GCIP Ukraine 2.0
A programme building the future of Ukraine's cleantech industry: from mentoring and grants to regulatory change and access to the global market. Part of the international UNIDO and GEF network spanning 17 countries.
The national phase of a global programme
GCIP Ukraine 2.0 is the Ukrainian phase of the Global Cleantech Innovation Programme, run since 2014 by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) with support from the Global Environment Facility (GEF). Globally, the programme has already supported over 1,650 companies and trained more than 500 experts across 17 countries in Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America. In Ukraine, the second phase has been run since 2025 by Greencubator, the country's largest cleantech accelerator with 17 years of experience.
Our goal: to speed up Ukraine's transition to clean technologies. To help startups grow and attract investment, build a strong ecosystem around them, and spread the knowledge that makes each next team stronger than the one before.
Three components of the programme
Acceleration is only one of them. The second changes the conditions teams work in, the third makes each next team's experience stronger than the one before.
Startup acceleration
From first product to market entry: mentoring, grants up to $20,000, meetings with investors.
Ecosystem development
Working with government and business on regulations and partnerships for Ukraine's leadership in European cleantech.
Knowledge management
Collecting and sharing the team's research, methodologies, and practical experience.
Component 1Acceleration
The GCIP 2 Ukraine acceleration programmes are a complete system for developing Ukrainian cleantech startups and SMEs. They cover three interconnected support formats: pre-acceleration, Advanced Acceleration, and post-acceleration. Each one matches a specific stage of a team's development and helps it move step by step from a promising idea to a business ready to scale.
Pre-acceleration designed for teams that have a prototype but are still working on the product and business model. At this stage, participants validate market needs, refine their value proposition, develop their MVP, and prepare for further growth.
Advanced Acceleration designed for startups with a developed solution, an MVP, first customers or sales. Its focus is technology commercialisation, strengthening the business model, raising investment and market readiness, growing sales, and preparing to enter international markets.
Post-acceleration continues supporting teams after the main cycle. It helps them move from a formed strategy to practical scaling: improving the product, going through technology verification, and preparing to raise funding, build partnerships, and enter new markets.
A team joins whichever cycle matches its actual level of readiness. This is how GCIP builds a continuous development path, from idea to a competitive cleantech business.
Five months of training
A structured programme built around the company's real growth needs, not around abstract theory.
Grants up to $20,000
Grant funding for the best teams based on programme results.
InvestorConnect
Organised meetings with investors and corporate partners, open to all programme participants, not just finalists. This is a cross-programme initiative from Greencubator, available to participants of our other programmes too.
Personal mentoring
One-on-one business strategy consultations from a panel of 20+ experts: lawyers, strategists, sustainability specialists, investors.
Programme experts and mentors
Teams that have already been through acceleration
Products from GCIP graduates aren't just promising ideas, they are real cleantech products built for business, cities, and people. Browse the slider and meet the Ukrainian technologies already cutting resource use, reducing environmental impact, and shaping the economy of the future.
![Product display from Re[Sens]](/images/programs/gcip/products/resens.jpg)
People who change the world
Demo day, certificate ceremony, and Cleantech Sunday, where whole families come. Photos from 2025.
GCIP acceleration is not just knowledge, mentorship, and business development. It's a community of entrepreneurs, experts, and partners united by the drive to create real change: supporting one another, growing together, and celebrating shared wins.
Component 2Cleantech ecosystem development
Component 2 of GCIP Ukraine 2.0 is aimed at creating favourable conditions in Ukraine for the development, financing, and scaling of innovative clean technologies.
We work on the systemic barriers that slow the path of promising developments from technology to practical deployment: complex regulation, a lack of early financing, limited access to labs, testing, and certification, and insufficient interaction among ecosystem participants.
GCIP brings together government, business, research institutions, investors, and entrepreneurship support organisations around practical solutions for the development of Ukrainian cleantech.
Studying the barriers
We analyse the regulatory environment, access to financing, infrastructure, testing, certification, and other resources cleantech companies need to grow.
Shaping practical solutions
We develop policy recommendations and a roadmap for implementing them, taking into account Ukrainian realities and international experience.
Bringing the ecosystem together
We bring startups, investors, government bodies, researchers, and experts together to discuss and test the proposed solutions.
