Tag Archives: UK

Helping European news publishers succeed online

During the pandemic, demand for local news has grown as people try to stay up to date. COVID-19 has also increased the financial challenges many of these news publishers face. It’s now more important than ever to support local news, and that’s why we are introducing the Digital Growth Program from the Google News Initiative (GNI), a free training program for small-to-medium sized news publishers. This will be available first in Europe, and will roll out to more regions in the coming months. 


The GNI Digital Growth Program has been created to help establish and grow the online business of news publishers who have more recently started developing their digital platforms. We meet regularly with publishers of all sizes to hear how we can help them develop their products, expand their business and improve their readers’ online experience. Based on feedback from these conversations, we’ve designed workshops which cover the fundamentals of digital business strategy, audience engagement and revenue strategy.


In Europe, we have partnered with FT Strategies and Table Stakes Europe from WAN-IFRA to deliver in-depth labs, which include intensive training sessions and mentoring delivered over a number of weeks and months. As part of these labs, our partners will offer training from industry experts on a range of subjects, including change management, subscriptions and audience growth. While the training is free, spaces are limited and available upon application. 


The GNI Digital Growth Program is available from today in six countries: Spain, the UK, Germany, Italy, Poland and France.  It’s all in local languages, and many more countries to follow in the coming months. Publishers can sign up to a workshop or apply for a lab at the GNI Digital Growth Program page. 


Together with the participating publishers, we will measure how this program helps to improve their business over time. This builds on many years of support we’ve provided to the news industry as part of the Google News Initiative. Most recently that support entailed emergency funding to more than 5,300 local news organizationsand five months of fee relief on Ad Manager for news publishers globally. Through these and other programs, products and partnerships, we remain committed to supporting news publishers of all sizes around the world as they transition to a more digital world.

Helping European news publishers succeed online

During the pandemic, demand for local news has grown as people try to stay up to date. COVID-19 has also increased the financial challenges many of these news publishers face. It’s now more important than ever to support local news, and that’s why we are introducing the Digital Growth Program from the Google News Initiative (GNI), a free training program for small-to-medium sized news publishers. This will be available first in Europe, and will roll out to more regions in the coming months. 


The GNI Digital Growth Program has been created to help establish and grow the online business of news publishers who have more recently started developing their digital platforms. We meet regularly with publishers of all sizes to hear how we can help them develop their products, expand their business and improve their readers’ online experience. Based on feedback from these conversations, we’ve designed workshops which cover the fundamentals of digital business strategy, audience engagement and revenue strategy.


In Europe, we have partnered with FT Strategies and Table Stakes Europe from WAN-IFRA to deliver in-depth labs, which include intensive training sessions and mentoring delivered over a number of weeks and months. As part of these labs, our partners will offer training from industry experts on a range of subjects, including change management, subscriptions and audience growth. While the training is free, spaces are limited and available upon application. 


The GNI Digital Growth Program is available from today in six countries: Spain, the UK, Germany, Italy, Poland and France.  It’s all in local languages, and many more countries to follow in the coming months. Publishers can sign up to a workshop or apply for a lab at the GNI Digital Growth Program page. 


Together with the participating publishers, we will measure how this program helps to improve their business over time. This builds on many years of support we’ve provided to the news industry as part of the Google News Initiative. Most recently that support entailed emergency funding to more than 5,300 local news organizationsand five months of fee relief on Ad Manager for news publishers globally. Through these and other programs, products and partnerships, we remain committed to supporting news publishers of all sizes around the world as they transition to a more digital world.

Explore 250 years of the Royal Academy of Arts

London’s Royal Academy of Arts(RA) has been championing artists and architects for more than 250 years, and—pandemic or not—isn’t stopping now. Since its founding in 1769, the RA’s graduates have influenced culture in the UK and abroad through art practice, education, research and more. During this time of closed doors, the RA is inviting art fans around the world to walk their halls, explore their collection and delve into their stories on Google Arts & Culture.

