January 12, 2008

Fifteen Israeli Startups Visit California Next Month

Michael Arrington

68 comments »

In February the Israel Web Tour rolls into Silicon Valley. Ninety Israeli startups applied to join the tour, and fifteen of them were selected to attend. The tour consists of a week-long conference and cultural exchange between Silicon Valley and Israeli entrepreneurs and venture capitalists.

The general public is invited to parts of the show. more information is available on this website, including speakers.

Participating startups include 5min, Plymedia, AllofMe, Nuconomy, ClickTale, blogTV, Sportingo, PicScout, Qoof, 8hands, Velingo, Innovid, Semingo, PageOnce and Journeys.

I moderated a panel at the event last year. Highlights from that panel and the event in general are in the video below.

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Comments

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web-to-print

January 12th, 2008 at 10:45 pm

Mike, broken URL for 5min.com - shift the dot.
security

January 12th, 2008 at 10:48 pm

Will be there for sure.

Brilliant ideas are continuing to come out of Israel.

Hope the tour also comes to New York City
Jon

January 12th, 2008 at 11:04 pm

Am I the only person who thinks it’s rather odd to categorize start-ups by country when they are essentially an online virtual company serving a global audience? On a daily basis, I deal with people from 5 different countries (and time zones)… I think the sooner we ditch this “country-centric” idea of our world, the better as it’s making less sense the more we progress towards a virtual economy.

Video was pretty interesting btw but do you have a follow-up Michael regarding the companies you featured last year? Find out which ones boomed, busted or just stayed the same.

Jon
http://buzvia.com - Share Influence
David

January 12th, 2008 at 11:08 pm

Someone needs to hire a branding agency and have them meet these guys at the airport. This is some of the crappiest naming of companies I’ve ever seen.
David

January 12th, 2008 at 11:08 pm

Although I have to admit I’m still laughing at this one Semingo? WTF
Robert Lancer

January 12th, 2008 at 11:24 pm

Jon – Think about it, if these startups didn’t come for a country that cared deeply about their success, we wouldn’t even of herd about them. It’s important to see what countries / regions are emerging as fertile startup grounds.
Michael Arrington

January 12th, 2008 at 11:25 pm

Robert - agree. There is nothing wrong with being proud of your country. Plus people tend naturally to organize geographically. These kinds of things make a lot of sense. And reaching out to other communities is great, too.
Serkan

January 13th, 2008 at 12:35 am

Maybe I should think about doing something like that with Japanese companies. It’s a really cool idea to mix ideas that way.
Exchange3D

January 13th, 2008 at 12:42 am

David, crappy naming is part of their selling strategy. I know, I have dealt with several of them
Everett

January 13th, 2008 at 12:56 am

@3 Agree but back in 1999 I read in Business 2.0 that the US was ‘x’ years ahead of Europe, and Europe was ‘x’ years ahead of Asia… and finally Canada was ‘x’ years behind the last whichever country… so maybe there is some national pride in coming to the US together to show what they’ve got and it should be interesting. I notice they do this with film festivals too!
CAR

January 13th, 2008 at 1:38 am

i agree with #3 100% who cares what country. the way article was presented was like its a bad thing or be on look out israelis are coming to california.
Double Page Spread

January 13th, 2008 at 1:39 am

Anything from the Palestiniens?
Marzipan From Toledo

January 13th, 2008 at 1:53 am

@12:

don’t open a can of worms.
Zergrinch

January 13th, 2008 at 2:40 am

Fifteen startups eh. I wonder if any of them will be knocking on poor Michael’s door at 6 in the morning…
Niko

January 13th, 2008 at 2:57 am

@13
and why not?
Can anyone say: Apartheid

January 13th, 2008 at 3:04 am

It’s one thing to be proud of your country, it’s another to be deluded by it.

Israel is a modern day apatheid - which is getting more and more severe by the day - hardly something to be proud of.
martin

January 13th, 2008 at 3:22 am

@16

Dude..what are you talking about!!! Israel rocks!!!

+
why discuss political issues on techcrunch, if I wanted to read your biased point of view I could always check out aljazera’s website

good luck to all the Israeli start-ups
JeffC

January 13th, 2008 at 3:53 am

Agree with 17. I Love Israel, and it has a right to protect itself. Remember that most Palestianians were in the streets celebrating on 9/11. Know who your friends are, and stop blaming the U.S. and Israel for all the world’s problems.

