ITGumbo: spicing IT up

During the week of July 6, 2008, news broke that Ness Technologies plans on selling its Israeli unit to SAP and there was a rumor that Google plans on buying VoIP service, Jajah. Virtualization companies Xeround and Ceedo were active, while in cleantech, environmentalists claimed that solar panel pricing is wrong. While these are some of the stories that stood out, they weren't the only ones. Check below for the full list of the 21 Israel-related technology headlines from the week of July 6, 2008.


Cleantech
Environmentalists: Solar panel pricing wrong

Israel helps China with wave power

For most Israeli contractors, green isn't an issue

Funding rises for clean-tech start-ups


Deals and Partnerships
Jacada Signs Material Contract with Nationwide Insurance

PicScout Teams up with Splash News to Give Bloggers Access to the Hottest, up-to-the Minute Celebrity Photos at picapp.com

InstallFree signs SaaS OEM agreement with Click Manageware

Ness Technologies set to sell Israeli unit to SAP

Google Buying Jajah?


Information Technology
Mellanox InfiniBand Adapters Provide Leading Storage Connectivity to Galactic Computing’s Line of VSTOR Storage Systems and Gateways

Virtualization is “Xeround” The Corner With An Extra $16 Million

VMware sets up new R&D centre in Israel

Hagemeyer Chooses Ceedo Virtualization Technology to Reduce Enterprise Costs and Streamline Day-to-Day Operations

Microsoft Going After MSN Israel Ltd.

MSN Israel employees had little warning of Microsoft moves


Miscellaneous
Israel's global firms employ 63,000 overseas

Walla, ICQ launch new communications program

Digital photo co PhotoFree raises NIS 2.84m

Oil hits record ($145.98) above $147 on Nigeria unrest, Israel / Iran tension

Sightix Offers B2B Social Networking Search Solution [Israel Media Tour]

Meet BreadCrumbz, An Israeli Finalist of The Adroid Developer Challenge



About the author: Lisa Damast is the Membership Manager of ebizQ.net and currently resides in Israel. Any questions or inquiries regarding this blog or ebizQ membership services can be directed to her via email at ldamast (at) ebizq (dot) net. She can also be followed on Twitter, where she covers additional Israeli technology companies and Israel-related headlines and topics.

Israel's hi-tech scene was in a bit of a lull during the week of June 29, 2008, perhaps because of July 4th in the United States. The biggest news was about Google AdWords killer, Peer39, which has a semantic search engine that brings back more accurate results and can thus display better ads. It also has the ability to differentiate between positive and negative contexts of words. After Peer39, Microsoft made headlines with two announcements. The first announcement was that it has partnered with Ben-Gurion University and the second was that MSN Israel will now be controlled fully by Microsoft and no longer jointly with Internet Gold. There was also a lot of technology investment-related news that took place. For these and the rest of the 12 technology-related headlines from the week of June 29, 2008, as well as a special bonus check below.


Technology
Microsoft and Ben-Gurion University of the Negev announce agreement

A First Look Inside Peer39 & Its Semantic Advertising Technology

Microsoft to take full charge of MSN Israel

Alvarion® Sets Off First Mobile WiMAX™ Internet Service in the U.S.


Business
Cleantech Index (CTIUS) Expands Globally, Adds 33 New Companies

Israel's high-tech culture must rejigger, VC says

Options trade points to stronger shekel

VMware Completes Acquisition of B-hive Networks

IncrediMail and Google Sign AdSense Direct Agreement

Metalink files to raise $25m


Miscellaneous
What Determines the Price of Oil?

Destination: San Francisco. And Still NoGoBoingo


Bonus
This past Tuesday, popular Israel Web 2.0 blog, the.co.ils hosted its annual web startup competition, TWS2008. Ten Israeli Web 2.0 companies were selected by an impressive list of judges and gave brief presentations about what they do. Some of the winners included, Nuconomy, Dapper, HiveSight and WorkLight. WorkLight securely brings personalized Web 2.0 into the enterprise. Here are two video clips of part of WorkLight's presentation:





About the author: Lisa Damast is the Membership Manager of ebizQ.net and currently resides in Israel. Any questions or inquiries regarding this blog or ebizQ membership services can be directed to her via email at ldamast (at) ebizq (dot) net. She can also be followed on Twitter, where she covers additional Israeli technology companies and Israel-related headlines and topics.

