Google is joining forces with the European Investment Fund and two other organisations to provide funding worth $75 million to small and medium sized businesses suffering from the coronavirus impact. The funding will target small and medium sized businesses in Latin America.
It is reported that the funds are a part of an $800 million initiative that was announced last March. The funds were designed to cope with the coronavirus pandemic. The technology giant announced that it will invest in two European Investment Funds. It will provide $15 million in loan capital to 1,000 European small businesses. Additionally, it will invest $10 million in European Investment Fund’s venture capital fund that is backing 200 life sciences companies.
The European Investment Fund belongs to the European Investment Bank group, which is a lending arm of the European Union. Google and the Inter-American Development Bank will work together to allocate $8 million for small companies in Latin America, media reports said.
Juan Rajlin, treasurer of Alphabet and Google, said in a blog post, “We have partnered with two innovative government-sponsored investment initiatives, with the belief that public-private partnerships can provide creative solutions to meet the needs of small businesses in this critical time.”
According to the blog post, allocation of $8 million to small businesses will help to increase capital available in the region. By the numbers, it is reported that two out of three people in the region are employed by small businesses. In the US, Google had collaborated with the Opportunity Finance Network which played a part in extending Grow with Google Small Business Fund’s interest loans worth $90 million.