$8M For US-Israel Joint Product Developments

Israeli and American tech companies have received $8.4 million in funding to develop new joint products.

The funding was approved by the BIRD (The Israel-US Binational Industrial Research and Development) Foundation, which encourages cooperation between Israeli and US tech companies, and offers funding to selected projects.  

The projects approved include:

New Phase (Petach Tikva, Israel) and Ultraflex Power Technologies (Ronkonkoma, NY) which will develop a machine to help treat stage 4 cancer patients with metastatic solid tumors;

Xerient Pharma (Petach Tikva, Israel), and Accuray (Madison, WI), which will develop a treatment to increase the effectiveness of treating pancreatic cancer;

Tevel (in Gedera, Israel) and Vinergy (Bakersfield, CA), which will develop a clean-energy autonomous harvesting system; and

Kadimastem Ltd. (Ness Ziona, Israel), and iTolerance (Miami, FL) which will develop technology to potentially cure type 1 diabetes without the need for chronic immuno-suppression.

The BIRD Foundation has approved over 1,000 projects for funding during its 45-year history. To date, its investment in joint products is over $370 million, and it has helped generate sales of more than $10 billion. 

The new projects that have been approved will have a total value of $20 million.

The submitted projects are reviewed by evaluators appointed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) of the U.S. Department of Commerce and the Israel Innovation Authority.

Dr. Eitan Yudilevich, the outgoing Executive Director of the BIRD Foundation, said: “This cycle demonstrated, once again, that there is great interest among US and Israeli companies in jointly developing innovative technologies and leveraging BIRD funding as a way to reduce their risk. I wish the awardees much success in bringing their jointly developed technologies to market.”