News Briefs

October 29, 2014 | The smart acquiring platform Credorax raised $40 million in its latest financing round. The round was led by Columbia Nova Technology Partners and previous investor Blumberg Capital to create an integrated and international system for online merchants to receive payments. According to company CEO Benny Nachman, the company hopes to use the funds to provide an online service provider for retailers in any geographic location. The company has secured up to $130 million to date, and since the service was launched in 2008, has also acquired a number of relevant bank services to bring all e-merchants’ online payment processing needs under one roof.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 29, 2014 | The IT incident management company BigPanda raised $7 million in Series A funding from Mayfield, Sequoia Capital and others. BigPanda has raised $8.5 million to date, and has plans to use the latest round of funds to accelerate the company’s growth. In addition, BigPanda launched the first data science platform to automate IT incident management. BigPanda was founded in 2012 by CEO Assaf Resnik and VP R&D Elik Eizenberg to bring a new approach to IT incident management.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 29, 2014 | Three Israeli academic institutions were ranked in the top 200 universities in the world, according to the annual ranking conducted by “US News & World Report.” The ranking rates 500 universities throughout the world and is considered a preeminent source on the ranking of world universities. The Weizmann Institute was rated the top institution in Israel, at 102nd place, taking the eighth best university in Asia. Tel Aviv University was rated 148th, followed by the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, rated 152nd, the Technion Israel Institute of Technology in 263rd place, and Ben Gurion University in 431st place.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 29, 2014 | The Israeli drug development company IntecPharma has secured Food & Drug Administration approval for a Phase III clinical trial on its Parkinson’s disease treatment. The Accordion Pill Levodopa is a gastro-retentive drug delivery system for the treatment of the common neurodegenerative disease. The company believes that the trial, which may be conducted together with a major pharmaceutical company, will be completed in the second half of 2015. IntecPharma is a publicly traded development stage biopharmaceutical company based in Jerusalem, Israel.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 29, 2014 | Endochoice, an American company that merged with Israeli endoscopic company Peer Medical in 2013, is set to file a NASDAQ IPO. According to reports, Endochoice plans to raise $100-$150 million on NASDAQ in 2015 at a company value of $500 million, though the company has yet to file a prospectus. Since Endochoice and Peer Medical merged in 2013, the company has raised $43 million from investors including Sequoia Capital, Mori Arkin and Dr. Uri Geiger’s Accelmed.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 29, 2014 | Due to the growth of cyber security exports, the Israel Export and International Cooperation Institution announced the establishment of special unit to promote relevant Israeli companies. The new unit of the Institution will provide Israeli cyber companies with services to promote exports and to create connections with security and technology agencies around the world. According to the Export Institute’s figures, there are currently 200 cyber companies operating in Israel, with a sector growth rate of 8 percent annually. The major market for these companies is the US, with the majority of technologies aimed at protecting the government, military and financial infrastructure.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 29, 2014 | Wix.com, the provider of a popular web development platform, has acquired OpenRest for millions, according to reports. OpenRest is the provider of online ordering and mobile solutions for restaurants. According to Wix, the acquisition will help narrow down the online needs of industry-specific clients, as well as providing more depth to Wix’s product suite. Wix has over 55 million users worldwide, allowing anyone to create a website from scratch as well as manage online business using built-in tools. OpenRest was founded in 2011 by Danny Leshem and Yoav Amit with the goal of bringing better solutions to restaurant owners and operators around the world.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 29, 2014 | The Israeli digital advertising company Matomy Media Group acquired Austrian mobile advertising platform MobFox for $17.6 million. According to Matomy, the acquisition will provide clients and media partners with access to innovative mobile programmatic advertising solutions. Within the acquisition deal, Matomy will pay $10.1 million in cash and $7.5 million in shares to MobFox. Earlier in the month, French advertising company Publicis Groupe acquired a 20 percent stake in Matomy Media, which was co-founded by CEO Oded Druker.