Google.org, the company’s philanthropic arm, announced today that it will donate $1 million (R15.3 million) to programs that help women entrepreneurs grow their businesses, as part of a series of new initiatives aimed at supporting women-owned businesses.

According to Mojolaoluwa Aderemi Makinde, Head Brand and Reputation, Africa – Google, “research shows that 58 percent of small and medium-sized business (SMB) entrepreneurs in Africa are women.”

“Despite this, women-owned businesses earn 34% less than men-owned businesses on average.” They are also less likely to be funded and invested in. This is why we are announcing a series of initiatives today aimed at providing women with the assistance they require to grow their businesses.”

#LookMeUp

In addition to the funding announcement, Google has launched #LookMeUp, a campaign to highlight and tell the stories of female entrepreneurs.

These stories feature women like Vivian Nwakah in Nigeria, who founded Medsaf, a pharmaceutical supply chain solution to help Nigerians gain access to quality pharmaceutical health care services, Mary Mwange, CEO and founder of Data Integrated, who is driving innovation in the mobile payments sector in Nairobi, Kenya, and Mosa Mkhize in South Africa, who founded Origins Publishers to provide books in their home languages to her children and others like them.

“Google is also providing free tools to help women entrepreneurs grow their businesses, and has launched an intensive program to drive the discovery of women-owned businesses through Google Business Profiles,” Makinde explains.

These tools include Google Business Profile, which assists businesses in creating a free webpage to help them be found online, and Primer, an app-based skills-building platform that allows business owners to access a series of free, custom-designed, bite-sized lessons on the go.

Google has also dedicated the March cohort of the Hustle Academy to women-owned SMBs in order to assist them in developing their skills. The Hustle Academy, which debuted last month, is a free, week-long boot camp designed to help small and medium-sized businesses gain the expertise they need to grow.

For more info, or to register for #LookMeUp events, visit lookmeupevent.com.