Israel Active

Finding 42.4 billion cubic feet of natural gas off Israel’s coast is no longer big news. The Or-1 site contains only a fraction of the huge discoveries at Tamar and Leviathan.

An unnamed Asian country has signed a $15 million contract to buy Elbit’s Wise Intelligence Technology (WiT) system. WiT supports every stage of the intelligence and investigation process.

In the last 12 months there has been a 17% increase in tourism to the Jewish State. Cruise passenger numbers increased by 68% to 208,000 visitors.

Great summary of Israel’s economy by Yoram Ettinger – ex Minister for Congressional Affairs at Israel's Embassy in Washington.

Stock picks are Ceva. Ezchip, Mellanox, Amdocs and Ceragon. Each benefits from increased network traffic and storage requirements, driven by growing amounts of data.

Impressed with Israel Technion’s new Nobel Prize winner, Microsoft’s $1 million funding will allow the new research centre to focus on artificial intelligence, games theory, computer science, economics, and psychology and their applications in e-commerce.

Israel Electric Corporation is to build a $1.3 billion project of three photovoltaic solar energy arrays in northern China.

An Israeli company, Green 2000, is helping Nigeria, Chad, Angola, South Sudan, Kenya, Equatorial Guinea and Ghana become self-sufficient by teaching them agricultural techniques that can increase food production significantly.

Both the IMF and Israel’s own Central Bureau of Statistics have increased their estimates for Israel’s 2011 GDP. The IMF now predicts 4.8% and the CBS calculates it will be 5%.

Following a new agreement between El Al and WestJet, passengers will have better connections between Israel via Toronto to the rest of Canada, plus Florida and the Caribbean.