Google on Thursday launched its Market Access Program, a new initiative designed to help Indian startups overcome barriers to entering global markets, while also announcing additions to its Gemma open model family.
The announcement comes against the backdrop of Google’s record USD 15-billion investment, unveiled last year, to build an AI infrastructure hub in Andhra Pradesh.
According to the company, the latest launches reinforce its continued investments in India’s physical AI infrastructure, including the Global AI Hub in Visakhapatnam. The facility offers a 1-gigawatt foundation powered by green energy and Google’s advanced AI chips, aimed at ensuring Indian startups gain access to high-performance computing resources.
Google said the Market Access Program would help Indian startups strengthen their go-to-market strategies and shorten the journey from local pilots to global scale.
The company also unveiled new additions to its Gemma open model family, which are tuned to support startups in building population-scale, production-ready AI applications.
"MedGemma 1.5 addresses the growing demand for advanced healthcare AI, enabling startups to work with high-dimensional medical imaging at scale," the release said.
FunctionGemma, meanwhile, is a lightweight model optimised for function calling and supports the next generation of on-device, agent-based systems, enabling AI applications to take secure and reliable action locally.
Google said these models expand the building blocks available to developers creating real-world, deployable solutions.
On the Market Access Program, the company said the initiative is targeted at AI-first startups that have moved beyond the prototype stage and are ready to scale responsibly.
The program is designed to support founders with transformative outcomes, including enterprise readiness through a specialised curriculum on global enterprise selling, complex pricing models and international buyer psychology, along with access to a global network via direct, facilitated introductions to Google’s worldwide network of CIOs and CXOs.
It also includes global immersion programmes in partnership with ecosystem leaders such as TiE Silicon Valley and Alteus, aimed at building in-person relationships in key buyer markets and international technology hubs, the company said.
"Applications for the Google Market Access Program are now open for eligible startups," it added.
Speaking at the launch event, Preeti Lobana, Country Manager for India at Google, said AI is rapidly moving beyond research labs into classrooms, healthcare and hospitals, agriculture, factories, and enterprises of all sizes.
"AI startups are no longer experimenting at the edges, they are turning their capability into products that people use, trust and pay for. This is the point at which models turn into businesses," she said.
