Hope for Israeli Startups
Filed under: Business, design, General, Medical Breakthroughs, Technology
Tivo, Skype, Java, and other technologies that we now wonder how we did without – all of them were first displayed and demonstrated at the world’s premier hi-tech show, DEMO. Being able to present at DEMO is a prestigious accomplishment, and in order to get in, you’ve got to have something special.
This year, there are ten slots for Israeli companies at DEMO ’09, and the lucky companies chosen to present this year – out of 300 applicants! – will be announced this Monday in Tel Aviv (yours truly has been invited to check it out). Those going on to the show (this year being held in Palm Springs, March 1-3) are practically guaranteed a shot at the big time (over the past four years, DEMO presenters have raised well over $2.5 billion dollars after the show). Previous Israeli entrants have included, among others, G.ho.st, which gives users a “personal computer” of their own from any terminal in the world, with it’s own operating system and software, and Vringo, which pioneered the business of video ringtones. Attending the show are dozens of computer businesses pros and journalists, as well as angels and VC’s.
Click to see video about DEMO \'09
Speaking of money: Is there any out there for startups anymore? Haven’t all the investors been scared off, after losing their shirts on the stock market and almost every other investment vehicle? Some have, sure. But in recent conversations with a whole raft of entrepreneurs, I’m hearing that there is money out there – and that because of the crisis, they may even have an easier time getting some. With stocks now considered suspect, investors are looking for places to put their money – and startups with good ideas and a good model are more attractive than ever, because they’re seen as a better bet than speculative stocks right now. Of course, that could just be the “happy face” talk they’re putting on to impress me (or reassure themselves) – but there’s a definite logic there. Besides, there’s this company, which just a couple of months ago netted $19 million in VC money. Not a bad take during a recession – or a boom, for that matter!
What Becomes of Ex-Presidents
Filed under: Business, General, Israeliness, Life, Politics
The may not much like soon to be former President George Bush in the U.S. – or in Iraq – and now that he’s leaving office, he may have a future in Israel – with his name emblazoned in lights on a business!
Most people will remember that Bush received a very high approval rating among Israelis when he came here at the beginning of 2008. Now, with Bush ready to leave office, Israeli commentators will be coming out with articles like this one looking back with nostalgia at the positive relationship between Israel and Bush.
Tough on the outside but sweet on the inside, Israelis are actually very sentimental – and have a good business sense, as well. So the chances of some ingenious Israeli adopting the name “Bush” for their business are good (maybe for a gardening service?). Admittedly, “Coffee Annan,” named after former UN Secretary Kofi Annan, was too obvious not to do something with. But other than having eaten it, Bill Clinton had little if anything to do with pizza – but that didn’t stop this Jerusalem entrepreneur from using the ex-president’s name to promote his slices. And chances are business will improve dramatically now that Hillary is going to be Secretary of State!
Year of ideas
The future to our economic woes - the penalty kick
The New York Times Magazine has published its ‘Year in Ideas’ for 2008 - an alphabetic listing of some of the most riveting developments in the fields of research, science and technology -”and deemed fit to include at least two ideas borne from the Sabra kopf.
The first accomplishment is the first-ever forensic dog-poop DNA unit being used in Petah Tikva to identify which dogs are pooping on the streets and which owners are to blame. Harry wrote all about it here on Israelity, out-pooping.. er, out-scooping the Times by three months.
The second shout out to Israeli research derives from our oasis in the south – Ben-Gurion University of Negev – where researchers from the Guilford Glazer School of Business and Management published a paper titled, “Action Bias Among Elite Soccer Goalkeepers: The Case of Penalty Kicks,” in the Journal of Economic Psychology earlier this year.
According to the researchers, and the Times, the BGU team may have some prescient advice for these tough economic times. Under the heading of “G” for “Goalkeeper Science,” the Times highlighted the work which analyzed 286 penalty kicks and found that 94 percent of the time the goalies dived to the right or the left – even though the chances of stopping the ball were highest when the goalie stayed in the center.
“Judgment and decision-making are very important for the understanding of economies, governments and businesses. Because decision-making processes in different contexts often share the same characteristics and biases, we can sometimes examine behavior is sports (where it is relatively easy to observe and where players have huge incentives to make the right choices) and learn from it about human behavior and decision-making more generally,” the researchers explained.
The Times remarked on the academics’ finding that suggests that goalies prefer to “show that they’re doing something,” rather than to appear passive, and quoted lead BGU author Prof. Michael Bar-Eli as he noted that “during periods of economic turmoil, C.E.O.’s might be tempted to change their corporate strategy, or investment managers to juggle their portfolios, even when staying put is the wisest course”.
Or maybe the optimal advice to be gleaned from the research is that we all should head out to the soccer field and practice our penalty kicks.
Come Say L’Haim At The First Green Drinks In The Middle East
Green Drinks, the loosely organized and phenomenally successful international meeting group for green people of all walks of life, is starting up its first chapter in the Middle East today.
That’s right folks: Be a part of history on Monday night (Dec. 15 — tonight) as Green Drinks TLV holds its inaugural event at the Gilda pub on Ahad Ha’am Street, starting at 8PM.
Open to the public, just walk in and ask someone: “Hey, are you green?” (You might want to try it in Hebrew: “Shalom, ata/at yarok/yeroka”), and you may find yourself engaging in a potentially very interesting conversation with all kinds of people who share your passion for the environment from the tie-wearing politician or clean tech professional all the way to the professional activists who hang out at Salon Mazal.
Who knows, maybe you’ll strike up a new business deal or find the love of your life at one of the regular meet ups?
Seeing that Israelis are far more susceptible to over-eating than over-drinking (should there be organic hummus?), I (as one of the organizers) am not really worried about scraping someone off the floor. But TLV does know how to party. Thanks to Green Drinks, well have a few more environmental partiers out on a weekday. And maybe we’ll make the world a little better while we’re having fun.
For more information please visit the Green Drinks TLV Facebook group.
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