Compared to previous weeks, the week of June 8th was lacking a little in the major headlines coming from Israel. Perhaps the biggest story from the past week was Intel's announcement that it will be closing its Yokne'am R&D center as part of its overall refocus. Most employees will be relocated to the company's Haifa center instead. Also, recent headlines on the Internet show much skepticism of a mass-produced, main stream electric car in the near future, indirectly (and directly) giving a blow to Project Better Place. Other headlines included Metacafe's downsizing, Continuity Software offering new features in its disaster recovery and data protection software and 800 members of Israel's hi-tech community (including yours truly) coming together at Mashable's MashBash Tel Aviv. Alas, check out these stories and the rest of this week's 12 Israel-related technology headlines through the links below:

Cleantech
Japanese firms cast doubt on electric car

'Israeli technology may offer cheap solar power'

Pics: Solar Thermal Demo Plant Rises in Israeli Desert

Israeli expertise to shape global water standards


Information Technology
Yokne'am R&D center victim of Intel's refocus

Consultancy co Comsec wins information security contract

Business intelligence co HighView completes IAI project

Startup Continuity Software Now Checks Virtualization DR


Miscellaneous
Metacafe downsizes

Israeli company develops radar system that sees through walls

Mobile broadcaster Flixwagon hitches to iPhone

MashBash Tel Aviv - The Official Jewneric.com Report


About the author: Lisa Damast is the Membership Manager of ebizQ.net and currently resides in Israel. Any questions or inquiries regarding this blog or ebizQ membership services can be directed to her via email at ldamast (at) ebizq (dot) net. She can also be followed on Twitter, where she covers additional Israeli technology companies and Israel-related headlines and topics.

In recounting Yahoo! President, Susan Decker's remarks in my last post, a few things made me think about the role that Israel will have in the future of the Internet. As mentioned in that post, the topic of the panel that Decker, Sergey Brin, Rupert Murdoch, among others participated on, was, "What is the future of the new Internet media?"

Included in Decker's response to this was a reflection that while Yahoo! currently covers the "breadth" of the Internet, the future is in its "depth," such as processing speed, low costs storage, mass media distribution - three areas in which companies in Israel are constantly innovating.

For processing speed, one only has to think of the Intel chips that have been released in recent years and their original development here in Israel. Since Intel first opened an R&D lab in Haifa in the 1990s, Israeli researchers have developed the Dual-Core Intel Xeon Processor 5100 series, the first PC processor with a 8-bit 8088 bus, Intel Pentium MMX and Intel Centrino. Although the Haifa lab didn't develop the latest Penryn chip, it did play a part in determining how the "new chip micro-architecture could be manufactured on a commercial scale."  

The commercial success of Intel's chips have enabled not just more digital activity and productivity, but have also increased demand for low cost storage - several innovations of which, have also come from Israel. In the portable storage realm, Walletex has added a new dimension to USB drive storage devices with its credit card-styled and -sized 4GB and 8GB storage devices. Its devices also have the technology to receive automatic updates from the Internet when plugged in and connected to the Internet. G.ho.st, a web-based operating system that acts as a virtual desktop, provides users with 5 GB of free storage that can be uploaded to the virtual desktop.

Storage on a virtual desktop isn't the only free online storage idea coming from Israel though - eSnips, the multimedia and storage social network, allows its users to not just upload up to 5 GB of data for free, but to also utilize its mass media distribution features, such as document and media file storing and handling, for other users to access and share. While this is a hybrid of low cost storage and mass media distribution, pure mass media distribution websites in Israel include MetaCafe and AniBoom. Both sites rely on user-generated and -submitted short film content, regular and animated, respectively and active participation in their communities.

It is the active participants of these communities that make it likely that these three mass media sites leaders in the present Internet media will continue to play a crucial part in shaping the future of the Internet and Internet media. The social networking aspects of these sites help inspire innovation here in Israel in ways that almost guarantee that these sites will reach and maintain the "depth" of the new Internet that Decker was talking about and which Yahoo! is still seeking.


About the author: Lisa Damast is the Membership Manager of ebizQ.net and currently resides in Israel. Any questions or inquiries regarding this blog or ebizQ membership services can be directed to her via email at ldamast (at) ebizq (dot) net. She can also be followed on Twitter, where she covers additional Israeli technology companies and Israel-related headlines and topics. 

As mentioned in my previous post, I attended the Presidential Conference in Jerusalem this past Thursday. One of the sessions that I attended was a panel discussion entitled, "The Revolution of the Internet and the New Media." The panel was moderated by Yossi Vardi and the panelists included, Yahoo! President, Susan Decker; Google Co-founder, Sergey Brin; Publicis Groupe Chairman and CEO, Maurice Levy; News Corporation Chairman and CEO, Rupert Murdoch; and Windsor Media Chairman and CEO, Terry Semel. The question posed to the panelists was "What is the future of the new Internet media?"

