News Briefs

November 7, 2013 | Israeli town of Ra’anana, which known to hold offices for such high tech firms as Amdocs and SAP, has recently launched its first startup hub. The hub, dubbed “Hubanana,” already houses 15 fresh Israeli startup companies, which pay a small fee in exchange for computer stations and mentoring.

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November 7, 2013 | Israeli company Wix, which developed an extremely successful Do It Yourself website building platform, held its Initial Public Offering yesterday. The company managed to raise $127 million, at a company value of $765 million.

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November 6, 2013 | Poland’s deputy Science and Education minister Professor Mark Rateizek and Israel’s Science, Technology and Space Ministry Director-General Bina Bar-On, have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) establishing the first-ever scientific cooperation between the two countries. The cooperation will take effect in 2014.

Photo: Crossed Flag Pins

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November 6, 2013 | Israeli Agriculture Minister Yair Shamir and officials from the Vietnamese government have agreed to establish a joint agriculture research and development fund. In addition the two governments will try to establish a free trade accord, increasing the two countries’ cooperation in the fields of agricultural technology, science and defense.

Photo: Crossed Flag Pins

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November 6, 2013 | Israeli company Mobli, a social-mobile photo and video-sharing multi-platform, today announced that América Móvil, a leading provider of integrated telecommunications services in the Americas has made a strategic investment in Mobli as part of Mobli’s $60 Million Funding Round. The two companies have also reached a business collaboration arrangement to introduce Mobli’s innovative products to América Móvil’s mobile users.

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November 6, 2013 | Israeli software house Comm-IT has announced that it has acquired SQL Server services company Valinor. The deal is valued at NIS 7.5 million (approx. $2.1 million).

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November 6, 2013 | The American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science has announced that Nancy and Stephen Grand of San Francisco have committed $50 million to advance the international study of personalized medicine.

The funds will be used by the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel, to operate the recently established Israel National Center for Personalized Medicine (INCPM).

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November 6, 2013 | New Israeli investment firm Aleph, which recently closed its first investment fund at $140 million, has picked its first investment – Israeli company WindWard. WindWard, which developed technology for monitoring the movement of sea vehicles, raised $5 million from Aleph.

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November 6, 2013 | Israeli company Garanita Data, which offers cloud computing services, has announced the closing of a successful Series A financing round, raising $9 million. The round was led by Bain Capital Ventures and Carmel Ventures. Garanita Data has raised $13 million to date.

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November 6, 2013 | Israeli company Wix, which has developed an extremely popular Do It Yourself (DIY) website building platform, is holding its Initial Public Offering on Nasdaq today, at a company value of approx. $800 million.

Wix is set to raise between $120 and $130 million. The company, founded in 2006, has raised $58.5 million to date.

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Israeli crowdfunding platform OurCrowd announced today that it has closed a strategic co-investment partnership with GE Ventures, a part of the General Electric Group.

OurCrowd has successfully raised over $22 million for its 28 portfolio companies to date, including eight financings in excess of $1 million.

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According to a recent filing with the SEC, Israeli investment firm Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP), has closed its seventh investment fund at a value of $120 million. JVP usually invests in early-stage startups in the fields of digital media, cyber security and Big Data.

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November 3, 2013 | Israeli company ZeroVM, which developed the first hypervisor designed specifically for the cloud, has been acquired by American hosting giant RackSpace. Though the financial details of the transactions were not disclosed, it is know that ZeroVM has raised over half-a-million dollars in seed funding.

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November 3, 2013 | Eltek, a leading Israeli manufacturer of advanced circuitry solutions, has announced the closing of its sale of 3,532,655 ordinary shares to Nistec, a leading provider of electronic manufacturing and design services. Nistec also acquired all of the ordinary shares held by Eltek’s principal shareholder, Mr. Yossi Maiman. As a result of both transactions, Nistec is now Eltek’s majority shareholder, holding 50.5 percent of its outstanding shares. The deal was announced last August.

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November 3, 2013 | Israeli company Mazor Robotics, which specializes in surgical robots for spinal procedures, is raising capital on Nasdaq. The company is holding a public offering, selling shares at a total value of $40.8 million. The offering will close tomorrow.

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