21Ventures LLC, a New York-based venture capital fund, today announced that based on the recent conflicts in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, the company is changing its current investment strategy to focus primarily on Israeli startups.
Currently, 21Ventures has $15M across 11 portfolio companies, 3 located in Israel and 8 in the United States. Henceforth, the fund will concentrate financing on Israeli startups, expressly to bridge the gap between The Chief Scientist of Israel's Ministry of Industry, Trade and Labour grant funding and institutional venture capital investments. 21Ventures also announced that it projects an additional $15M investment of seed financing in Israel over the next 18 months.
In making today's announcement, David Anthony, Founder and Managing Partner of 21Ventures, explained the company's new business strategy. "Israel has always been an attractive market for technology investors, but due to the recent events in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, both individual and corporate investors from America, Europe and Asia have already stopped and will continue to stop traveling to Israel to investigate and review investment opportunities there. Furthermore, over the past five years, Israeli VCs have continued to make later stage investments. Therefore, a tremendous financing void exists - a gap that 21Ventures plans to fill.
"The recent events in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip prove that the conflict in the Middle East is not going away anytime soon. And, the costs associated with Israel's military operations will continue to escalate - forcing budget cuts across all government institutions, including The Chief Scientist of Israel's Ministry of Industry, Trade and Labour, a multi-billion dollar source of funding for technology startups. Even though budgets will be slashed and the conflict will continue, Israeli scientists and entrepreneurs won't be deterred from their historical tradition of technological innovation. Here again, 21Ventures sees a tremendous opportunity for investment in Israel's vast technology resources, specifically their startups."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes.co.il - on August 29, 2006
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