Ron Porat has an odd business card, a metal rectangle made up of tools to pick locks, take the money and run.
“Yes, I can do that, but if I wanted to steal, I wouldn’t be talking about it with you,” says Porat, the CEO of Hacktics, an Israeli firm doing applications security and software and infrastructure testing, with unconventional thinking that matches his gold hoop earring.
“Picking locks is old fashioned, but cracking bank websites and user accounts is another specialty of ours and very up-to-date. We don’t do that either. But in Israel, we do what I would call…chutzpa technology.”
Porat smiles and looks around at the luxury setting of the Paris Chamber of Commerce. He and Hacktics partner Ofer Maor are fresh on the heels of a joint venture signed with Quotium, a mid-sized independent French and European firm doing application critical performance management solutions.
Both Quotium and Hacktics were two star companies at the recent annual IT security forum organized by the CCFI, the France-Israel Chamber of Commerce, and business bridge builder (BBB) Dominique Bourra, CEO of NanoJV.
Porat and Maor do a little business in Eastern Europe and a lot in the US, with Microsoft, for example, but the Paris security forum was their first real venture into western Europe. The JV with Quotium is the structure for working with big French and European groups.
The financial crisis as opportunity
Quotium CEO Michel Tiberini, also a sponsor of the Paris security forum, was very direct in his praise of the Israelis in general. “Israeli companies face IT security problems every day, and not exclusively military,” he commented. “The IT security is often a mirror of measures taken on the ground. They must find solutions every day.”
The current crisis was on the minds of the more than 15 small Israeli firms and 20 French giants and mid-sized firms participating in this eighth annual forum organized by the CCFI. Also present was Louis Gallois, the CEO of French-German industrial giant EADS that builds, among other things, Airbus aircraft. He spoke over lunch, a decidedly four-star French affair (though the wine served was Israeli: Millenium white and Barkan classic red).
Emanuel Benzaquen, CEO of Checkmarx, a leading Israeli developer of source code analysis (SCA) technologies and another forum star, has a positive spin on the crisis.
“There will be more IT regulations and PCI standards than before due to the crisis,” he said. “Our software helps industrial and service giants comply with all the changes. We are part of the solution.”
In native French and fluent English, Benzaquen attempted to explain to a non-engineer the nature of source code analysis technology, SCA, and cloud computing. He called SCA a young field in its second generation dominated by Israelis, after a first dominated by the Americans.
Born in France of Moroccan origins and one of the very few forum participants to wear a kippa, Benzaquen spent his formative professional years in California’s Silicon Valley. As a start-up builder, he says he lives mostly on planes, without stipulating in business or economy class. He also says he still has family in Casablanca and Marrakech, but that is another story.
“Classic IT security has always been with firewalls and anti-virus technology and the like,” he begins, “but we say that developer codes must be tested at the source. Everything begins with the application. If the code is not tested, it can be broken.”
Cloud computing involves developing codes on an outside host, such as the Internet, and also needs security, he tries to explain in plain English and French. Benzaquen knows this is big. Only a month after landing in France, he signed a licensee contract for Checkmarx SCA technology with a French service giant. The name of the giant?
“Sorry,” says Benzaquen, as the second round table was ending and he and other guests were heading for the banqueting room. He remarks that the name of the first giant US firm he signed with last year has not yet been revealed either. But he does note that he is extending his current road show in France.
Great synergy, little business
Louis Gallois went on to explain a modern-day corporate dilemma. “We must build factories in China to be close to our market there,” he said over the delicious veal and potato gratin main course, “but we know that the Chinese want very much to copy everything we are doing. So, IT security must be a top priority.”
Gallois did not tell the gathering if he had ever visited Israel, and refused to go into detail about the military work EADS does there.
Knowledgeable observers of France-Israel relations ask, if the synergy is so great, how is it that France is not even in the top five European countries for trade turnover and volume with Israel, and lags far behind leaders Great Britain and Germany?
“Israel is simply off the radar of many big French companies,” said Daniel Rouach, himself a BBB (business bridge builder), and a professor at the prestigious ESEC business school in Paris. He made aliyah more than 25 years ago and every year breaks his own record of round trips between France and Israel. He is also the founder and head of the IsraelValley website of the CCFI..
“Twenty-one of the CAC-40 companies are not present in Israel,” he continued, “and that is why the figures are lower than for other countries.”
He explained that giant groups dominate business in France, whereas the German model features many more mid- to small-sized companies that work a great deal with Israel. “The big groups in France are not comfortable with the unstable political situation in Israel,” Rouach said.
“There is a big business culture difference,” notes the head of Bioos, Mauro Israel, a French IT security expert and consultant. “The big French groups thrive on repeat contracts and markets, stable supply and demand.. They function in closed buying and selling circles. The Israelis are constantly scrambling for their markets.”
He says the crisis is shaking up supply and offer patterns. “Remember, IT hackers are not in a crisis,” he said. “They are working full time. This is a good opportunity for Israeli companies with solid technology offers, especially in the source code analysis field. The French need new suppliers now, but the Israelis must get out there and build bases in Europe.” <
Get personal
Also present was Isabelle Tisserand, the coordinator of the European Security Circle, organizer of the biggest annual IT security conference in Europe that just took place in Monaco. She had a few cultural comments of her own.
“I think we are seeing that the cultural corporate constraints between France and other countries such as Israel, the big groups on one hand and small start-ups on the other, for example, can be dealt with intelligently,” she said over lunch. “We can do business and maintain our differences.”
“I am hearing good things here,” noted David Hava, head of the Israeli MIW consortium of IT security companies. “There is real demand on both sides.” Leaving the dining hall and heading for the afternoon one-to-one meetings, where half the consortium’s 15 firms were present, he added, “I want to double Israeli participation in this forum next year. I think demand will remain very high with everyone waist-deep in the crisis.”
And as the one-to-one meetings got underway, the three head honchos of the France Israel Chamber of Commerce were holding their own mini-summit over coffee (but no more cigars inside the building).
“I think it is obvious that Gallois and EADS do not need Israelis to sell planes,” said Michel Kaufman. “I think the real question is, how do we get past the armies of VPs and purchasing managers in the big groups and reach the CEOs like Gallois?” said CCFI President Henri Cukierman. “The meetings, contact groups, and dinners we have done over the years have been dynamic and positive, but the figures for France-Israel business are bad, to be blunt about it.”
He turned in his chair and listened to the low buzz coming from the conference room.
“Gentlemen, I think we must get personal about this mission,” he continued. “We must take the CEOs and their wives to Israel for three intense days, take them around to the start-up founders, have them meet quietly with a minister, show them the contrast between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem and the view from Haifa, and put them in a helicopter for an overview. They don’t have to love the Israelis nor to try to understand the politics there. But they can learn to respect the work the Israelis do and how it would benefit the giant French groups to work with them.”
“We have to go beyond the Jewish connection thing, which is useful but not enough,” added André Maarek. “We must create a kind of personal respect between all the big group CEOs and Israel,” continued Cukierman. “We have to do this quietly for a number of reasons, and I think the chamber can do it. The best case scenario would be, the CEOs return to France and give the order, go Israeli!”
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes.co.il - on November 26, 2008
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2008