Tag: BioTech

In the News: Startups Equipped to Combat the Coronavirus

In the News: Startups Equipped to Combat the Coronavirus

Mar 23, 2020 |

It’s been another intense week as the global community continues to combat the coronavirus pandemic. I am proud of my team, working day and night to support our companies playing a part in this effort, mobilize our global community to join that effort in fighting the pandemic, and to identify selective opportunities to get in front of it. Read more about how OurCrowd is working through this period in my interview with CTech. I highly recommend you watch the recording of the webinar we held last week, where, joined by members of our executive team, I shared our insider view into the impact of coronavirus on startups, implications for the market, portfolio companies fighting the battle, and OurCrowd’s next steps. We plan on maintaining strong connectivity with our community and holding various more webinars in the near future – stay tuned on that. Furthermore, I believe that great companies are built in downturns and technology has a great role to play in solving and helping us get through this crisis. “From diagnosis, mitigation, patient tracking, contamination prevention, and protecting medical staff, to education and exercise...

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In the News: Join our Wednesday Webinar on coronavirus: Challenges & Innovation in the tech sector

In the News: Join our Wednesday Webinar on coronavirus: Challenges & Innovation in the tech sector

Mar 18, 2020 |

Alongside governments around the globe, Israel is taking strict social distancing measures in the face of the COVID-19 global health emergency. The startup nation is also utilizing its strengths to tackle the coronavirus – read about Israel’s ingenuity in response to the pandemic. To remind you, I will be hosting a webinar this Wednesday, March 18th at 6 PM Israel, 12 PM New York, 9 AM San Francisco, alongside OurCrowd’s medical venture partner Morris Laster, about the impact of coronavirus on startups, how some startups are fighting back, and what steps we are taking as OurCrowd. Click here or to register for the webinar. On a positive note, we are often blown away by the stories of success that our startups bring and this one no less so: Will Irwin had suffered from Essential Tremor for more than 2 decades when he heard about the Israeli startup, Insightec. He reached out to a colleague, Jonathan Wiesen, who sits on the OurCrowd Medical Advisory board, and the rest is history. Watch this video for their moving story. Startup Nation and Beyond We are proud to have...

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In the News: The impact of coronavirus on startups & OurCrowd’s next steps

In the News: The impact of coronavirus on startups & OurCrowd’s next steps

Mar 9, 2020 |

As the global community comes together to combat the coronavirus, our thoughts are with those directly and indirectly affected. Israel has taken an active role in trying to prevent the spread of the virus and has reduced potential exposure in various ways. Read here how Israeli research groups are hard at work on a vaccine. OurCrowd is maintaining close contact with our portfolio and network to provide guidance in navigating this crisis. See here a note that Sequoia sent its founders and CEOs regarding the current situation. Join me for a webinar next Wednesday, March 18th at 6 PM Israel, 12 PM New York, 9 AM San Francisco, about the impact of coronavirus on startups, how some startups are fighting back, and what steps we are taking as OurCrowd. Click here “From healthcare to transportation; artificial intelligence to agriculture and food and fighting fires in Australia to protection from missiles, OurCrowd is saving and improving lives.” Have a look at this piece – From cancer to coronavirus, OurCrowd innovates for humanity. Up until the coronavirus outbreak, Israeli tech companies were off to a promising start, as they raised over...

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Helping Change Lives: BioMed Innovation in the Startup Nation

Helping Change Lives: BioMed Innovation in the Startup Nation

Apr 18, 2013 | ,

And The Blind Shall See Again Ever wonder what causes the gradual onset of blindness? While invasive techniques do exist to combat diseases that result in blindness, wouldn’t it be nice if there was some way to deal with these diseases that didn’t involve cutting our eyes open? Well, Professor Shy Shoham and his team at the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the Technion felt so—and it seems they are on their way to developing a non-invasive solution to degenerative retinal diseases. So how does this thing work? Without getting too far into the particulars, the retina is to the eye as film is to the camera and degenerative retinal disease causes the eye’s “film” to be less sensitive to light, thus affecting vision. To help the retinal cells regain the necessary sensitivity to light required for vision, light-sensitive algae or bacteria are introduced into the eyes. Using holography, Shoham stimulates the retinal cells with very intense beams of light to specific cells, providing a high-resolution image. The team at the Technion hopes to develop some sort of prosthetic...

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