Israel Active

I reported previously that United Airlines increased their direct service between Tel Aviv and San Francisco to a daily schedule.  Now El Al have announced they are to launch a 3-times-a-week direct service between the two leading technology hubs later this year.

Israel’s tallest building - the 238m Azrieli Sarona tower in Tel Aviv - is near completion, but already on two of its top 61 floors Israel’s Teddy Sagi Group has launched Labs - its shared office venture. Labs will have offices, meeting rooms, shared workspaces, a convention hall, studio, projection room, lounge and a gym.

Israel’s Powermat has partnered with Regus Israel, supplying wireless charging services to Israeli co-working offices. Regus is the world's largest provider of flexible workspace solutions. Regus has 15 co-working locations in Israel, mostly in Tel Aviv and Herzliya.

Israel-based Boom25 offers a unique opportunity for UK shoppers who purchase from any of the 600 retailers affiliated to Boom25’s website. Every 25th purchaser gets their purchase money back.  Its an alternative to accumulating points.

I wrote previously about Israel’s SuperMeat which is developing lab-produced meat from animal cells. SuperMeat has just raised $3 million and plans to bring its “clean chicken” products to market within three years, at a price similar to current conventional chicken products.

I reported previously in 2014 that Forbes predicted that Israel’s Kaltura was most likely to be “one of the next billion-dollar exits” thanks to its wide-ranging video solutions platform. Well guess what - Kaltura is planning a 2018 launch on NASDAQ, at a value of $1 billion.

Israel has broken all previous records for incoming tourism, and are set to end 2017 with 3.6 million tourists - half a million more than the previous record. It includes a 20% increase over the 120,000 Christian pilgrims who visited in Dec 2016.

The Israel Airports Authority has announced a $1.43 billion plan to upgrade Israel’s main Ben Gurion airport to cope with an anticipated 50% increase in passenger turnover within the next five years. The airport exceeded 20 million passengers in 2017 – 18% up on 2016.

Ambassador Yoram Ettinger gives a very upbeat end of year state of the Israeli economy. It includes Israel’s progress since 1987 from the new book “Israel – Island of Success” by Dr Adam Reuter and Noga Kainan.

The Israeli Ministry for the Development of the Negev and Galilee is investing $25.5 million (NIS 90 million) in the establishment of 45 co-working tech hubs in Israel’s peripheral regions. The ministry said they expect all 45 to be operational by the third quarter of 2018.