The RA collection is a varied and unconventional treasure trove of British art, with works from luminaries like J.M.W. Turner, John Constable and Angelica Kauffman, through to contemporary masters like Lubaina Humid, Yinka Shonibare and Lynn Chadwick. Out of the 200+ worksnow available online, 20 have been captured in gigapixel resolution using our Art Camera technology, giving users the closest possible look at the details of each work.

At the ripe old age of 250, the RA underwent major renovations last year to extend and enhance their public offerings. The refreshed building was then captured from head to tail using Street View to enable art fans to explore the building and its galleries online for the first time.

  • Group image of RA Schools class of 2020.jpg

    RA President Rebecca Salter writes about how we must value a rich arts education for all.

    © Benjamin McMahon

  • Installation of colorful figures.jpg

    The Turner Prize-winning British artist Lubaina Himid RA and Royal Academician discusses teaching, politics and her mom.

  • Image of a library space.jpg

    Tucked away in the heart of the Royal Academy is a hidden room of thousands of art books (and a few artworks).

    © Benedict Johnson

  • Gallery V of the Royal Academy 2017 Summer Exhibition.jpg

    The Royal Academy's annual open submission art show has happened every year since 1768 and is a staple of the British art world.  Explore 250 years of the Summer Exhibition


    Photo: Dave Parry, © Royal Academy of Arts


  • Image of The Last Supper .jpg

    Discover the story behind the RA’s version of The Last Supper, and how it differs from the original.

Thirty stories illustrate the RA’s history, including a few lesser-known tales such as the feud between John Constable and JMW Turner. Self-guided tours of masterpieces mean you can explore at your own pace and virtually press your nose up to the canvas without raising a security guard’s ire. Take a walk through the building’s many halls, explore a sculpture installation, see the unusual props in the life drawing studio and walk from the grand Piccadilly entrance right through to the stately Burlington Gardens extension. 

As Axel Rüger, Secretary and Chief Executive of the Royal Academy, says, “Especially in times of crisis, art galleries and museums should be places of community that provide inspiration, escape, solace, fun and consolation. The Royal Academy of Arts has existed to do that since 1768. At a time when our doors are sadly closed, we are delighted to continue that cultural exchange online, through Google Arts & Culture.”

Visit g.co/MeetTheRA to explore, or download the free Google Arts & Culture app for iOS or Android.

Explore 250 years of the Royal Academy of Arts

London’s Royal Academy of Arts(RA) has been championing artists and architects for more than 250 years, and—pandemic or not—isn’t stopping now. Since its founding in 1769, the RA’s graduates have influenced culture in the UK and abroad through art practice, education, research and more. During this time of closed doors, the RA is inviting art fans around the world to walk their halls, explore their collection and delve into their stories on Google Arts & Culture.

The RA collection is a varied and unconventional treasure trove of British art, with works from luminaries like J.M.W. Turner, John Constable and Angelica Kauffman, through to contemporary masters like Lubaina Humid, Yinka Shonibare and Lynn Chadwick. Out of the 200+ worksnow available online, 20 have been captured in gigapixel resolution using our Art Camera technology, giving users the closest possible look at the details of each work.

At the ripe old age of 250, the RA underwent major renovations last year to extend and enhance their public offerings. The refreshed building was then captured from head to tail using Street View to enable art fans to explore the building and its galleries online for the first time.

  • Group image of RA Schools class of 2020.jpg

    RA President Rebecca Salter writes about how we must value a rich arts education for all.

    © Benjamin McMahon

  • Installation of colorful figures.jpg

    The Turner Prize-winning British artist Lubaina Himid RA and Royal Academician discusses teaching, politics and her mom.

  • Image of a library space.jpg

    Tucked away in the heart of the Royal Academy is a hidden room of thousands of art books (and a few artworks).

    © Benedict Johnson

  • Gallery V of the Royal Academy 2017 Summer Exhibition.jpg

    The Royal Academy's annual open submission art show has happened every year since 1768 and is a staple of the British art world.  Explore 250 years of the Summer Exhibition


    Photo: Dave Parry, © Royal Academy of Arts


  • Image of The Last Supper .jpg

    Discover the story behind the RA’s version of The Last Supper, and how it differs from the original.

Thirty stories illustrate the RA’s history, including a few lesser-known tales such as the feud between John Constable and JMW Turner. Self-guided tours of masterpieces mean you can explore at your own pace and virtually press your nose up to the canvas without raising a security guard’s ire. Take a walk through the building’s many halls, explore a sculpture installation, see the unusual props in the life drawing studio and walk from the grand Piccadilly entrance right through to the stately Burlington Gardens extension. 

As Axel Rüger, Secretary and Chief Executive of the Royal Academy, says, “Especially in times of crisis, art galleries and museums should be places of community that provide inspiration, escape, solace, fun and consolation. The Royal Academy of Arts has existed to do that since 1768. At a time when our doors are sadly closed, we are delighted to continue that cultural exchange online, through Google Arts & Culture.”

Visit g.co/MeetTheRA to explore, or download the free Google Arts & Culture app for iOS or Android.

How AI could predict sight-threatening eye conditions

Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the biggest cause of sight loss in the UK and USA and is the third largest cause of blindness across the globe. The latest research collaboration between Google Health, DeepMind and Moorfields Eye Hospital is published in Nature Medicine today. It shows that artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to not only spot the presence of AMD in scans, but also predict the disease’s progression. 

Vision loss and wet AMD

Around 75 percent of patients with AMD have an early form called “dry” AMD that usually has relatively mild impact on vision. A minority of patients, however, develop the more sight-threatening form of AMD called exudative, or “wet” AMD. This condition affects around 15 percent of patients, and occurs when abnormal blood vessels develop underneath the retina. These vessels can leak fluid, which can cause permanent loss of central vision if not treated early enough.

Macular degeneration mainly affects central vision, causing "blind spots" directly ahead

Macular degeneration mainly affects central vision, causing "blind spots" directly ahead (Macular Society).

Wet AMD often affects one eye first, so patients become heavily reliant upon their unaffected eye to maintain their normal day-to-day living. Unfortunately, 20 percent of these patientswill go on to develop wet AMD in their other eye within two years. The condition often develops suddenly but further vision loss can be slowed with treatments if wet AMD is recognized early enough. Ophthalmologists regularly monitor their patients for signs of wet AMD using 3D optical coherence tomography (OCT) images of the retina.

The period before wet AMD develops is a critical window for preventive treatment, which is why we set out to build a system that could predict whether a patient with wet AMD in one eye will go on to develop the condition in their second eye. This is a novel clinical challenge, since this it’s not a task that is routinely performed.

How AI could predict the development of wet AMD

In collaboration with colleagues at DeepMind and Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, we’ve developed an artificial intelligence (AI) model that has the potential to predict whether a patient will develop wet AMD within six months. In the future, this system could potentially help doctors plan studies of earlier intervention, as well as contribute more broadly to clinical understanding of the disease and disease progression. 

We trained and tested our model using a retrospective, anonymized dataset of 2,795 patients. These patients had been diagnosed with wet AMD in one of their eyes, and were attending one of seven clinical sites for regular OCT imaging and treatment. For each patient, our researchers worked with retinal experts to review all prior scans for each eye and determine the scan when wet AMD was first evident. In collaboration with our colleagues at DeepMind we developed an AI system composed of two deep convolutional neural networks, one taking the raw 3D scan as input and the other, built on our previous work, taking a segmentation map outlining the types of tissue present in the retina. Our prediction system used the raw scan and tissue segmentations to estimate a patient’s risk of progressing to wet AMD within the next six months. 

To test the system, we presented the model with a single, de-identified scan and asked it to predict whether there were any signs that indicated the patient would develop wet AMD in the following six months. We also asked six clinical experts—three retinal specialists and three optometrists, each with at least ten years’ experience—to do the same. Predicting the possibility of a patient developing wet AMD is not a task that is usually performed in clinical practice so this is the first time, to our knowledge, that experts have been assessed on this ability. 

While clinical experts performed better than chance alone, there was substantial variability between their assessments. Our system performed as well as, and in certain cases better than, these clinicians in predicting wet AMD progression. This highlights its potential use for informing studies in the future to assess or help develop treatments to prevent wet AMD progression.

Future work could address several limitations of our research. The sample was representative of practice at multiple sites of the world’s largest eye hospital, but more work is needed to understand the model performance in different demographics and clinical settings. Such work should also understand the impact of unstudied factors—such as additional imaging tests—that might be important for prediction, but were beyond the scope of this work.

What’s next 

These findings demonstrate the potential for AI to help improve understanding of disease progression and predict the future risk of patients developing sight-threatening conditions. This, in turn, could help doctors study preventive treatments.

This is the latest stage in our partnership with Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, a long-standing relationship that transitioned from DeepMind to Google Health in September 2019. Our previous collaborations include using AI to quickly detect eye conditions, and showing how Google Cloud AutoML might eventually help clinicians without prior technical experience to accurately detect common diseases from medical images. 

This is early research, rather than a product that could be implemented in routine clinical practice. Any future product would need to go through rigorous prospective clinical trials and regulatory approvals before it could be used as a tool for doctors. This work joins a growing body of research in the area of developing predictive models that could inform clinical research and trials. In line with this, Moorfields will be making the dataset available through the Ryan Initiative for Macular Research. We hope that models like ours will be able to support this area of work to improve patient outcomes. 


How AI could predict sight-threatening eye conditions

Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the biggest cause of sight loss in the UK and USA and is the third largest cause of blindness across the globe. The latest research collaboration between Google Health, DeepMind and Moorfields Eye Hospital is published in Nature Medicine today. It shows that artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to not only spot the presence of AMD in scans, but also predict the disease’s progression. 

Vision loss and wet AMD

Around 75 percent of patients with AMD have an early form called “dry” AMD that usually has relatively mild impact on vision. A minority of patients, however, develop the more sight-threatening form of AMD called exudative, or “wet” AMD. This condition affects around 15 percent of patients, and occurs when abnormal blood vessels develop underneath the retina. These vessels can leak fluid, which can cause permanent loss of central vision if not treated early enough.

Macular degeneration mainly affects central vision, causing "blind spots" directly ahead

Macular degeneration mainly affects central vision, causing "blind spots" directly ahead (Macular Society).

Wet AMD often affects one eye first, so patients become heavily reliant upon their unaffected eye to maintain their normal day-to-day living. Unfortunately, 20 percent of these patientswill go on to develop wet AMD in their other eye within two years. The condition often develops suddenly but further vision loss can be slowed with treatments if wet AMD is recognized early enough. Ophthalmologists regularly monitor their patients for signs of wet AMD using 3D optical coherence tomography (OCT) images of the retina.

The period before wet AMD develops is a critical window for preventive treatment, which is why we set out to build a system that could predict whether a patient with wet AMD in one eye will go on to develop the condition in their second eye. This is a novel clinical challenge, since it’s not a task that is routinely performed.

How AI could predict the development of wet AMD

In collaboration with colleagues at DeepMind and Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, we’ve developed an artificial intelligence (AI) model that has the potential to predict whether a patient will develop wet AMD within six months. In the future, this system could potentially help doctors plan studies of earlier intervention, as well as contribute more broadly to clinical understanding of the disease and disease progression. 

