Tag: startup nation

Israel has the #2 startup ecosystem in the World according to new report

Nov 23, 2012 | ,

Startup Genome just released the Startup Ecosystem Report. The report (which you can download here) contains the first data-driven Ranking of the World’s Top 20 Startup Ecosystems and  a deep dive into the each of the individual Startup Ecosystems Here are the top 20, in order: Silicon Valley Tel Aviv << Israel is #2 in the world Los Angeles Seattle New York City Boston London Toronto Vancouver Chicago Paris Sydney Sao Paulo Moscow Berlin Waterloo (Canada) Singapore Melbourne Bangalore Santiago How Israel’s startups stack up The report uses Silicon Valley as the index — a perfect 100 score. Israel ranks #2 in the world when compared to Silicon Value for the strength of its startup ecosystem. Israel ranks this high globally because “it has the 2nd highest output index of startups with a healthy funnel of startups across the developmental lifecycle, a highly developed finding ecosystem, a strong entrepreneurial culture, a vibrant support ecosystem, and a plentiful supply of talent”. Where Israel is strong as a startup culture According to the report, Israel has a similarly educated entrepreneurial community (40% with Masters/PhD vs 42% in Silicon Valley). Startups...

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Who invests in Israel?

Who invests in Israel?

Nov 20, 2012 | ,

Investing is Israel has become more popular ever since Warren Buffett, the world’s most prominent investor, started investing in Israel. Buffett is known not to invest on foreign countries, but he too sees the promise in Israel. In May of 2006, Buffett bought Iscar, an Israeli metalworking company, for $4 billion. This marked the most Buffett ever paid for a foreign investment. In fact, this was Berkshire Heathway’s first ever purchase of a non-American company. Since that investment, Buffett has called Israel the best place to invest and has said “We’re interested in more investments in Israel.” Here are some other notable investments by American businesses: Stanley Black & Decker’s CEO John F. Lundgren bought AeroScout, an Israeli company that created chips to track objects over the internet, for $240 million Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg bought Face.com, facial recognition software, for $60 million. Zuckerberg also bought Snaptu, an Israeli internet design company, for $70 Million IBM’s CEO Ginni Rometty invested in Worklight, an Israeli IT and Enterprise Software company, for $95 million Microsoft’s CEO Steve Ballmer invested an R&D center...

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Does conflict halt Israel’s growth?

Does conflict halt Israel’s growth?

Nov 19, 2012 |

In the book, “Start-Up Nation,” there is an entire chapter talking about the Israeli mindset; how terrorism and war never affects work ethic. Intel has a few D&P centers in Israel. During a rain of rockets fired near one of the centers during the Second Intifada, the Israeli workers continued work as normal, stopping only to seek shelter from the rockets. The book considers this as part of the reason why Intel is so successful, being that Israel has a huge percentage of the company’s profits. In 2005, Intel Israel exported $1.2 billion, over 14 percent of Israel’s sum total of exports. The Israeli workplace was never closed. That is the essence of the Israeli work ethic. It is a common misconception that war halts this country’s GDP. Israel has seen tremendous growth in its GDP since the last war, and is growing exponentially. The last time I saw a chart with this kind of growth was my weight gain since 8th grade.  Notice that in 2012, with a GDP growth of $25 billion dollars, Israel was hit...

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500Startups, Geeks on a Plane, and OurCrowd

500Startups, Geeks on a Plane, and OurCrowd

Nov 13, 2012 |

Last week, we had the pleasure of hosting dinner for Dave McClure and his coterie of geeks from his Geeks on a Plane (#GOAP) trips. It was the first time GOAP visited the Middle East and we heard from many attendees that they plan to come back quickly and often. From the 500Startups crew, Dave attended along with new partner, Shai Goldman and super-duper events superwoman, Sheila Goodman. We’re happy to have met with Dave and his merry band of startup entrepreneurs to talk about investing and building companies in the Startup Nation. We’d love to hear from all of you and get your insights from your travels once you return. Looking forward to doing it...

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Fine, but what’s the sequel to “Startup Nation”?

Fine, but what’s the sequel to “Startup Nation”?

Oct 21, 2012 |

We’re not too proud to admit it: the book, Startup Nation is pretty darn similar to our worldview at OurCrowd. Israel is a country brimming with ideas and aspirations. Combined with a little chutzpa and you’ve got a great petri dish of startup goodness. I think many of us are familiar with what makes Israel such an interesting and compelling destination for investing dollars. But what happens after Startup Nation? What are the challenged faced by startups after they’ve raised their first rounds of money? Case study: New Dimension Software and Roni Einav That question is addressed square-on in an article today on the Times of Israel. The article profiles Roni Einav, founder of New Dimension Software which was ultimately sold to BMC for $675M. Thankfully for us, Einav has written a new book cataloguing his experiences, From Nordeau to Nasdaq. Unlike Startup Nation, though, which focuses on the big picture opportunity of investing in Israel, Einav’s new book addresses the skills required to ride the startup roller coaster. [bra_blockquote align=”right”]”Nordau to Nasdaq is not the ‘bad news’ antithesis of...

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