Israel tech investment, with a side of shmoozing

“Is Israel a good investment?” 

That, as Roy Weiler, an Israel-born consultant now living in Los Angeles put it, was the question the Israel Conference had been convened to answer. 

Now in its sixth year, the conference attracted hundreds of investors and entrepreneurs for speeches, panel discussions and plenty of networking in an attempt to answer that query in the affirmative. It took place Oct. 30 and 31 at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles.

The data on investor confidence in Israel speaks for itself. According to the Israel Venture Capital Research Center, Israeli high-tech companies, the focus of the conference’s first day of programming, raised $2.3 billion in 2013 from local and foreign investors, the largest amount in 10 years.

And now, it seems, California is jumping on the bandwagon. That, at least, was the subject of the conference’s kickoff panel, which covered this year’s memorandum of understanding between the state and Israel. With two-way trade between the two parties totaling more than $4 billion in 2013, an agreement was signed in March to promote further cooperation on things like water conservation and resource renewal. 

Panelist Glenn Yago, a senior fellow at the Milken Institute, told the audience that Israel recycles 83 percent of its water. The United States, by comparison, only recycles 5 percent, and drought-stricken California recycles even less. 

The panel was followed by a Q-and-A with Noam Bardin, the CEO of Waze. Part mobile navigation app, part social media sensation, Waze was acquired by Google in June 2013 for about $1 billion and has come to symbolize success for legions of Israeli startups. 

Bardin spoke about the transition to Google and what he saw as the essential difference between small startups and big corporations. At startups, there is what Bardin described as a “religious fever” for the product, that “one reason for living, which is the product.” Corporations, on the other hand, are more focused on servicing their brand. 

“I think, as large companies go, Google is definitely the best company to be at. But it is still a very large company,” he said.

Bardin’s Q-and-A was followed by several sessions on new technology, many of which addressed, among other things, the emerging “Internet of Things” (IoT). IoT is a buzzword among techies that describes a not-so-distant future in which everything with an on-switch can connect to the Internet. 

So, for a company like Tekoia, which introduced the conference to a mobile app that can remotely control all Wi-Fi-enabled electronics, this may eventually mean customers can program their dishwasher from their phone. It may also mean vendors can advertise a new dishwasher on the same phone, in part by tracking customer usage. 

One speaker’s presentation had a decidedly political slant. Steven Pressfield read from his book “The Lion’s Gate,” which tells the story of the Six-Day War though the eyes of the Israeli soldiers who served in it. 

Networking breaks punctuated the two days of programming, but even during sessions, the patio outside the conference hall hummed with activity. There was a healthy balance between people looking for money and people with money to invest. 

Yechiel Kurtz, after a demonstration of his voice-recognition product VocalZoom, was greeted with four business cards upon returning to his seat. Similarly, the CEO of Bites (bites.tv), which drives and tracks audience engagement through online polling, got an introduction to a major potential client — The Wall Street Journal, whose deputy editor-in-chief, Rebecca Blumenstein, had been called in to moderate two of the panels. 

Donray Von, a media investor who consulted for hit artists like Outkast and The Roots, was also pleased with the turnout: “I met people from Atlanta, Tel Aviv, Silicon Valley, Texas. That is the network effect.” 

Friday’s proceedings inside the Skirball Cultural Center’s packed Ahmanson Hall were heavily Hollywood-themed. Panels composed of entertainment heavyweights took the stage to discuss Israel’s influence on stateside content development and the evolution of exciting tech in the Holy Land. 

The conference’s co-chair and chairman of International Technologies, Yossi Vardi, moderated the Power On! television panel, which featured executive power couple Jennifer and Bert Salke, the presidents of NBC Entertainment and Fox 21, respectively, as well as Oasis Media Group CEO David Lonner. 

The panel examined the root cause behind Hollywood’s recent trend of taking Israeli shows and adapting them for American audiences, as has been the case with hits like “In Treatment” (HBO), “Homeland” (Showtime), “Hostages” (CBS) and “Rising Star” (ABC). While on the topic, Vardi jokingly prodded the company heads beside him on stage, asking, “Why did it take you guys in Hollywood 2,000 years to do this?”

“The culture, the fact that young people are all in service, creates for deeper thinking and an informed culture. You see the results of that in the creative work,” Jennifer Salke said.  

The conference’s other co-chair and managing director of STEP Strategy Advisors, Sharona Justman, welcomed to the stage participants in the App-solutely program, which focused on rising newcomers in the application development world. Featured apps included Samba, which records video of your friends’ reactions to messages you send them, and Nutrino, an app that helps you determine health goals and can even recommend dishes at restaurants that fit  your dietary needs.

Late on Friday afternoon, as the conference drew to a close, Justman reflected on what she deemed a massive success: “Our conference now has such pull that we attract all the top CEOs who I ask, and [they]actually want to be here. We are a quality conference focusing on Israel. If you want to do business with Israel, we want you here, whether you’re 18 or 88.” 

Yael Swerdlow, co-founder and CEO of Los Angeles-based Snapcious, a mobile brand platform and photo challenge, was thoroughly impressed with what the conference had to offer general attendees. 

“I’ve been to over 50 conferences in the past five years and I’ve been shoved off to green room after green room,” she said. “Nothing compares to this and the openness, the proximity to everyone. If one-tenth of what I did here works out, you’ll be reading about us next.”