While the panelists were able to paint an overall picture of what the relationship between the Internet and media will probably look like in the future, only Susan Decker's comments really stood out. She began by mentioning that "the more things change, the more they stay the same." She discussed the importance of the Internet for essentials and mentioned that while Yahoo! currently covers the "breadth" of the Internet, the future is in the "depth," such as processing speed, low costs storage, mass media distribution.

In relation to mass media distribution and the role that it will play, she emphasized the personal connection that will be widespread in the future, and how it will affect news and TV in the future. This new media, dubbed "we" media, will allow individuals to define news and entertainment and receive it for themselves based on their own personal interests and then to share it with their entire social graph. What role Yahoo! will play in this, is still a major question. In reference to that, Decker concluded by stating that with over 500 million users, Yahoo! is both the largest social network and the least useful, and that the social graph will be used in the future to prioritize one's information and interactions with others through it.

The means of attaining this in the future are what IT professionals should keep an eye on and try to really understand:
1. Creating open experience - figuring out the how and where.
2. Highly personal filters that are user generated and customized.
3. The connection of the online and off-line worlds and the digitization of everything.

(Note: Picture is of the stage before the panelists arrived.)

Globes is reporting that EyeBlaster, an online advertising campaign developer, has filed for an Initial Public Offering (IPO) on Nasdaq, and that it is the first company with Israel-ties to do so in a while.

According to the company's original news release, its software allows its customers

to manage campaigns across digital media channels, including online, mobile and in-game, and a variety of formats, including rich media, in-stream video, display and search.

EyeBlaster Rich Media, enables the creation, deployment and management of in-banner and out-of-banner ad formats, such as an expandable banner, a polite banner, a push down banner and a full-page overlay ad.

EyeBlaster's primary competitors are Google's DoubleClick and Microsoft's Atlas. According to the Matimop database, EyeBlaster's target end users are interactive ad agencies, media buyers, infrastructure suppliers and individual publishers.

Below is an edition of the Hawthorne Videoactive Report on YouTube from last month that mentions some of EyeBlaster's recent research findings. The first 36 seconds of the report cover EyeBlaster.



Company Facts:

Founded in 1999.

R&D based in Ra'anana.

Gal Trifon - Co-founder and CEO.

Ofer Zadikario - Co-founder and Chief Solution Officer (CSO).

Products: EyeBlaster Ad Campaign Manager, EyeBlaster Rich Media, EyeBlaster Search, etc.

Website: www.eyeblaster.com


Related ITGumbo content:

AT&T acquisitions and the future of business

Quigo on the sales block

AOL does it again: Purchases Yedda

ClickTale Ltd. takes web analytics to the next level

PLYmedia gets reply


About the author: Lisa Damast is the Membership Manager of ebizQ.net and currently resides in Israel. Any questions or inquiries regarding this blog or ebizQ membership services can be directed to her via email at ldamast (at) ebizq (dot) net. She can also be followed on Twitter, where she covers additional Israeli technology companies and Israel-related headlines and topics.

BeInSync Ltd., a user-driven data management company based in Israel, has announced that it was "selected by the editors of Webware, a CNET site, as a finalist in this year’s 'Webware 100' Awards for Utility & Security."

According to the BeInSync website, BeInSync Business (Professional) management software boosts the productivity of mobile workforce, small teams and telecommuters by deploying a,

reliable online backup, synchronization, access and sharing services to 5-1,000 users within minutes and with virtually no IT investment.

The software provides security through encryption and is "transferred directly between the different user computers." It is easy to activate as it is wizard-based and "synchronization works automatically in the background and does not require any user intervention."

IT professionals looking to cut spending costs and for freedom from relying on different applications to manage data collaboration can find an all-in-one solution in BeInSync Business. 

 
What is Webware?

Webware (www.webware.com) provides the latest information on Web 2.0 sites, services, and applications. Its timely and relevant blog entries about hundreds of web-based services, such as wikis, blogs, and social networking sites, help users determine the best products for them to use in their daily lives.

Voting on the Webware site is going on now.


Company Facts
Founded in 2002.

Motti Vaknin, CEO.

Sharon Carmel, Founder & Vice President of R&D.

Products: BeInSync Professional and Business Editions.