On the naming points. It’s always interesting to see a group of names like this, to see which ones stand out. Ones with actual words that mean something are best in my book. I have no idea what any of these do … but ClickTale, AllofMe, and blogTV seem to have branding legs. Now, I’ll go and check out what they actually do …
Rajeev

January 13th, 2008 at 4:02 am

Good to have diversity in Business. New Ideas will flow.

http://tekno-world.blogspot.com
What's Hot Today.com

January 13th, 2008 at 4:14 am

This is a great idea, hopefully something meaningful will come of it.

http://www.whatshottoday.com
Inbal

January 13th, 2008 at 4:22 am

16,
Go and read another article in Al Arab. If you’re going to show everyone on a technology website how sapient you are by extrapolating political situations you obviously don’t apprehend, at least make a better effort to vindicate your claims.
Anton Mannering

January 13th, 2008 at 4:36 am

Having been part of the Paddy’s Valley group of startups that traveled to SF from Ireland in December all I can say is that I think this is a fantastic idea. The benefit to the businesses involved and the idea of mixing ideas and people from different contexts and the opportunity for learning from people from a different ecosystem and locations is invaluable.
It’s the equivalent of increasing the size of the gene pool, diversity makes you stronger. And as earlier people pointed out, if someone builds a great web service that works, in this online world, do you care where the originator is from?

Good luck to the Israelis I wish them every success…
Double Page Spread

January 13th, 2008 at 4:38 am

can of worms, ha,

Lets have a look,

lets not discuss politics on TC, ecxept for the Tech President Primaries rigtht?

Lets not talk about the oppression that Zionists in Israel are inflicting upon the owners of the occupied land they have stolen with the aid of the UK’s Gov.’s initial policies and these days the USA foreign aid (they call it) that has been used to decimate a nation of children (oops you said terrorists right).

NO LETS JUST TALK ABOUT POLITICS WHEN IT SUITS US ha

AND IN BETWEEN THAT LETS TALK ABOUT FB.

did anyone notice a little bias here?
Omri

January 13th, 2008 at 5:04 am

A wise man once said “the Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity”.

Had the Palestinians wanted, they could have had an independent state years ago, but that’s not half as fun shooting missiles at civilian centers and whining about Israeli oppression, is it?
Spez Smartman

January 13th, 2008 at 5:15 am

why are there so many Israeli startups? I mean, it’s a great thing and all, but why so many from Israel?

Congrats to all of them btw.

http://www.gabbr.com
Jon

January 13th, 2008 at 5:16 am

@23: Politics invade every part of our lives, I don’t see these start-ups (no matter where they come from) having anything to do with the geo-political map that we inhabit. They are sharing in the stream of ideas that represent the internet. We all know governments don’t necessarily represent the people that elect them.

TC is run by one person, as such, he can do as he wishes, when he wishes and how he wishes for whatever reason he justifies to himself… never forget that this is HIS sandbox we are collectively playing in.

Jon
http://buzvia.com - Share Influence
Isabelle

January 13th, 2008 at 5:33 am

Why Israeli companies?
1. More Israeli companies are traded in the NASDAQ than any other non-US country.
2. Just in the last few weeks 4 Israeli startups were acquired by US companies:
Quigo - AOL ($363 million)
XIV - IBM ($350 million)
Onaro - Netapp ($120 million)
Kasamba - LivePerson ($40 million).

On average, there is big startup acquisition in Israel every 2nd week. Their startup industry booms.

Also, it’s important to note two issues:
1. These are all web 2.0 companies. So, it’s pretty well segmented.
2. The event is organized by the Israeli chamber of commerce.
Mayer

January 13th, 2008 at 5:52 am

Good luck to my friends at 5min.com, Qoof.com as well as Sportingo. I have met these companies several times and they are all great companies in their own ways.

Good luck to all 15 companies. Make Israel proud.
Double Page Spread

January 13th, 2008 at 6:18 am

@26 Great points Jon, no arguments there.

I have no problems with TC covering politics, none with fellow startups either no matter where they are from, I am just wondering while we celebrate, why our neighbors aren’t celebrating too?
Joe T

January 13th, 2008 at 6:50 am

What about Qooba and Zwingo? Noone ever mentions them.
Ben

January 13th, 2008 at 7:45 am

Israel is apartheid but individuals like these startup not personally responsible for it.
Jenkins

January 13th, 2008 at 8:08 am

Quigo is NOT an Israeli company — good try though. They had one israeli founder *several* years ago but he didn’t last very long. Quigo is a wild success story and very American.
Webepags

January 13th, 2008 at 8:13 am

This is definitely proof of a globalizing economy

http://www.webepags.com
josh

January 13th, 2008 at 9:05 am

david
i agree with you - these names are bad.
i am interested to know - just out of curiosity - why did you think so? why for example Semingo sucks?
Josh
Technicle

January 13th, 2008 at 9:33 am

craigslist.org doesn’t seem like a good name..

nor “Open Data” Corporation (if any) >> “Control Data” Corporation (right, that one, which dominated from the 60s thru 80s, now of cos no more)..

or would “Standard and Poor” sound a good name for the financial sector?..
or HSBC (originally: Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation - still is)..
yet they do pretty well, on a worldwide scale…
jason

January 13th, 2008 at 9:35 am

A Qoof is like a Queef only louder.
Marzipan From Toledo

January 13th, 2008 at 9:54 am

@15:

See 16,17,18, 21, 23, 24, etc.

