Even during the profound challenges taking place in Israel and the war in Gaza, OurCrowd continues to operate and provide services to its customers. Following the start of the war, OurCrowd announced the Israel Resilience Fund, and today, it is announcing the first close of the vehicle that aims to support Israel’s tech sector. OurCrowd is the leading venture investor in Israel, and its marketplace offers smaller investors to participate in early-stage investments in Israel and around the world.
According to a note from OurCrowd, eight initial investments have been made following more than $13 million in investments for the Fund. In total, the Fund seeks to raise $50 million and will use the money to support companies directly impacted by the crisis or by backing firms providing solutions of need like emergency medicine or reconstruction.
OurCrowd said it would waive all management fees and carried interest to support the Fund. The company said this is on the fastest closing venture funds – ever.
The first recipients of investments include:
- BlueTree, a company that has developed proprietary technology to reduce sugar in natural beverages. The company was recently evacuated from its facility in Kiryat Shmona near the Lebanon border;
- Carrar, experts in EV battery thermal management systems. The company was forced to relocate from its headquarters in Sderot near Gaza;
- Edgybees, utilizing satellite and motion imagery to deliver actionable insights currently in use to save lives;
- Verobotics, utilizing an autonomous robot for building exterior upkeep and proactive maintenance, whose key staff are serving in the reserves.
The Israel Resilience Fund hopes to catalyze co-investments from other OurCrowd funds, VCs, and investors in its global network, as well as potentially from government matching programs.
“Resilience Fund investments are catalyzing a ‘snowball effect” whereby the money being deployed is attracting and enabling up to 5X or 10X in additional funding, which will have a real impact on the targeted companies,” said Cali Chill, head of funds at OurCrowd.
Jeff Kupietzky, who recently sold his company Jeeng to OpenWeb for $100 million, will manage the Fund.
Other investment partners include Noam Kaiser, a former Partner at Intel Capital, and Liat Sverdlov, a Partner with the OurCrowd Investments Team.
Kupietzky said that many companies are experiencing shortened runways – first because of the terrible economic environment and exacerbated by the war.
“Startups do not know when international investors will resume investing in Israeli startups as they wait for the conflict to subside. Additionally, companies face operational challenges with key personnel called up to the military reserves, while evacuations and rocket fire pose a challenge to daily business operations. Companies resiliently continue, yet many need financing to extend runways through the crisis and power their ultimate success,” said Kupietzky.
Jon Medved, OurCrowd Founder and CEO, stated:
“Many venture-backed companies in Israel are already struggling due to the global venture slowdown and now face even more serious obstacles due to the war in Gaza, requiring immediate, focused investment. The Israel Resilience Fund will seek to create outsized returns for investors by taking advantage of discounted valuations in the current market, while supporting numerous Israeli companies to survive the crisis and flourish in the long run. As Israel’s most active VC, with hundreds of direct portfolio companies, OurCrowd is uniquely positioned to deploy capital immediately into a large pool of companies.”
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