We're a bootstrapped AI startup doing $350K+ revenue and already spending 4-figures monthly on GCP, with our spend growing.
But, because we haven't taken venture funding, we were only approved for $2K in credits instead of the $350K for AI startups that includes Gemini credits.
This feels backwards and frankly regressive; we're a paying startup customer with real revenue, just no institutional money, and Google is going to punish us for that?
I know Azure etc will gladly throw tons of credits and inference our way to switch and save us a ton of money, but switching would be a huge distraction for us for us right now.
However, we go in and out of profitability right now, and I'm self-funding, so even the $2-3K we'd currently save each month would help us stay at break-even so I don't have to dip into my personal bank account each time we're in the red -- and there's not much left in that bank account tbh. Basically, I feel stuck.
Two questions:
- Has anyone gotten an exception as a bootstrapped company?
- Has anyone just... gotten a small check from a friendly investor to technically qualify? Like could I have a VC friend write a $5K SAFE and suddenly be eligible? I like me a good loophole but while this would be an annoying distraction, it's far less annoying than having to migrate off Google entirely.