We trained and tested our model using a retrospective, anonymized dataset of 2,795 patients. These patients had been diagnosed with wet AMD in one of their eyes, and were attending one of seven clinical sites for regular OCT imaging and treatment. For each patient, our researchers worked with retinal experts to review all prior scans for each eye and determine the scan when wet AMD was first evident. In collaboration with our colleagues at DeepMind we developed an AI system composed of two deep convolutional neural networks, one taking the raw 3D scan as input and the other, built on our previous work, taking a segmentation map outlining the types of tissue present in the retina. Our prediction system used the raw scan and tissue segmentations to estimate a patient’s risk of progressing to wet AMD within the next six months. 

To test the system, we presented the model with a single, de-identified scan and asked it to predict whether there were any signs that indicated the patient would develop wet AMD in the following six months. We also asked six clinical experts—three retinal specialists and three optometrists, each with at least ten years’ experience—to do the same. Predicting the possibility of a patient developing wet AMD is not a task that is usually performed in clinical practice so this is the first time, to our knowledge, that experts have been assessed on this ability. 

While clinical experts performed better than chance alone, there was substantial variability between their assessments. Our system performed as well as, and in certain cases better than, these clinicians in predicting wet AMD progression. This highlights its potential use for informing studies in the future to assess or help develop treatments to prevent wet AMD progression.

Future work could address several limitations of our research. The sample was representative of practice at multiple sites of the world’s largest eye hospital, but more work is needed to understand the model performance in different demographics and clinical settings. Such work should also understand the impact of unstudied factors—such as additional imaging tests—that might be important for prediction, but were beyond the scope of this work.

What’s next 

These findings demonstrate the potential for AI to help improve understanding of disease progression and predict the future risk of patients developing sight-threatening conditions. This, in turn, could help doctors study preventive treatments.

This is the latest stage in our partnership with Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, a long-standing relationship that transitioned from DeepMind to Google Health in September 2019. Our previous collaborations include using AI to quickly detect eye conditions, and showing how Google Cloud AutoML might eventually help clinicians without prior technical experience to accurately detect common diseases from medical images. 

This is early research, rather than a product that could be implemented in routine clinical practice. Any future product would need to go through rigorous prospective clinical trials and regulatory approvals before it could be used as a tool for doctors. This work joins a growing body of research in the area of developing predictive models that could inform clinical research and trials. In line with this, Moorfields will be making the dataset available through the Ryan Initiative for Macular Research. We hope that models like ours will be able to support this area of work to improve patient outcomes. 


Get creative with “do it”

It seems that baking bread, cleaning one's cellar or brewing Kombucha have become popular hobbies while staying at home. But how about creating a work of art? “Do it” are DIY instructions shared by leading creatives you can easily do at home. Today we have created a new hub for ‘Do It’ on Arts & Culture —created in collaboration with Serpentine Galleries,Independent Curators International and Kaldor Public Art Projects. 

 It began as a project by the Artistic Director of Serpentine Galleries, curator Hans Ulrich Obristand 12 artists in Paris in 1993, and now we’re adding new “do its” including ones shared by Virgil A. Abloh, Sumayya Vally from Counterspace Studio, and Arca. 

 More “do its” will be published weekly, you can also try others from the past 27 years: make a wish with Yoko Ono,invent book titles like the Raqs Media Collective or bake a delicious gratin guided by film director Agnes Varda. 

 We hope these instructions will help you release your inner artist—share your creations via  #DoItAroundTheWorld. To find out more about “do it” visit g.co/doitaroundtheworld or discover more on Google Arts & Culture—or download our free app for iOS or Android. 

Header image by Precious Okoyomon

Street View is helping this tour guide stay in business

On March 24, government restrictions due to COVID-19 went into effect across the United Kingdom. With nonessential businesses forced to close, public gatherings banned, and most people required to stay at home, these regulations instantly transformed daily life. They also presented a serious threat to Katie Wignall’s business: Katie makes her living as a tour guide, showing curious visitors the highlights of London.

But instead of trying to simply wait out the crisis, Katie looked to technology for a solution to creatively keep her business going. We chatted with her to find out how she’s successfully managed to take her walking tours virtual.

Beaver statues on London's Oxford Street

One of the beaver statues on Oxford Street

Describe your business, Look Up London.

