BIRD-F approves $15m investments in 16 projects

Among the US participants: Texas Instruments, J&J, Nortel, Motorola, Gore, Delta & PineLand, Ciba, Molex and Spansion.

At its recent Board of Governors meeting held on last week in Washington DC, the Israel-U.S. Binational Industrial Research and Development Foundation (BIRD-F) approved investments totaling approximately $15 million in sixteen new projects with a combined budget of nearly $43 million.

Nine major U.S. corporations were successfully recruited to invest in BIRD-F funded projects in conjunction with Israeli companies. The leading US companies participating in this round are: Texas Instruments, Johnson & Johnson, Nortel, Motorola, Gore, Delta & PineLand, Ciba, Molex and Spansion.

These investments represent a portion of the over $230 million that BIRD-F has invested in nearly 700 projects generating direct and indirect sales of over $8 billion.

BIRD-F promotes strategic partnerships between Israeli and American companies in various technological fields. BIRD-F assists, free of charge, in the identification of strategic partners for development of a joint product.

BIRD-F works in full cooperation with the Chief Scientist’s Office at the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Employment in Israel, and with the U.S. Commerce Department’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)

Approximately half of the projects approved in this round are in communications and micro-electronics. Global market leaders like Nortel, Motorola, Spansion, Molex, and Texas Instruments, are partners in these projects. Four of the approved projects are in life sciences, with market leaders Johnson & Johnson, Gore, and Delta & PineLand.

One of the leading projects, between Israeli Compugen and Ortho-Clinical Diagnostics, a J&J subsidiary, is for discovery and development of markers for the diagnosis of several cancers and of congestive heart failure. Over 30% of BIRD-F investments are in life sciences.

BIRD-F executive director Dov Hershberg expressed his satisfaction with the large number of projects approved and the participation of leading global players in BIRD's projects. "The large number of approved projects re-confirms Israel's solid technological base. The participation of industry leaders like Nortel, J&J, Motorola, Texas Instruments, Ciba, Spansion, Gore, and others in BIRD-funded projects reflects the attractiveness of these projects and the value these companies attribute to collaborating with Israeli partners."

"Among the participating Israeli companies there are quite a few cutting edge companies such as Cima Nanotech, Compugen, Ceragon, Discretix, Elbit Systems, Visionix, Nexense, Wisair and others."

Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes.co.il - on Tuesday, June 28, 2005

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