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 29, 2014 | The Israel Cancer Research Fund announced 94 new grants, totaling $3,453,332, for the 2014/2015 funding year. The areas of cancer research set to be sponsored by the ICRF include: bone, brain, breast, colorectal, gastrointestinal, liver, lung, kidney, bone marrow transplantation, ovarian, pancreatic, prostate, and uterine cancers; anti-cancer drug mechanisms, multi-drug resistance, and target therapy. ICRF awarded its first grants in 1977 and since has funded over 2,115 grants valuing a total of $52,361,664.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 29, 2014 | BlueSnap announced that 40 Israeli companies have signed on with the global payment gateway in the past year. The company also signed a long-term lease in Herzliya, Israel and hired Meir Gefen, the former COO at KMI Software Systems, as the General Manager. Some of the Israeli companies to join BlueSnap this year were Israel Experience, Feedvisor and EyeClick. “Israel’s entrepreneurs are thriving and innovating in this vibrant hi-tech market, ” said Ralph Dangelmaier, CEO of BlueSnap. “We are excited to expand our team and support the amazing growth of our merchants with our smarter payment gateway.” BlueSnap was founded in 2004 and offers global payment solutions to in 180 countries, 29 languages, 60 currencies and 110 payment types.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 29, 2014 | BSP, the Israeli company developing non-invasive methods for the detection of heart disease, received Food & Drug Administration approval to market and sell its HyperQ Rest System. The system is intended to aid in the diagnosis of patients with chest pain in the emergency room and is meant for use in ECG testing. The FDA approved the use of the device based on clinical trials conducted in emergency departments for the diagnosis of Acute Coronary Syndrome (ACS) in patients with acute chest pain. The HyperQ technology developed by the company enables advanced diagnostics means with high diagnostic value for detection of heart disease in the early stages, saving invasive and radioactivity tests.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 29, 2014 | Eleven Israeli startups will visit Philadelphia, Pennsylvania this week with hopes of engaging in a business partnership with the City of Brotherly Love. The startup representatives will attend Philadelphia’s first Israel Technology Conference, sponsored by Drexel University. As part of the conference, the representatives will meet with local venture capital firms and visit the Comcast Center. City Mayor Michael Nutter met with Pitango co-founder Chemi Peres last November to promote Philadelphia as a suitable startup city for Israeli companies looking to establish themselves in the United States. The conference is catered to media and healthcare information technology startups from Israel, interested in breaking into the American market.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 29, 2014 | Israeli pharmaceutical company BiondVax, developing the universal flu vaccine, announced that it received approvals from the European Union and Japan’s patent authorities for the companies flu vaccines. The Multimeric Multi-Epitope Polypeptide Influenza Vaccines is a family of patents for vaccination against influenza in humans, vaccines that provide long-lasting protecting against a variety of flu strains. The approved patent in Europe and Japan was approved some time ago by authorities in the US, Hong Kong, Australia, China, Russia and Mexico. BiondVax is a publicly traded company that has created a universal flu vaccine to improve global protection against influenza.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 28, 2014 | The DevOps solutions provider QualiSystems announced that the company has completed a $8 million financing round. An anonymous international cloud computing company along with existing investors in the company, Gemini Israel Ventures, Evergreen Venture Partners and Fishman Group. QualiSystems was founded in 2004 and serves a variety of different customers with DevOps needs. The company has offices in the United States, Britain, Singapore, China, Germany, Korea, Taiwan and Israel.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]

October 28, 2014 | 3M, the American multinational company, will open an R&D center in Israel in addition to the companies research and development centers in the US and Singapore. The company came to the decision after Jonathan Pantanowitz suggested that the company invest more in Israel. The new R&D center will be responsible, in addition to its R&D duties, for the company’s investment fund, through which the company will invest in two Israeli companies, TaKaDu and VocalZoom. In addition, the center will be responsible for cooperation with local academic institutions and research institutes in Israel. 3M’s Israeli branch was established in 1996 and employs nearly 200 individuals.

[sharethis-inline-buttons]