I provide walking tours all over London for public and private groups. I’m a Blue Badge Tourist Guide, which is the top accreditation for tourist guides in the UK. We do two years of training, pass 11 exams, and we’re the only guides that can take you inside the Tower of London and Westminster Abbey.

Look Up London started originally as a blog and social media channels, where I shared quirkier bits of London history. The name is all about spotting the little details in the architecture around you, to tell the story of why something looks the way it does. For example, on Oxford Street, which is famous for its shopping, there's a building decorated with sculptures of beavers. They're a clue to the fact it used to be a hat factory—slightly gruesome, but a detail that is so often missed by passersby!

How has your business been impacted by COVID-19 and the government restrictions?

I’ve had to shut down, basically. I can’t go out; we’re not able to meet up in groups to deliver the normal tours. All of the work I had booked going into the summer—the busiest time—has just been cancelled or postponed. Literally overnight there was no work at all. 

Katie Wignall giving a tour of London's Guildhall

Katie giving a tour of the Guildhall

What gave you the idea for virtual tours?

It was actually a suggestion from a follower on Instagram who asked, “Is there a way you could do virtual tours?” I started out by going out myself and having my husband film me on London streets, but then as the situation escalated, we weren’t allowed outside.

So then I thought I’d experiment with Google Street View. If I couldn’t go outside, I could offer people the next best thing, through a screen. I was already using Street View a lot for my work—it’s really good for my research. I love the feature where you can go back in time. It’s not possible for every location, but for a lot of central London, you can select a place in Google Maps for desktop, drag the Street View pegman into the picture and click on the clock in the top left corner to explore imagery from the past. You can see where buildings have been demolished and what used to be standing where.

So now, every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 2 PM London time, I use Street View to give a virtual tour on Instagram Live. And for anyone who can’t make that time, I post the recordings on my website. They’re all free, and if people enjoy them, they can make a donation.

What’s been the response?

People have been so lovely. From the comments, I think it’s been very helpful for people in lockdown, who maybe are older and can’t get out of the house as often, or people who’ve had to leave London and are feeling homesick. Lots have messaged me to say it’s made them feel like they’ve been outside. They’ve really learned something new and taken their minds off the situation for twenty minutes or so.

Any advantages to using Street View compared to being there in person?

The great thing about Street View is that you can hop about—you can jump a mile down the road and people don’t have to get on a bus or actually walk, so you can cover a lot of ground.

And then there’s that feature to go back in time and see things how they appeared years ago, back to 2008. On a normal tour, you can show pictures and give people an idea, but if people are on Street View and feel like they’re standing in a space and seeing the changes right there, it’s a different experience.

One example, on my Aldgate tour, is a garden space that has been relandscaped. The garden looks beautiful now, but three years ago you could see the cobbles of Victorian London. And those cobbles happen to have been the site of the murder of Catherine Eddowes, who was a victim of Jack the Ripper. That was an evocative thing to be able to show.

Any advice for other small business owners who are trying to figure out how to adapt right now?

I think you have to do the thing that you enjoy doing. I don’t think I’d be able to do these three times a week if I didn’t enjoy them. If you have something that you want to share, there’s no reason you shouldn’t do that. Technology has made everything so accessible, and if you care about something, chances are others care about that as well.

Source: Google LatLong


Google helps Switchboard support UK LGBT+ communities

Every February people across the UK celebrate LGBT+ History Month, raising awareness about  LGBT+ communities. Based in London, Switchboard LGBT+ Helpline has supported LGBT+ people since the 1970s, just a few years after the partial decriminalization of homosexuality in the UK. Since then, they’ve witnessed and shaped many more milestones of UK LGBT+ history, helping millions of people. 

As an entirely volunteer-led organization, Switchboard keeps its phone lines open every day from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. (yes, even during the holidays!), and offers additional support on email and text. Volunteers are there to listen and assist callers, offering a safe space for anyone to discuss what’s on their mind, including sexuality, gender identity, sexual health, and emotional wellbeing. No matter where you are, no matter how you identify, you can call Switchboard and speak openly, in confidence, without any judgment. 

