Applications Open: GNI's North America Innovation Challenge

Jul 21, 2021

As a part of the Google News Initiative’s $300M commitment to help journalism thrive in the digital age, it has launched its third Innovation Challenge in North America.

GNI Innovation Challenges support projects that drive digital innovation, help publishers understand their communities and develop new business models. The GNI funds sets of projects from around the world that meet specified criteria, with the intent of producing learnings that can be shared with the wider industry.

Google is taking a turn this round of the North America Innovation Challenge by calling for projects which focus on a fundamental challenge for local publishers: understanding and serving the needs of your communities. The changes in our digital world requires both a fresh understanding of a community’s needs and an understanding of how to communicate the benefits and values of a news organization back to its community.

As local news organizations strive to address the needs of their communities and attain financial sustainability, this North America Innovation Challenge will support projects that tackle the challenges of better understanding and serving communities to enhance the relationship with their varied audiences. To achieve this, GNI encourages news organizations to further develop learnings about their audiences through rigorous research.

Google will fund selected projects up to $200,000 and will finance up to 70% of the total project cost. Special discretion on the total project cap may be considered by the Jury, depending on the scale and impact of a very large collaborative effort.

Applications remain open until August 26, 2021. More information can be found here.