Israel Active

Israel’s Firebolt, developer of cloud data warehouses for engineering teams, has just raised $100 million ($1.4 billion valuation) to join the Unicorn club of private companies worth over $1 billion.

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According to consulting firm Harel-Hertz, Japanese firms invested some $2.9 billion across 85 deals in Israeli companies last year, almost triple that in 2020. Japan accounts for 15.8% of all foreign investment in Israeli high-tech, compared just 1.8% in 2016.

(cybersecurity) raised $150 million ($1 billion valuation). (analytics) raised $100 million ($1 billion valuation). (Israeli R&D AI Ops) raised $190 million ($1.2 billion valuation).

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OurCrowd, Israel’s most active venture firm, will host its Virtual Job Fair on Monday, Jan 17 (5-7pm Israel time). The online event will highlight thousands of vacancies across OurCrowd’s portfolio companies. CEOs and HR experts will advise on resumes, interviews, self-marketing, and use of LinkedIn.

Video interview that explains how Israel's army service shapes post-military careers.

The re-opening of Israel for foreign tourists has encouraged foreign airlines to restart their Tel Aviv services. Virgin Atlantic resumes its London UK operation on Jan 20. The airline offers free unlimited date changes, one transfer to a different passenger, plus other benefits.

Despite low occupancy due to Covid, construction of Israeli hotels is at a five year high. Half of the 148,000 sqm being built is in Tel Aviv, with other sites in Jerusalem, the Kinneret, Haifa and the North. The Israeli tourist industry hopes for a speedy return to the record 4.55 million foreign visitors in 2019.

An interesting idea - global index provider MSCI is considering reassigning Israel from the Middle East, to a new region, likely Europe. It would open the door to large amounts of passive inflows for the Israeli capital markets. It would benefit Israel more than when MSCI upgraded Israel to “developed” in 2010.