Running an always-on program with more than 200 volunteers on a small budget requires the right tools. Volunteers need to be trained and prepared—calls can be emotionally challenging, and many topics require detailed, in-depth knowledge. For this reason, Switchboard consolidates all their training securely into Google Drive and gives every volunteer access via their own G Suite for Nonprofits account. “As an organization we try to move with the evolving nature of culture, education, and society, and G Suite for Nonprofits has really helped us to do that,'' says Tash Walker, Co-Chair. Watch the video to learn more about Switchboard’s impact and how they use G Suite and other Google for Nonprofits products to offer high quality, reliable services to the LGBT+ community. 

Meet Kwara, a startup in the new Africa Immersion program

At Google for Startups, we look for ways to support promising new companies around the world. But those companies usually stay put in their home regions, which can be limiting—it means a smaller network of expertise to draw on, and a restricted pool of venture capital investors. We wanted to see what might happen if we expanded the geographical horizon, and connected up-and-coming businesses in one region with well-honed resources from a different region.


So in September, Google for Startups UK launched our first-ever Africa Immersion cohort, a 12-week program to bring expertise from Google and London startups to tech startups from Africa. We chose ten startups from our Launchpad Africa program, a network of tech startups around the world, who can share learnings, support and do business with each other. We wrapped up last week in Lagos, where we brought key investors from the UK to meet with the founders. 


To get a behind-the-scenes view of the Africa Immersion cohort, we chatted with Cynthia Wandia, co-founder and CEO of Kwara, an online and mobile banking platform for financial cooperatives (also known as credit unions and community banks).

First, what does Kwara do?


We provide secure, simple and affordable online and mobile banking for cooperative financial institutions and their members, who are often excluded by traditional banks. Starting in Kenya, our mission is to make sure that these institutions can meet their members’ financial needs instantly, helping them avoid expensive predatory alternatives.

Two Kwara team members smiling

Team Kwara: Austin Kabiru, Software Engineer, and Cynthia Wandia, Cofounder & CEO

How did you get started—where did the idea come from?

The idea started from the view that small-scale cash crop farmers should be able to command more value for their produce. As most farmers rely on the cooperative for their primary financial needs, we decided to strengthen the cooperatives by making them more secure, transparent and investible.

Who are your customers? What does your company do for them?

Our first sector is financial cooperatives, also known as credit unions and community banks. Our technology helps them acquire and retain more members, secure their members’ funds, and increase their own revenues. Members in turn benefit from increased convenience, transparency, peace of mind and more complete credit profiles. And since we link our banking platform to the formal financial sector, the members can also access shared channels such as ATM networks and widespread agent infrastructure.

Why did you decide to participate in the Africa Immersion program?

We were first connected to Google through Launchpad, a three-month accelerator program that provides early-stage startups with access to Google technology, mentorship and workshops on growing their businesses. Before Launchpad, we had acquired some customers who were willing to try out our product while it was still in an early testing stage, and we were making sure that we really could solve all the problems we wanted to address. Launchpad helped us focus on a single product and user, and define our tech team responsibilities. And the Google brand gave us added credibility with potential customers. We also benefited immensely from the lessons and experiences that other startups shared with us. So we were keen to participate in another Google program, specifically one that sought to open up new investor networks to us, as well as continue to introduce us to a peer group of admirable startups from all over the continent. 

Is there a moment or event from the program that particularly stands out to you?

Access to the Google for Startups UK team who have an extensive network and are very open to share has been the highlight. We have been linked with experts in product, fundraising and marketing, both from within Google and from leading startups in the UK.

What do you hope will come out of the program?

We hope to align with a few like-minded investors to start conversations about our next funding round. We also hope to continue our mentorship with the Google for Startups team, and hopefully speed up our marketing efforts.