Google has launched its new startup accelerator program which aims to help about 20 startups led by women founders in India. Google says the program will help the startup founders address challenges unique to their experience, which primarily includes fundraising and hiring among others.

The program for women-focused founders will have two cohorts for this year and each cohort will support 20 women founders. The application for the first cohort for this program will begin today and Google will select 20 women-led startups for the program.

The programme will place special focus on areas like access to networks, access to capital, hiring challenges, mentorship and many others which, for a variety of social reasons and low representation, prove challenging for female founders.

In addition to these, the curriculum will include workshops and support around AI/ML, Cloud, UX, android, web, product strategy and growth, as well as provide access to a global community of women founders. Google mentioned that the applications for the programme are open till July 10.

So why has Google set up this new programme? India is the world’s third largest startup capital, trailing only the US and China. It boasts over a 100 unicorns with 22 getting added to the list just in 2022, spanning verticals such as e-commerce, health tech, fintech and many others.

However, only 15 per cent of these Indian unicorns have one or more women founders.

“The new programme is part of a larger effort by Google towards improving the representation of women across different sections of India’s digitally-trained workforce, be it entrepreneurship, professionals looking to upskill or young graduates seeking a head start on their career, with the ultimate objective of making technology universally relevant and helpful,” the search giant highlighted in a blogpost.