We’re kicking off our first accelerator for the Middle East and Africa region by welcoming the inaugural Google for Startups Accelerator: Climate Change cohort, our new class of deep tech, climate-focused startups in the Middle East and Sub-Saharan Africa region.

The cohort begins with a bootcamp week, and we are excited to invite 11 startups for this exclusive week-long event. The bootcamp is focused on providing a comprehensive and immersive experience designed to empower and elevate the 11 startups founded in climate change initiatives with the right guidance, mentorship, skill-building and networking opportunities.

Meet the startups (in alphabetical order):

• ArabiaWeather (Amman) is a leading climate technology and weather intelligence company empowering industries and governments with accurate and innovative weather solutions.
• CarbonSifr (United Arab Emirates) empowers every person and organization in our region to take tangible climate action.
• Ecording (Turkey) is a social enterprise that develops sustainable and innovative environmental technologies against the global climate crisis.
• IWROBOTX (Turkey) provides Autonomous Sea Cleaning Robots & Vessels.
• Nadeera (Beirut) is a social enterprise that helps instill circular economy practices through technology-enabled interventions.
• NeedEnergy (Zimbabwe) uses Data Intelligence to Provide Smart and Clean Energy Solutions. Our goal is simple – provide effective, intelligent solutions to Africa’s growing energy demands.
• Octavia Carbon (Nairobi) designs, builds and is set to deploy at-scale DAC machines that can directly capture CO2 from the atmosphere in the Kenyan Rift.
• Based in Tunisia, Seabex’s AI-driven sensorless precision irrigation solution empowers farmers with actionable insights for water-efficient crop growth.
• Sentra.world (United Arab Emirates) is a SaaS platform powering ESG/ decarbonization for industrial businesses enabled by AI & blockchain
• SolarTaxi (Ghana) seeks to advance the growth and adoption of sustainable transportation through the provision of locally assembled electric vehicles.
• Uvera created a technology that can increase the shelf-life of fresh foods within 30 seconds, without any use of chemicals and without altering the sensory qualities of fresh foods, such as smell, texture, color and taste.

It’s an exciting opportunity to work with these founders and startup teams to help grow and scale their business in this space. Programming for the Google for Startups Accelerator: Climate Change begins in mid-September and concludes with a demo day in Dubai in November, just before COP28. We can’t wait to see what role these startups will play in the circular economy. Visit Google for Startups to learn more about the program.