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09 July 2020 Nine hundred million in 5 years to accelerate Italian digitalization. It is Google's investment in Italy, announced by the administrator of Google and Alphabet. In fact, 'Italia in Digitale', a new program dedicated to Italian small and medium-sized enterprises, kicks off.

"Google is proud to be a partner in Italy's economic recovery," comments Sundar Pichai and explains: "To help transform Italian companies large and small, we will invest over $ 900 million in 5 years, which include opening the two Google Cloud Region in partnership with Tim. " The Google project includes a million euros of free advertising to Unioncamere companies. Italian government reactions satisfied. "I welcome this important investment in Italy by Google and Sundar Pichai. Technology and digital innovation are central elements of my government's agenda for the future of our country. We continue like this!", Comments Prime Minister Conte on Twitter, while the Minister of Development Stefano Patuanelli stresses: "It is often repeated that our country is not attractive for investments and that we have fallen behind European competitors on technology transfer. Today Google presents a 900 million investment plan, in Italy, to further push the digitalisation of SMEs. It is a very important project which confirms the centrality of the Italian system in the international panorama ". 

In detail, Google is ready to start training projects, tools and partnerships to support companies and people looking for job opportunities. During the pandemic, the web giant immediately started to collaborate with governments around the world - including Italy - to face the crisis. Through a partnership with the Ministry of Health, for example, it was possible to provide essential information related to Covid-19 on the search engine, on Maps and on YouTube. With the Ministry of Education, on the other hand, the process that allowed millions of Italian students and teachers to continue teaching with distance teaching tools, with closed courses, was accelerated. In addition, Google has distributed advertising credits and grants to Italian small and medium-sized enterprises, government agencies and non-profit associations. Many small businesses have suffered heavily from the crisis, particularly in the tourism, retail and catering sectors. According to research by McKinsey, 60 million job positions are now at risk in Europe. 

The new Google project was born from the experience and success of previous initiatives such as Growing in Digital and Google Digital Training, which in the last five years have helped 500,000 people to obtain the digital skills necessary to relaunch a business or improve their career . Google now plans to help 700,000 other people and small and medium-sized businesses to digitize, with the goal of bringing the total number to over 1 million by the end of 2021. "For many years, Google has been engaged in Italy to spread digital skills. useful for finding a job or growing a business ", comments Fabio Vaccarono, managing director of Google Italy. "If these skills were important before the pandemic - he adds -, they have now become all the more necessary: ​​to overcome the challenges of the present, digitalization is an essential element, to find new job opportunities, to relaunch a company, and to the benefit of the whole society".