Israel Active

Dan Huttenlocher is the Founding Dean of Cornell Tech and Vice Provost of Cornell University. He describes the new Joan and Irwin Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech on a visit to Israel’s Technion Institute campus.

10 Israeli companies showcased at Imaginenano 2015 in Bilbau Spain, Europe’s largest nanotechnology conference. Two, Melodea and Valentis, are using cellulose nanocrystals to make a variety of groundbreaking products out of wood pulp sludge and other plant-derived waste. Meanwhile see how Technion scientists engraved the 1.2 million letters of the Hebrew Bible on a microscopic wafer of gold.

Scientists at Israel’s Ben Gurion University have developed an app that records if you break the speed limit, swerve, stop short, or switch lanes too often. Insurance companies could use the information to reward good drivers and “punish” bad ones.

Israeli startup Massivit is using Autodesk’s “Spark” to print a full-sized car. The Strati is billed as the world’s first car where all the non-mechanical components have been produced on a 3D printer. The Strati was designed and developed by US-based Local Motors.

Israel’s OffBits has produced “build it yourself” kits, comprised of throwaway screws, springs etc. Kids can assemble the kits into cool little toy robots and add their own “bits”.

Rafi Mehudar is one of this year’s Israeli Independence Day torch-lighters. 42 years after he invented the modern form of drip irrigation, it is still used by only 5% of the world’s farmers. But that technology is responsible for crops that feed over a billion people.

Canadian handset maker Blackberry has bought Israeli device security company WatchDox, whose 100 employees will form the basis of Blackberry’s Israeli Research & Development team.

German energy giant RWE AG, one of the five largest energy and gas companies in Europe, is opening an innovation center in Israel in order to develop tech for a smart grid – a metering system that will keep track of how consumers use electricity.

Israel’s Orad Hi-Tec has developed many of the slick graphic technologies used in live broadcasting. Orad has just been bought for an estimated $60 million by US video production giant Avid Technology and will become part of Avid’s new Israeli research and development facility.

A new consortium of top Israeli companies and universities is to develop 3D printing technologies for the Israeli aerospace industry. The aim is to design and manufacture complex geometric structures that can only be produced by printing.