Google Inc. has begun to make good on its commitment to plow a small fraction of the proceeds from its wildly successful stock offering into social investment projects, the company says.
Funding for “good works” will largely be derived from the donation of 1 percent of the equity from last year’s initial public offering, along with 1 percent of its annual profits.
Google said Tuesday it plans to organize its charitable work under the umbrella of a new organization it calls Google.org. The mission is to focus on vast issues like global poverty, energy and the environment.
One of the first recipients, Acumen Fund will get $5 million to fund big anti-poverty and healthcare works through targeted financing of entrepreneurial projects in the developing world.
A $400,000 grant will go to a Kenyan research project conducted by economists from Harvard University and the University of California, seeking the best way to improve rural water quality to prevent a leading cause of death in children.
Technoserve, a global development organization founded in Ghana in 1968, aims to run a business plan competition for entrepreneurs across Ghana and use a $500,000 Google.org grant to support the winning projects, said Luba Vangelova, a spokeswoman for Technoserve based in Washington D.C.
Google officials said Google.org is partly modeled on the Omidyar Network, a new model philanthropy funded by eBay (Research) founder Pierre Omidyar. For more details visit here.