2021

Sundar sent the following email to Google employees earlier this morning. The email has been edited to remove internal links. 

Hi everyone,

I hope you are all taking good care. Since the beginning of the pandemic, we’ve put the wellbeing of our Google community front and center. We’ve done this while also taking care of our customers and partners, launching over 200 new products and features to help people and businesses navigate this difficult time. 

In March of 2020, we made the early decision to send employees home to slow down the spread of COVID. Since then, we’ve extended our Carer’s Leave coverage to help employees care for loved ones. We’ve continued to cover the full wages of on campus workers who couldn’t perform their jobs because of office closures. And, we’ve made sure that Googlers and our extended workforce have access to vaccines as soon as they are available locally. Additionally, thanks to the generosity of Googlers and support from Google.org, we’ve helped Gavi to fully vaccinate over 1 million people in low-and middle-income countries globally. 

Even as the virus continues to surge in many parts of the world, it’s encouraging to see very high vaccination rates for our Google community in areas where vaccines are widely available. This is a big reason why we felt comfortable opening some of our offices to employees who wanted to return early. And I have to say it’s been great to see Googlers brainstorming around whiteboards and enjoying meals in cafes again in the many offices that have already re-opened globally. 

Getting vaccinated is one of the most important ways to keep ourselves and our communities healthy in the months ahead. As we look toward a global return to our offices, I wanted to share two key updates:

• First, anyone coming to work on our campuses will need to be vaccinated. We’re rolling this policy out in the U.S. in the coming weeks and will expand to other regions in the coming months. The implementation will vary according to local conditions and regulations, and will not apply until vaccines are widely available in your area. You’ll get guidance from your local leads about how this will affect you, and we’ll also share more details on an exceptions process for those who cannot be vaccinated for medical or other protected reasons.

• Second, we are extending our global voluntary work-from-home policy through October 18.We are excited that we’ve started to re-open our campuses and encourage Googlers who feel safe coming to sites that have already opened to continue doing so. At the same time, we recognize that many Googlers are seeing spikes in their communities caused by the Delta variant and are concerned about returning to the office. This extension will allow us time to ramp back into work while providing flexibility for those who need it. We’ll continue watching the data carefully and let you know at least 30 days in advance before transitioning into our full return to office plans. For those of you with special circumstances, we will soon be sharing expanded temporary work options that will allow you to apply to work from home through the end of 2021. We’re also extending Expanded Carer’s Leave through the end of the year for parents and caregivers.

I know that many of you continue to deal with very challenging circumstances related to the pandemic. While there is much that remains outside of our control, I’m proud of the way we continue to take care of each other while helping people, businesses and communities through these difficult times.  

I hope these steps will give everyone greater peace of mind as offices reopen. Seeing Googlers together in the offices these past few weeks filled me with optimism, and I’m looking forward to brighter days ahead. 

-Sundar

Between 2020 and 2050, Africa’s population is expected to double, adding 950 million more people to its urban areas alone. However, according to 2018 figures, a scarcity of affordable housing in many African cities has forced over half of the city dwellers in Sub-Saharan Africa to live in informal settlements. And in rural areas, many also occupy makeshift structures due to widespread poverty.

These shelters have remained largely undetectable using traditional monitoring tools. Machine learning, computer vision and remote sensing have come some way in recognizing buildings and roads, but when it comes to denser neighborhoods, it becomes much harder to distinguish small and makeshift buildings. 

Why is this an issue? Because when preparing a humanitarian response, forecasting transportation needs, or planning basic services, being able to accurately map the built environment – which allows us to ascertain population density – is absolutely key.

Enter Google’s Open Buildings

Google’s Open Buildings is a new open access dataset containing the locations and geometry of buildings across most of Africa. From Lagos’ Makoko settlement to Dodoma’s refugee camps, millions of previously invisible buildings have popped up in our dataset. This improved building data helps refine the understanding of where people and communities live, providing actionable information for state and non-state actors looking to provide services from sanitation to education and vaccination.

Open Buildings uses AI to provide a digital footprint of buildings. This includes producing polygons with the outlines of at least 500 million buildings across the African continent, the majority of which are less than 20 square meters. The full dataset encompasses 50 countries.

The data provides the exact location and polygon outline of each building, its size, a confidence score for it being detected as a valid building and a Plus Code. There is, however, no information about the type of building, its street address, or any identifying data. We have also excluded sensitive areas such as conflict zones to protect vulnerable populations.

