VC Cafe | Israeli Tech, Venture Capital & AI

Battery Ventures

Battery gives back to Israeli entrepreneurial community with venture creation workshop

Battery Ventures held its first Entrepreneurship and Venture Creation Workshop in Tel Aviv on July 1 and 2 (see VC Café’s previous coverage of the workshop here). For Battery, the workshop served two main purposes: (1) to enable the firm to ‘give back’ to the Israeli entrepreneurial community amidst a challenging funding environment; and (2) to enable the firm’s investment professionals to meet and evaluate the entrepreneurial talent that is currently working on, or considering launching, early stage technology ventures in Israel.

Brian Rosenzweig

Janvest Wants to Fill the Seed Investment Gap in Israel (Interview)

Janvest, a new seed fund of $5 million backed by American angel investors and chaired by the former head of the Mossad (Danny Yatom), saw an opportunity to fill the gap by making offering US-based angel investors the opportunity to tap into the Israeli startup industry. To learn more, VC Cafe interviewed Brian Rosenzweig, one of the managing partners in the new fund and the former marketing director at 21Ventures.

Perfecto Mobile

Perfecto Mobile Gets Perfect Backer in Vodafone Ventures for App Testing in the Cloud

Vodafone's venture capital arm made a strategic minority investment in Israeli startup Perfecto Mobile joining previous backers Carmel Ventures and Vertex Venture Capital who invested $7 million ten months ago. The sum of the round was undisclosed, but sources in the Israeli media estimate it at $4-5 million.

11Kicks

Special: 20 Israeli Startups Come to London for “New Media” Delegation

The Commercial Office at the Embassy of Israel in London and the Israel Export Institute have organized a New Media delegation, taking place on the first week of July. VC Café is privileged to support the event as the main media partner.

888

After Layoffs and Profit Warnings, 888 Buys Mytopia’s assets for $18 million

Online gambling giant 888 acquired the assets of American-Israeli casual game studio Mytopia from Real Dice, Mytopia's parent company. According to VentureBeat Games, the deal is estimated at $18 million, but could reach up to $48 million if Mytopia's assets hits certain revenue milestones by 2011.

Calpers

Bitesize Friday: Israeli startups get funded, launch new products

Calpers, eVrit, Matomy, Fribiz, eType, Venture capital in Israel, Consumer confidence in Israel, Israeli incubators, venture capital performance

101

Entrepreneurship 101: What Motivates Us? [Video]

Check out this interesting video on the hidden truths behind what really motivates us at home and in the workplace. I loved the illustrations of RSAnimation to the original talk given by Dan Pink.

EIS

Israeli Government Reveals High Tech “Bail Out” Plan to Boost the Technology Sector

The proposal will enable investors in startups to receive tax write-offs on investments for high-tech companies who spend at least 70% of their salaries in Israel. The new law is part of broader reforms to boost the high-tech sector, led by Dr. Yuval Steinitz, Israel's minister of finance and his ministry's director general, Haim Shani

Erel Margalit

JVP Raises $25 Million Annex Fund to Support Existing Portcos

Jerusalem Venture Partners successfully raised $25 million for an annex fund to strengthen the portfolio companies in the Israel-focused JVP IV which closed in 2001. The aim of the fund is to support existing investments by "enhancing their business propositions" and preventing premature sales in a downturn.

BRM

eToro Social Forex Trading Raises $2.4 Million More Led By Social Leverage

Tradonomi, the parent company behind eToro has completed a $2.4 million round led by new investor Social Leverage, with participation of previous backers BRM Capital and Cubit Investments.

888

Play4Skill Raises $400K for Dominoes Gambling

Play4Skill, a relatively unknown Israeli startup, has raised an second round of $400,000 from from Israeli advertising agency Adler Chomsky. P4S develops multi-player skill games, primarily focused on 3D life-like Domino games.

Ariel Maislos

The Proof was not in the Pudding: Pudding Media is Shutting Down

Pudding Media, an Israeli mobile advertising startup, faces imminent shut down. According to Calcalist,Pudding Media let go 25 employees this morning and announced it will cease its operations in Israel. The company's assets will be put on sale as the company only retained five employees for maintenance reasons

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