Introducing the first cohort of the Google for Startups Accelerator: Women Founders

In a time of so much socio economic uncertainty, one thing is clear: when more women build their own businesses, economies grow. In Canada, only 16% of Canadian small and medium-sized businesses are owned by women. Yet research shows that by advancing gender equality and women’s participation in the economy, Canada could add up to $150 billion in GDP.

In order to provide women with high-quality mentorship opportunities and the support that they need to successfully scale, we launched the first Google for Startups Accelerator for Women Founders, a three-month virtual program for seed to Series A technology startups based in North America.

After receiving hundreds of applications, we’re excited to welcome the below twelve startups into our inaugural cohort, including five Canadian companies from across the country:

• Coconut Software (Saskatoon, Saskatchewan) Customer engagement solutions that modernize how banks and credit unions engage, creating a streamlined experience for both staff and customers
  
  
• COI Energy (Tampa, Florida) Brings together utilities and businesses to detect and eliminate energy waste in buildings to optimize the electric grid - creating a climate friendly economy for future generations to live, work, play and thrive
  
  
• CultivatePeople (Arlington, Virginia) The company’s compensation software, Kamsa, provides global market compensation data and helps companies make data driven pay decisions so they can eliminate pay gaps.
  
  
• CurieAI (Santa Clara, California) Transforming care for respiratory illnesses like Asthma and COPD through AI-based models that help physicians understand respiratory health, disease progression, and treatment effectiveness at an individualized and population level.
  
  
• Fairygodboss (New York City, New York) The largest career community for women and provides free resources like career connections, job listings, virtual recruiting events, community advice, and the hard-to-find information about how companies treat women.
  
  
• Heirlume (Hamilton, Ontario) Making trademark registration as easy and accessible as domain registration by providing the first self-serve professional-quality trademark search and application platform.
  
  
• Kapwing (San Francisco, California) A company on a mission to enable digital storytelling via an online image, video, and GIF editing platform.
  
  
• Livestock Water Recycling (Calgary, Alberta) A machine learning enabled nutrient recovery technology (PLANT) and myPLANT data dashboard creates value for food producers by digitizing their waste outputs, allowing reduced expenses and environmental impact.
  
  
• My Intelligent Machines [MIMs] (Montreal, Quebec) Helping life-science companies use their big data and AI to maximize food and drug production.
  
  
• Possip (Nashville, Tennessee) Using text-message based pulse checks in over 100 languages to allow schools and districts to quickly and routinely hear from their community of families and staff, and act on the insights they learn.
  
  
• Wisy (San Francisco, California) Developing technology to bring digital efficiency into the physical world, supporting consumer products businesses and making them thrive in the new economy.
  
  
• Zennea Technologies (Vancouver, BC) Aiming to be the first clinically-proven medical device for chronic snoring and mild OSA - so people who snore won’t have to worry about ineffective solutions ever again.
  
  
  This cohort brings together a diverse set of women-led startups from across Canada and the US. Collectively, these founders are solving many of the world's largest challenges - from access to education to global environmental sustainability.
  
  We’re proud to support women founders and connect them with the best of Google’s products people and technology. In addition to mentorship and technical project support, the accelerator also includes deep dives and workshops focused on product design, customer acquisition and leadership development for founders. Our cohort will also join our global Google for Startups Women community; a peer-led community of women entrepreneurs from around the world. Accelerator programming begins September 28 - we can’t wait to get started.