It’s not every day that Israel celebrates sixty years of independence, and despite of global and local economic and political shocks, Israel’s economy is stronger than ever. Here are some of the reasons that make Israel and the Silicon Wadi a strong investment destination:
- The Shekel is growing faster than than the dollar
- Israel has 150 publicly traded companies on NASDAQ! That’s more than any other country apart from the US. (see the full list)
- Unemployment is at its lowest level since 1990, falling below 7%
- The government foreign and local currency bond ratings have been upgraded from A2 to A1
- Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, IBM and others bought Israeli companies this year, strengthening their R&D Centers in Israel.
- Foreign investments, Venture Capital funding ($1.1 billion in 2007) and M&A activity are all reaching record levels that compare to the high tech boom in 2000.
- Spending by foreign tourists in Israel totaled $2.4 billion last year, 16.5% more than in 2006. (Central Bureau of Statistics)
- The MacBook Air’s song “New Soul” performed by Yael Naim topped the sales iTunes this year, passing Britney Spears and Madonna
In order to celebrate the occasion, VC Cafe put together a small present, a map of our own little “Silicon Wadi” featuring over 75 web 2.0 companies active in Israel.
Click to enlarge the Silicon Wadi Poster:
Feel free to download this image, but please link to the source -the content on VC Cafe is protected by a Creative Commons License. If you have a web 2.0 company in Israel and your logo is missing from the Silicon Wadi poster, please send it to me with a link to eze at vccafe dot com.Looking to decorate the office with this cool piece? Posters in HD quality will be available for sale in the next few days.
Happy 60 Israel!
He is a former General Partner at Google Ventures (GV) in Europe, former head of Google for Entrepreneurs in Europe, and founding head of Campus London, Google's first startup hub. Eze writes on Israeli tech, venture capital, artificial intelligence, and founder strategy.
He is also the founder of Techbikers, a nonprofit that brings together the startup ecosystem on cycling challenges in support of Room to Read.
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