Satellite mapping using AI 

The Open Buildings dataset was generated by using a model trained to detect buildings using satellite imagery from the African continent. The information for the buildings detected is then saved in CSV files which are available to download. The technical details of the Open Buildings dataset, including usage and tutorials, are available on the dataset website and the Google AI blog.

How will this improve planning?

There are many important ways in which this data can be used, including — but not limited to — the following:

Population mapping: Building footprints are a key ingredient for estimating population density. This information is vital to planning for services for communities. 

Humanitarian response: To plan the response to a flood, drought, or other natural disaster.

Environmental science: Knowledge of settlement density is useful for understanding the human impact on the natural environment. 

Addressing systems: In many areas, buildings do not have formal addresses. This can make it difficult for people to access social benefits and economic opportunities. Building footprint data can help with the rollout of digital addressing systems such asPlus Codes.

Vaccination planning: Knowing the density of population and settlements helps to anticipate demand for vaccines and the best locations for facilities. This data is also useful for precision epidemiology, as well as prevention efforts such as mosquito net distribution.

Statistical indicators: Buildings data can be used to help calculate statistical indicators for national planning, such as the numbers of houses in the catchment areas of schools and health centers, mean travel distances to the nearest hospital or demand forecast for transportation systems.

Google’s AI Center in Accra

This project was led by our team at the AI Research Center in Accra, Ghana. The center was launched in 2019 to bring together top machine learning researchers and engineers dedicated to AI research and its applications. The research team has already been improving Google Maps with AI, adding 120 million buildings and 228,000 km of roads across Africa to Maps in the last year. This work is part of our broader AI for Social Good efforts.

The cultural scope of the beautiful Italian Peninsula never ceases to amaze people all over the world. But the possibility of getting to know the traditions and peculiarities of many Italian gems has been drastically reduced since the pandemic hit. Among such treasures is Parma, a delicate city set in the very heart of Italy. Beyond being the capital of iconic food such as Parmigiano and Prosciutto, Parma is a city of incredible cultural heritage that gained the prestigious title of “Italian Capital of Culture for the year 2020” but had to put a year-long calendar of events on hold due to the pandemic. 

Eighteen months later, the city is ready to celebrate its cultural heritage with the world on Google Arts & Culture. The collaboration between the Municipality of Parma and Google brought online the work of 33 institutional partners in the Parma area, including over 17,000 images from the archives of the municipal museums, 30 places digitized with Street View and much more. It’s a  project of true cultural valorization that highlights the magic behind this city.

Travel to Italy from home and check out some of Parma’s wonders. Explore the masterpieces, enjoy the sound of music and get a taste of that Italian cuisine:

1. Deep into a towering dome: Step inside and see the details of a 27-meters-high dome like you’ve never seen before and learn about the artist Correggio’s devotion to the Benedectine congregation.

2. Get your artists in place: Thanks to the Google Art Camera, the online experience faithfully reproduces over 200 masterpieces by international artists such as Picasso, Francis Bacon, Goya, Monet and Tiziano Vecellio but also by Italian artists including Ligabue, De Chirico, Boccioni, Filippo Lippi and Parmigianino.

3. 300,000 bamboo plants: Did you know Parma holds the largest existing labyrinth in the world? Labirinto della Masone was created by the visionary mind of Franco Maria Ricci. It is composed of 300,000 bamboo plants and is considered a magical place, all waiting to be discovered!  

4. Music to your ears: The land of renowned musicians Verdi and Toscanini, Parma is a favorite destination for opera lovers, who can now immerse themselves in a collection of 10,000 stage photographs, sketches and posters from the newly digitized Casa della Musica(literally “House of Music) archives. Several museums are now online, with the goal of bringing the history of sound reproduction to all ears. 

5. No stereotypes when it comes to food: Known worldwide for Parmigiano Reggiano, the digital hub also features the Parmigiano Reggiano Museum to discover all about the history of one of the world’s most loved cheeses. 

6. Did you say Pasta?: “Pasta” is synonymous with Italy so of course the online hub also includes the famous Pasta Museum to virtually transport you from the wheat fields to the traditional Italian household to make pasta. Check it out to truly understand the role that this type of food has played and continues to play in gastronomy, art, culture and in the lives of people around the world.

The journey into the beauty of Parma doesn’t end here. Continue to discover the wonders of the Capital of Culture 2020 and 2021and let yourself be amazed by the art, music and culture of the city.  

Want to continue traveling to Italy from home? Look behind the curtain of one of the world’s greatest and oldest theaters, La Scala Theater in Milan or take a virtual tour of some of Italy’s most iconic sites through the “Wonders of Italy” experience. 