There are better places to discuss the Israeli/Palestinian issue. If most of you are passionate about the Palestinian issue, then you’d probably be better of expending your energy writing a letter to your congressmen and senators.

Also, the US has a free-trade agreement with Israel. It’s odd, but it has one.
Macaroni Mike

January 13th, 2008 at 10:24 am

Regardless of Silicon valley’s well-nown pro-Israel affiliation, right in sync with the rest of the country, what’s surprising is the full monty that TC seems to be giving its (new-found?) israeli friends.

If said group was from Chile, Singapore or the erstwhile Dubai Electronic Free Trade zone (DFTZ) etc. , no one would miss a heartbeat. What gives?
jack mchenry

January 13th, 2008 at 10:24 am

US dollars fund Israel research, indirectly the chief scientist, which is an interesting technique for government startup investment and many military spin-outs to VC funded startups.
shuly

January 13th, 2008 at 10:47 am

there is nothing political about this visit. Israeli startups gravitate towards new markets since they lack a sizable local one. This is nothing new in our global economy. The fact is…once they establish their US presence the local economy benefits from hundreds of new jobs. There are many such efforts by other countries and it is what keeps this industry and region so fresh with new ideas and innovations.
User447

January 13th, 2008 at 11:12 am

Agreed with @12. Anything from the California Palestine Chamber of Commerce?
Steel

January 13th, 2008 at 11:41 am

We fund everything else connected to Israel; in fact, BILLIONS every year. Why should this be any different. P.T. Barnum says one is born every minute (sucker) and we here at home are the biggest foreign aid suckers alive. Again, we gotta stop this crap.
David Lee

January 13th, 2008 at 11:59 am

I’ve created a spreadsheet to help finding information about these Israeli startups, compare their Alexa/Compete ranking, etc.

http://www.editgrid.com/tnc/da.....artups.new

Charts are in “Alexa Charts” and “Compete Charts” tab.
shuly

January 13th, 2008 at 12:08 pm

to # 42…IsraelWebTour is NOT funded by the US or Israeli governments. It is a private effort supported by leading players in the industry (corporations, VCs etc).
Marzipan From Toledo

January 13th, 2008 at 12:36 pm

@12, 41:

your derisory remarks are not funny at all.

Israeli companies have as much right as any other company to come in and penetrate the US market. That said, to equate the political and economic power of an Israeli company with that of a Palestinian company is supercilious. It is unfortunate that is the case but that is the reality today.

The fact that this equality does not exist is the root of the problem which faces both the Israeli and Palestinian people today. I would kindly suggest you give some thought to this prior to revealing to all the TC readers how detached from reality you are by posting insolent comments.
James Barclay

January 13th, 2008 at 12:52 pm

Aren’t there enough political blogs to discuss the Arab/Israeli issue???

I want to give a big shout for Qoof and its CEO Richard Kligman - the guy is amazing, innovative, is a spiritual guy and an entire industry is waiting for him to unleash his platform on the net.

Good luck in Silicon Valley Richard
Tal

January 13th, 2008 at 1:19 pm

These start-ups should be judged by their content and business model and not by their location.

Personally I think Israel is a greate place and we definitely plan to expend our site to Israel in the further.

Tal,
http://www.copenda.com
Miriam

January 13th, 2008 at 1:51 pm

There is one Israeli who decided to bridge the divide by establishing a start-up in Ramallah, and joint-manage it with a Palestinian. Zvi Schreiber, who has had Israeli start-up sucesses in the past with Unicorn (acquired by IBM) and Tradeum (acquired for $500m), founded G.ho.st, which stands for Global Hosted Operating SysTem, and put it in Ramallah with a Palestinian COO,
Tareq Maayah.