Website: www.beinsync.com.


Related ebizQ and ITGumbo content:
2Win-Solutions.
Company in Focus: XIV.
Company in Focus: Voltaire Ltd.


About the author: Lisa Damast is the Membership Manager of ebizQ.net and currently resides in Israel. Any questions or inquiries regarding this blog or ebizQ membership services can be directed to her via email at ldamast (at) ebizq (dot) net. She can also be followed on Twitter, where she covers additional Israeli technology companies and Israel-related headlines and topics.

In the past few months, several start-ups focused on video overlay products and solutions have made headlines. One such company, the Israel-based PLYmedia, was one of 15 selected companies that participated in the Israel Web Tour 2008 in California earlier this month and was recently mentioned in a post on NewTeeVee as being one of Overlay.tv's competitors.

However, whereas Overlay.tv targets consumers, PLYmedia is more oriented towards businesses. According to the PLYmedia website, PLYmedia,

"delivers web video publishers and broadcasters a range of applications focused on a new movement towards personalized, enhanced and interactive web video technology by bringing new context and meaning to video.

Through the development and deployment of its interactive, multi-dimensional web video platform - PLYplatform™,
PLYmedia's applications,

"transform standard web videos into interactive, multi-dimensional and personalized user experiences."

How does it benefit businesses? The website states that,

"by adding new layers or "PLYs" of contextual content such as advertisements, subtitles, pop-up bubbles and other layered content to existing web videos, our platform and technology creates exciting new revenue streams for content providers, increasing their ROI and their user base." 

IT professionals searching for online media solutions that can increase their company's ROI and user base should consider the benefits of PLYmedia. For any professionals, IT or not, who are still wondering what exactly a "PLY" is or who enjoy watching entertaining promo videos, below is a teaser that the company created about itself before the 2008 Israel Web Tour.




Company Facts

Founded in 2006.

Ben Enosh, CEO.

Yuval Klein, COO and President.

Products: subPLY, bubblePLY, adPLY,  infoPLY, PLYapps

Website: www.plymedia.com 

Last week, 15 Israeli web companies had the opportunity to meet with investors and various executives in Silicon Valley, CA during the Israel Web Tour 2008. ClickTale Ltd., one of the selected 15, was chosen to participate for its innovative technology that allows Website owners and staff to record, watch and analyze user behavior on their sites as part of its hosted service.

According to ClickTale CEO, Tal Schwartz's LinkedIn profile,

"ClickTale (www.clicktale.com) is a web analytics service that captures and analyzes customer interactions inside web pages, revolutionizing traditional web analytics that measure activity between pages. ClickTale records and plays back customer's every online interaction, every mouse movement, click, scroll, keystroke, and window resize. Subscribers to ClickTale have been able to increase revenues and improve usability by minimizing abandonment of shopping carts, maximizing completion of online forms, optimizing landing pages, and running usability testing."

ClickTale's software can provide IT professionals with vital business intelligence to help meet the company's bottom line. 


Company Facts

Founded in 2006.

Dr. Tal Schwartz, Co-Founder & CEO.

Arik Yavilevich, Co-Founder and CTO.

Website: www.clicktale.com

Mark Hendrickson of TechCrunch posted about the Flash WYSIWYG editor, Sprout yesterday and included invites to use the beta version to the first 200 readers who signed up through a link on TechCrunch. So far, the general sentiment among those who have tested it out is that it is, in fact, very easy to make Websites and widgets (mini web-programs/gadgets on sites that users can interact with, such as weather boxes) among other things.

While Sprout is getting a lot of attention, it is not a new idea and already faces some direct competition. A few months ago, TechCrunch along with several Israeli-technology focused blogs posted about the Israel-based Flash WYSIWYG Web-based editor, Wix. At the time, Wix was still in stealth mode and didn't offer much information on its Website. If you go to the site now, however, most of its features are visible to viewers, and it is quite impressive. The site is still in beta, but anyone can sign up to receive more information and be invited in future beta invitation rounds.

Technology professionals should keep an eye on Sprout and Wix, as both sites can make creating and spreading widgets less time consuming and more cost-efficient. Adam Metz has posted a good overview of enterprise widgets and their benefits on his blog, MetzMash.

It should be interesting to see how these companies will do and how the enterprise industry will embrace and use their services.


Company Facts
Has been in beta since October 2007.

Giora Kaplan, Co-Founder.

Avishai Abrahami, Co-Founder.

Nadav Abrahami, Co-Founder.

Website: www.wix.com