Google Donates €1 million to the International Mathematical Olympiad

Google is a company run by engineers which prides itself with its technical prowess. While computer science takes precedence, mathematics is almost as important for a company that relies on its algorithms more than anything else.

Add to this a tradition of donations to educational and scientific pursuits and its latest move is hardly surprising. Google has announced that it will be donating €1 million to the International Mathematical Olympiad organization.

The money will be enough to fund the next five editions of the annual competition for gifted high school kids. With the funding, the financial burden on the organizing countries should be significantly lower.

"Maths is very important to Google. It’s the basis of everything we do: from the algorithms that deliver answers to your search queries, to the way in which your Gmails are grouped in conversations, to the technology advances which are enabling us to develop driverless cars," Simon Hampton, Director of Public Policy at Google, writes.

"It’s so important to us, that our founders named the company after a very large number - a Googol," he continued.

"And so yesterday, together with the Advisory Board of the International Mathematical Olympiad, we were proud to announce that we are making a gift of one million euros to the organisation to help cover the costs of the next five global events (2011-15)," he announced.

The International Mathematical Olympiad is the oldest of the International Science Olympiads and has been held each year since 1959, except in 1980. It was first held in Romania with seven countries participating and has since grown to include almost 100 countries.

Each year the competition takes place in a different country and the organizers are responsible for the funding. With Google's help though, things are set for the next five years even though the organizers for the 2013 edition and beyond haven't even been picked yet.