Israel’s Government, Tech Industry brace for U.S. tax reform impact, supported by a first position paper by IATI's Government Relations Committee, claiming that the lowered U.S. tax rate could encourage companies to set up shop in the U.S instead of in Israel.

Click for media coverage of the policy update: TheMarker news item, TheMarker weekly column, The Times of Israel, Calcalist - English version, Hebrew version. 
 

IATI reported end March some significant milestone agreements in achieved with the Israeli Tax Authority, concerning Preliminary Approvals for Foreign Investors. These approvals were frozen for a few months which made the funds' work difficult. IATI addressed the subject working closely with the Tax Authority and has achieved some important points:
- Previously given approvals remain unchanged. 
- New requests for approvals will include some basic criteria on the foreign investors' tax position in their current land.
-In the case that 90% or more of the foreign investors in the fund are not tax-refundable in their current land, they will receive exemption from paying tax in Israel.
In the days following the agreement we have already seen some tax arrangement being signed promptly.
IATI will continue to co-work with the Tax Authority on setting new laws and regulations to widen the tax exemption of foreign residents. 
We thank Att. Dr. Ayal Shenhav, Att. (Acc.) Eldar Ben-Ruby (Meitar) and Acc. Amit Oring (E&Y) from IATI's Legal & Accounting Committee. 
   

250,000 school children participated in our National Cyber Championship we led with the Ministry of Education. This is the 3rd year of the championship, which is a part of our long term activity for the promotion of STEM education and encouragement of diversity within the tech industry. The finals included 350 schools from all over Israel.
IATI Co-Chair Erez Tzur said at the event that the championship is the globally leading youth cyber competition which helps sowing the seeds of Israeli advanced technologies. We thank Ofer Rimon and Iris Tzur from the Ministry of Education and their teams; Shahar Bar-Or, leader of the IATI MNC Forum Education Committee, and the committee members; and our mentors who helped train the children on their way to the great finals. 

Click for all info on the 2018 IATI Cyber Championship finals: videos, photos, press items and more. 

 

The Youth Start-Up Championship of Ministry of Education and IATI took place in March - the winners, chosen out of 1,200 participants from all over Israel, presented their innovations to leading industry and investment top executives. We are glad to promote tomorrow's young tech talents, as a part of our continuous effort we lead for STEM education and greater diversity in Israel High-Tech industry. We thank Ofer Rimon form the Ministry of Education and Taasiyeda.  

 

This year, the 6th annual IATI MNC Hackathon was themed Education Tech. Top developers from 10 Israeli R&D centers met and collaborated in mixed groups at this globally unique IATI event. We congratulate the winning team, Play Ground, and thank the teams for their great team spirit and comprehensive ideas. As a leading force in combining education and technology in Israel, IATI is glad to grow new & innovative ideas in the field.

We warmly thank the participating MNCs: AT&T, Corning, eBay, Google, Intuit, Marvell, Micro Focus, Motorola, RedHat, and Siemens. Many thanks to the industry mentors and to Ms. Ayelet Gradman. See you at next year's IATI hackathon!

Click for the event page - with photo albums (preperation day, event day), team presentations and press coverage.  
 

Check out the special IATI Member discount registration prices!

Find more about our special offer for non-member life science start-ups! 
 

The Education Work Group of IATI's MNF Forum gathered for its quarterly meeting, in the presence of IATI's Co-Chair Erez Tzur, and Shahar Bar-Or of Western Digital. The group discussed preperations for National Cyber Championship as well as other project now being developed, such as deepening IATI's co-operation with the Ministry of Education with the High-Tech Excellent Program.  

IATI co-led Digital Health 2018 Conference together with SNC and EY. 

​Click for presentations from the Digital Health 2018 Conference.

IATI CEO Karin Mayer Rubinstein spoke at the demo day of Kama-Tech start-up accelerator, led by Moshe Friedman and Avreimi Weingut. During the event' 10 Haredi start-ups presented for hundreds of investors and industry to execs. Later on a panel took place, IATI, founder and manager the committee for Haredi in high-tech, is proud to be a leading and suporting force in what concerns promoting tech entrepreneurship among Haredi pupulation, and enlarging diversity in within the industry.  
 

IATI and the Ministry of Economy's first Korean VC Forum took place last week, and allowed 100 Israeli start-ups to meet up with 12 leading Korean VC funds. We are proud to keep connecting Israeli innovation with Korean tech industry, through our important co-operation with Korean Venture Capital Association. We thank Head of Foreign Trade Administration Ohad Cohen, Head of Israel Economic and Trade Mission to Seoul Shay Feller, and Director Of Asia Pacific at Foreign Trade Administration Noa Heinemann.

Click for the full event press coverage.

We were honored to host Mr. James Patchett, President & CEO of the New York City Economic Development Corporation and his team for a festive dinner, where we brainstormed and shared best practices with top executives of leading Israeli high-tech and life science companies. It was a pleasure to connect NYCEDC with the local tech ecosystem, a connection which will surely lead to great future collaborations.

Over 100 Italian ICT and Biotech start-ups asked to inquire about Israeli ecosystem and IATI, and over 300 Italian-Israeli B2B meeting were held, in a special conference in the Italian region Puglia. The official Israeli delegation to the conference, sponsored by the Italian Trade Agency and co-selected with IATI, visited innovative companies in Puglia, in order to evaluate future bilateral co-operations. The B2B event was held in the presence of Ms. Sharon Kabalo, Minister Counselor for Economic and Scientific Affairs of the Israeli Embassy in Rome, and managed by IATI's team. We thank the Italian Trade Agency, the office of Industrial Cooperation and International Organizations in Rome and in Tel Aviv, and the Apulian Region Council for Economic Development.

Lonza invited early stage life science start-ups to be IATI members for FREE - for one year. 16 companies were selected and have already started to to enjoy the benefits of an IATI membership.We're happy to have you on board!