This and so much more, on Google Arts & Culture and on the Google Arts & Culture app foriOS and Android

In 2019, our Quantum AI team achieved a beyond-classical computation by outperforming the world’s fastest classical computer. Today, a quantum processor from the Sycamore generation that accomplished this important computing milestone will be donated to the Deutsches Museum of Masterpieces of Science and Technology in Munich, Germany. 

The Deutsches Museum has one of the largest collections of science and technology artifacts in the world. This means that the Sycamore will share the same exhibition space as some of the world’s most important technological achievements: like the roundest object in the world – a silicon sphere that gives the kilogram a new definition; the Z3, one of the earliest computers; the Wright Flyer, considered the first serial motor plane; and automotive history from the first diesel engine to the Waymo Firefly. The museum has a long history of preserving artifacts that mark the start of new eras in science and technology, which is why we’re honored to have the Sycamore processor among these exhibits. The beyond-classical experiment ushered in a new era for exploring near-term quantum algorithms that could have tangible benefits to society, for example—design more efficient batteries, create fertilizer using less energy, and figure out what molecules might make effective medicines.

This also marks an important milestone in the collaboration between Google Research and Germany’s burgeoning quantum community.  Since Google has a research presence in Munich and Berlin, it has given us the opportunity to partner with several German organisations to explore the future of quantum computing. For example, the Sycamore processor has already been used by some of our industrial research partners, like Volkswagen and Mercedes-Benz, and will be the foundation for experiments designed with Boehringer Ingelheim, Covestro and BASF. 

If you can’t travel to Munich to visit the Deutsches Museum in person, don’t forget that you can take a virtual trip through Google Arts & Culture.

Journalism has always been about bringing communities together, and delivering information that is valuable to them. But traditionally, the most influential outlets have focused on serving the majority, often inadvertently leaving people behind. The result is entire communities who are unable to find quality journalism which reflects their lives and values.

Today, it’s possible for digital publishers to reach local and niche audiences online with journalism readers care about and can see themselves in. Despite this, we know that achieving financial sustainability as a digital news business is often a major challenge.

That’s why we at Media Lab Bayern are partnering with the Google News Initiative and the European Journalism Centre to launch the GNI Startups Lab Europe – an intensive six-month accelerator program designed to help a group of up to 12 early-stage digital news organisations find solid financial footing.

The program has been designed specifically for news startups producing original content, drawing on our team’s collective expertise. This will be the GNI’s fourth Startups Lab, following runs in Brazil, North American and Hispanoamérica. The European Journalism Centre brings their deep domain knowledge and vast network from across the continent. We at Media Lab Bayern will leverage our experience as a media innovation hub for more than 200 European media startups over the past six years. During this time, we have learned how startups can build a sustainable business, with the three most important things to get right being building something your users need, getting the word out and finding a viable business model.

That’s why we have structured the program into three phases:

1. In the first two months we’ll work with the participating teams on their product and team. Which audience do they serve? Which problems do they solve for them? And do they have the resources inside their team to build an amazing product?

2. In the middle months, we provide inspiration on how to grow an audience. Do they have the right marketing strategy? How big is the addressable market?

3. And finally, for the final two months of the program we will help them develop a sustainable business model — something which no company can survive without. How many income streams do they have and what might be unconventional ways to monetize their content? Experimentation will be a key element of this phase, as there is no one-size-fits-all solution. 

The GNI Startups Lab Europe will start this November. You can learn more and apply here; applications are open until September 20, 2021. If you are an early-stage digital news publisher who is passionate about reaching an underserved community then we want to hear from you. 

Together we can build a sustainable future for digital news, so every European who searches for a community can find exactly what they are looking for.

As a middle schooler, Mackenzie Thomas would wake up at 5 a.m. to watch SportsCenter. “I hoped to see my childhood heroes Mia Hamm, Briana Scurry and Lisa Leslie,” she says, “but instead I memorized tons of MLB and NBA scores.” Even then, she saw how differently the media celebrated women athletes compared to men. Now she’s dedicated to driving equity on and off the court. 

Today Mackenzie leads marketing inclusion, and her days are spent asking hard questions and ensuring that Google is focusing on historically underrepresented voices in tech and in media, where only 4% of television sports coverage is dedicated to women’s sports, for example. And she’s a core member of the team responsible for driving Google’s partnership with the WNBA and National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL).  

Fresh off of Google’s sponsorship of the WNBA All-Star Game and presentation of ESPN Film’s latest 30 for 30 documentary featuring Maya Moore — and as we prepare to watch the world’s top athletes compete in Tokyo — we talked to Mackenzie about Google’s efforts to bring equity to sports and what it means to her personally.