge from this period in a strong position.


I also spent some time on the call sharing observations about the patterns we’re seeing from the first pandemic of the digital era. While technology has allowed certain types of businesses to continue working as before, we can’t expect the world to snap back into place in a single day—this is a long-term effort. And when the crisis does pass, the world won’t look exactly as it did before the pandemic. This provides an opportunity for all of us to help people reimagine everything, from online work to education, to medicine and entertainment.


Overall, we made some good progress this quarter in spite of all the challenges. None of it would be possible without the herculean efforts from Googlers around the world. Thank you for everything you do to continue to support our users, customers, partners, and communities. We will get through this together. 


-Sundar


COVID-19: $800+ million to support small businesses and crisis response

As the coronavirus outbreak continues to worsen around the world, it’s taking a devastating toll on lives and communities. To help address some of these challenges, today we’re announcing a new $800+ million commitment to support small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), health organizations and governments, and health workers on the frontline of this global pandemic. 


Our 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. This is an increase from our initial $25 million announced last month. In addition, we’re providing $20 million in ad grants to community financial institutions and NGOs specifically to run public service announcements on relief funds and other resources for SMBs.

  • 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, we’re 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. This is in addition to the $15 million in cash grants Google.org is already providing to nonprofits to help bridge these gaps for SMBs.

  • $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. We hope it will help to alleviate some of the cost of staying in touch with their customers.

  • 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. Learn how to apply for credits on the Google for Education site.

  • 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. Additionally, employees from across Alphabet, including Google, Verily and X, are bringing engineering, supply chain and healthcare expertise to facilitate increased production of ventilators, working with equipment manufacturers, distributors and the government in this effort.

In addition to these commitments, we also increased the gift match Google offers every employee annually to $10,000 from $7,500. That means our employees can now give $20,000 to organizations in their communities, in addition to the $50 millionGoogle.org has already donated. Together, we’ll continue to help our communities—including our businesses, educators, researchers and nonprofits—to navigate the challenges ahead.

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