Strengthening institutions
We run consultations, training, and working sessions for organisations that influence the development and financing of clean technologies.
From research to implementation
- Analysing the environmentStudying Ukraine's cleantech ecosystem, government policy, and the main barriers.
- Consultations with market participantsInterviews, working meetings, and discussions with startups, government, investors, academia, and experts.
- Recommendations and a roadmapIdentifying priority mechanisms and practical steps to implement them.
- Building capacityTraining events, working sessions, and support for institutions able to implement the proposed solutions.
GCIP's recommendations are not formed in isolation. Representatives of government, startups, the investment community, academia, civil society, and the expert community are all involved.
The methodology is based on Cleantech Group's international experience, but all solutions are tested and adapted to the Ukrainian context. Gender equality and youth engagement are built into Component 2's research, consultations, recommendations, and training. This helps create policies and programmes that account for different experiences and open up more opportunities for women and young innovators in cleantech.
Systemic change creates an environment where Ukrainian clean technologies can grow faster, attract investment, and enter new markets. Soon we'll be ready to share the roadmap of 13 policy mechanisms recommended for implementation in the Ukrainian environment. Stay tuned.
Component 3Knowledge management
Component 3 of GCIP Ukraine 2.0 turns the experience of running the programme into knowledge available to startups, experts, government bodies, investors, and other members of the cleantech ecosystem.
We systematise research, methodologies, analytical materials, and practical findings, track the programme's results, and create opportunities for sharing experience in Ukraine and internationally.
Research and analytics
We collect and analyse data on Ukraine's cleantech ecosystem, startup development, investment needs, policy, and programme results.
Methodologies and practical materials
We adapt GCIP's international approaches to the Ukrainian context and create guides, tools, and recommendations for startups, mentors, experts, and entrepreneurship support organisations.
Measuring and sharing impact
We track teams' progress, programme results, and the impact of cleantech solutions, turning the data into reports, success stories, analytical materials, and practical findings.
International representation
We help Ukrainian cleantech teams present their startups at industry events in Ukraine and abroad, and find new contacts, partnerships, and opportunities for growth.
GCIP's research, methodologies, and practical materials are created so the programme's experience can be used by the wider ecosystem.
International representationUkraine on GCIP's global stage
Taking part in GCIP opens up opportunities for Ukrainian cleantech teams to reach beyond the local ecosystem and present their solutions to a wider professional audience.
We invite programme participants and graduates to industry events in Ukraine and abroad, in Istanbul, Vienna, Baku, and other cities where representatives of the global cleantech community, investors, international organisations, experts, and technology companies meet.
The GCIP team aims to give startups the best possible conditions to take part: helping them prepare a presentation, showcase their product, join professional discussions, meet potential partners, and become part of an international network of innovators.
For Ukrainian teams, this is more than a chance to talk about their startup. It's an opportunity to see the global market, test their own ambitions, find new points of growth, and make Ukrainian clean technologies visible to the world.
What companies who went through the acceleration say
«We'd been through various incubators and accelerators, but here it all came together: the right information at the right moment. Marketing, sales, pitch preparation, legal, everything mattered. In every block there was something useful specifically for our company. I'm convinced we were in the right place at the right time.»
«Taking part in the programme was a turning point for our startup: we went from a lab experiment to a structured "green" business. An important achievement was introducing an environmental impact accounting system, which became our competitive edge when working with B2B partners.»
«This accelerator was exactly the push we needed, not just to absorb information but to turn it into action right away. Thanks to the programme we shaped a clear value proposition, product line, and market strategy, prepared a professional pitch, and signed our first client.»
«Thanks to meetings with experts, and especially working with a personal mentor, we significantly strengthened our pitch deck, better understood our strengths, and learned to communicate effectively with future partners and investors.»
«Every block changed our analytics, both marketing and sales. We realised our CRM was weak and are already testing a new one. The whole programme brought a lot more structure to us and gave us a new perspective on our processes.»
«For us, it was especially valuable to see new possibilities and learn to think asymmetrically, to realise our technology has far more potential than just the end product. And probably most important of all was the community and the new contacts with participants from different fields.»
No acceleration round is open right now
There are no open acceleration rounds at the moment, but we will gladly let you know when they open. In the meantime you can: