Peres Center To Showcase 44 Startups As Part Of ‘Innovation Dream Team’

The Peres Center for Peace and Innovation selected its second cohort of 44 Israeli startups earlier this week to showcase in the Israeli Innovation Center as part of its Israeli Expo 2021.

These startups have become part of the center’s “Innovation Dream Team, ” a new platform which will see select Israeli startups harness their knowledge and experience to strengthen one another and help nurture the next generation of Israeli entrepreneurs, the Peres Center said in an announcement.

Members of the “Dream Team” will have the opportunity to expand their circle of contacts, exchange ideas and interact with international delegations visiting the Peres Center. Through dedicated Peres Center events and meetings, they will also pass on their knowledge and expertise to carefully selected young entrepreneurs. As such, the Peres Center will increasingly serve as a hub, strengthening the Israeli innovation ecosystem as a whole.

The Peres Center for Peace was founded in 1996 by Shimon Peres, the Nobel Prize-winning elder Israeli statesman who advocated for peace with the Palestinians and Israel’s neighbors, and one of the architects of Israel’s peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan. The center rebranded as the Peres Center for Peace And Innovation after the establishment of an innovation wing for Israel, one of Peres’ flagship projects before his passing in 2016 at 93. Peres was a champion of Israeli technologies and Israeli startups.

The center officially opened its doors in October 2018 in an inauguration ceremony attended by hundreds of people including representatives of tech giants such as Facebook, Google, and eBay. Government and business delegations from around the world also attended, including from Indonesia, Singapore, India, Africa, USA, Italy, France, Australia, the UK, South Korea, Mexico, Switzerland, Russia, and Germany.

The center opened its Israeli Innovation Center in February 2019 and has welcomed over 75,000 visitors from 56 countries, including heads of state, parliamentarians, and corporate executives.

Peres Center officially launched its “Innovation Dream Team” on Tuesday with a morning fireside chat featuring Sir Ronald Cohen, chairman of the Global Steering Group For Impact Investment, and Chemi Peres, chairman of the Peres Center, managing general partner at Pitango Venture Capital, and son of the late Shimon Peres. The chat was called “Innovation Driven By ESG” (Environmental, Social and Governance.)

The startups in the second cohort were selected from hundreds of applicants by the Expo Hall committee led by the Peres Center, the Israel Innovation Authority, and the Ministry of Economy.

Some of the chosen companies in the second cohort include SIMPLIIGOOD, an agtech startup on the production of spirulina, Cybereason, a personalized cybersecurity platform, and UTILIS, an infrastructure assessment tool informed by satellite radar data.