Tiny Israel The Economic And Technology Giant

[JStone]

Israel: Techonomy Success

Israel’s founding fathers must be proud. After all, the spirit in which the country was created, with tenacity and against all odds, is not too different from the way an entrepreneur creates and nurtures a startup. So in a world where oil is king, Israel is proving that hard work and ingenuity are just as formidable, if not more.

For a Middle Eastern country, Israel has very little oil. But what it lacks in natural resources, it has made up for in human resourcefulness.

The tiny nation of 7 million people is a much-envied model of technology entrepreneurialism. So much so that it is globally acknowledged as the “Startup Nation.” Indeed, Israel is believed to attract more venture capital per person than any other country and more NASDAQ IPOs have been filed from Israel than any country outside the U.S.

Snaptu, a phone apps maker founded in 2007, was acquired by Facebook last month. In fact, high-profile companies have gobbled up quite a long list of Israeli startups over the past year. In September 2010, AOL bought video content provider 5Min Media and Google took over Quiksee, which has developed the technology to integrate personal videos into Google Maps. The same month Russian search engine Yandex invested a substantial sum in face recognition application provider Face.com.
But this is not just a recent trend. Since 1972 when medical imaging venture Elscint became Israel's first company to file a NASDAQ IPO, at least 160 Israeli startups have filed

IPOs at the technology stock exchange, hundreds of Israeli ventures have been acquired, and the world has benefited from Israeli innovations such as the USB memory stick, instant messaging, and advanced cardiac stents. Even non-Israeli technology giants such as Intel and Microsoft have grown on the back of their operations in Israel. In fact, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has been quoted as saying that Microsoft is “an Israeli company as much as an American company," given the size and importance of its Israeli teams.
Israeli tech startups | Israeli venture capital industry | Techonomy success marks revival of startup culture

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4KHZFp-4DE4&feature=related]Start-up Nation: The Story of Israel's Economic Miracle - YouTube[/ame]