They say they are the the world’s only true Web Operating System. Aside from being a for-profit venture, Schreiber has pledged 15% of the founding equity of G.ho.st to the G.ho.st Peace Foundation (GhPF), whose goals are to create a foundation for peace via business.
mike

January 13th, 2008 at 1:53 pm

# Double Page Spread

January 13th, 2008 at 1:39 am

Anything from the Palestiniens?
mike

January 13th, 2008 at 1:55 pm

‘Un-American’
Google in HebrewOh, the conspiracy theorists will have a field day. The director of Google’s Haifa research center says, in an interview with Globes, a local business newspaper: “The thing is that essentially, Google is built on a certain degree of Israeli character that is very un-American.” To be sure, the R&D boss, Yoelle Maarek, refers, at least ostensibly, to the Mountain View search engine’s risk-taking culture, which is, presumably, akin to the boldness of an Israeli tank commander. But, for the more paranoid anti-semites, the quote will just confirm their worst fear: that the future has arrived, and the Jews got there first. It was bad enough that the leading PC maker, enterprise software company and operating system are all run by tech moguls (Michael Dell, Larry Ellison and Steve Ballmer) of Jewish origin. Now the cabal even organizes the information itself. Do no evil? That’s what they would say.
VC Cafe

January 13th, 2008 at 2:37 pm

Michael,

I’m on the Israel Web Tour’s steering committee and I provided additional coverage on each of the 15 participating companies. These are going to be Israel’s hottest web companies for 2008….

Here’s my post from last week: http://www.vccafe.com/2008/01/.....companies/

and here are some of the recent headlines:
* Exclusive Interview: Ten questions with the founder of TripTouch.com
*Arnold Schwarzenegger: your Israeli seed investment just raised $8M
* Overview: 16 Israeli companies at CES 2008 this week

So, for Israeli specific coverage, tech innovation and vc deal flow, I invite you to check out VC Cafe (www.vccafe.com)

Thanks,
Eze
nemrut

January 13th, 2008 at 3:16 pm

Curious how a country smaller than the state of Maine has such a high ratio of startups/access to capital…
carl

January 13th, 2008 at 4:34 pm

#51 look below

‘Un-American’
Google in HebrewOh, the conspiracy theorists will have a field day. The director of Google’s Haifa research center says, in an interview with Globes, a local business newspaper: “The thing is that essentially, Google is built on a certain degree of Israeli character that is very un-American.” To be sure, the R&D boss, Yoelle Maarek, refers, at least ostensibly, to the Mountain View search engine’s risk-taking culture, which is, presumably, akin to the boldness of an Israeli tank commander. But, for the more paranoid anti-semites, the quote will just confirm their worst fear: that the future has arrived, and the Jews got there first. It was bad enough that the leading PC maker, enterprise software company and operating system are all run by tech moguls (Michael Dell, Larry Ellison and Steve Ballmer) of Jewish origin. Now the cabal even organizes the information itself. Do no evil? That’s what they would say.
Craig Newmark

January 13th, 2008 at 11:23 pm

re #35, you’re right, “craigslist” not such a good name.

Craig
craig@craigslist.org
Why Israel?

January 14th, 2008 at 12:47 am

Nothing special about Israel, besides the fact that it’s a bunch of Jews.
Jews == Innovation, creativity, know how, brains, and entrepreneurial drive and spirit.
Let’s see just a partial list of the companies that define technology and their Jewish founders:
Google: both Google boys are Jewish (yes, Brin AND Page)
Facebook: Zuckerburg - definitely a Member of The Tribe…
Intel: Andy Grove - yap M.O.T. as well
Oracle: Larry Elliosn - got the Jewbone in him
Dell: Michael Dell - yes, there are Jews in Texas too
Craigslist: Craig Newmark, drank Manishevitz as a kid
IAC/InteractiveCtop: Barry Diller - in the Shool in Yum Kipur too
Mark Cuban - MOT
Microsoft: Steve Ballmer, CEO not a founder, but nevertheless MOT
EBay: Meg Whitman, MOT CEO

more…
Double Page Spread

January 14th, 2008 at 2:40 am

Marzipan From Toledo

Im not a comedian, so i care less about being funny. However, what I see going on now in Palestine should make any sane person ashamed, not proud. You know the Germans are still to this day paying pensions and compensation to the survivors of the holocaust. They are very ashamed of their history and I cannot help feeling that one day many innocent Israelis will feel the same.

Right now though I care more about the victims of your countries oppression than I do about not opening a can of worms. This is nothing personal, nor about individuals who have no control over their state, however, that does not extend to those who are ignorant as to the reality on the ground and who condone it.
wayayeman

January 14th, 2008 at 10:44 am

why has my earlier post been removed ?

several earlier posts should also be removed if thats the way u r going to operate - poor show guys !
Howard Jacobs

January 14th, 2008 at 3:19 pm

Qoof.com What a amazing idea and technology. I look forward to it going live so I can start Using it right away! Usermericals is the wave of the future after seeing Qoof I got very excited.

Howard
zzagen

January 15th, 2008 at 12:49 pm

Hi Hi… dont forget that in many israeli companies/start-up there are arab partners, like in NearConn.com…
Israeli Catholic

February 2nd, 2008 at 10:28 am

Jews have lots of brain… But no heart!
Rami

February 9th, 2008 at 10:22 pm

from what i heared, NearConn will be the surprise of this year. it’s a very special startup with a super special team…