Religious Anglos' high-tech underground
By Oded Hermoni

From Ha'aretz

August 7, 2000
On a typical Saturday morning, the congregation in the Hatzvi Yisrael synagogue in Jerusalem's Talbieh neighborhood looks like a convention of high-tech CEOs.Among the worshipers are familiar faces from the business world. They shake hands and tell anecdotes of recent visits to Silicon Valley. They try to avoid any serious business discussions out of respect for the Sabbath, but between handshakes, they arrange meetings for the coming week.

The Hatzvi Yisrael synagogue is one center of Anglo-Saxon immigrants in Jerusalem. For hundreds of years, the synagogue has been a meeting place for Jewish merchants traveling around the world - a combined spiritual, religious, cultural and business center. "This is to a large extent a continuation of a Jewish tradition," says Danny Gimpel, an analyst at the Delta venture capital fund who immigrated from the United States several years ago.

The high-tech industry is based on social and business connections that open up the right doors and bring together knowledge and finance. In the past, veterans of army units like 8200, or the air force, have been the dominant social-business network in high tech. Recently a equally significant group has been added - a religious Anglo-Saxon network.

This network emerged from the non-military margins, perhaps even as a conscious alternative to existing Israeli networks. Unlike Russian immigrants, whose presence is widely felt, Anglo-Saxon immigration has been much smaller, yet is very much evident in the local high-tech industry. This network of immigrants is based on Anglo-Saxon culture, English language, and an observant lifestyle. It is concentrated in Jerusalem, Ra'anana, Beit Shemesh and the West Bank and is jokingly referred to by the secular high-tech network of Tel Aviv and Herzliya as "the Jerusalem Mafia."

The Malha ghetto
Malha Technology Park is another Anglo-Saxon stronghold in Jerusalem where dozens of high-tech firms employ American immigrants. "We are so dominant here that some have renamed it the Malha ghetto," says one. "There are some firms where you see hardly any secular Israelis, only religious Anglo-Saxons," adds a senior executive.

Beit Shemesh has in recent years also attracted a large community of religious immigrants from Anglo-Saxon countries who are linked by an internal e-mail list estimated to include some 700 families. "This week, our first Israeli-born, sabra employee started working," says Daniel Schreiber, who moved from England and started one of the biggest firms in Beit Shemesh, Alchemedia. Schreiber says he is sometimes approached in synagogue by people interested in working with him, but he prefers to keep his lives separate. "It's not easy for me to work with people from my synagogue. Business is business, and community is community."

But yeshivas and synagogues enable entrepreneurs to meet new employees and financial backers. Schreiber met Michael Eisenberg, a partner in the Jerusalem venture capital firm Israel Seed, which invested in Alchemedia, at Yeshivat Har Etzion.

Eisenberg, like his partners at the leading venture capital firm, immigrated to Israel not long ago. "Clearly, there's a social network that helps business. There are acquaintances from the synagogues and yeshivas and other activities in the native countries, such as Bnei Akiva summer camps," Eisenberg says. "Today, I have many secular Israeli friends, so it doesn't always make a difference. Israel Seed, like another Jerusalem fund, Jerusalem Global Ventures, is staffed almost entirely by Anglo-Saxons.

"There's a clear advantage to that. The target market of Israeli industry is the U.S., and all we're trying to do is penetrate the business networks there. Anglo-Saxons have much less of a problem infiltrating. It's their home and therefore, they succeed," says a partner in an Israeli venture capital firm.

Gary Laiber, a partner in the Orion AIG venture capital firm, immigrated from Australia and now lives in Jerusalem. "In synagogue and in yeshiva you meet many people in industry and hear about what's happening and that's important, because the human capital is an important element. It's a small world. I studied at Yeshivat Hakotel and I met people there who I worked with later in various frameworks."

Establishing a forum
The closed network of the Anglo-Saxons and their success in the target countries of Israeli industry - especially in the U.S. - has created some conflict beneath the surface with veteran, secular Israeli businessman. "There's a lot of arrogance and conceit, primarily among the generation of pilots, in the venture capital funds and high-tech companies," says an American immigrant who is a partner in one of the funds.

On the other hand, an Israeli partner in a competing venture capital fund says: "We haven't managed to understand them or infiltrate them - they're a kind of cultural riddle. Below the surface there's tension between the sabras and the Anglo-Saxons, just as there is outside the high-tech industry, in Israeli society at large."

The religious Anglo-Saxon community in high-tech also has its own unofficial events. On the first of every Hebrew calendar month about 30 people gather in a Tel Aviv restaurant to trade business and community experiences. There are also family events and dinners in homes - circumcisions and weddings - where people have a chance to meet and network.

Members of the network also have places to go out, such as the religious bistro on Keren Kayemet Street in Jerusalem. Even in the heartland of secular culture, on Medinat Hayehudim street in Herzliya Pituah, there are initiatives. Recently, a notice appeared on the door of a building housing some ten venture capital funds, calling for the establishment of a quorum of men for prayers. The notice included an e-mail address for more information.

Robert Bosch, a partner of the Infinity venture capital fund and a Ra'anana resident, has recently been toying with the need for a more formal organization of the community. Bosch, who immigrated from Washington several years ago, sat recently with friends - industry executives who came from Western countries in the last few years - and decided to set up a forum for religious Anglo-Saxon high-tech workers.

"We already have a list of 200 people. The need isn't only business-related, but also social. We're all going through a process of getting acquainted with a new culture, and it isn't always easy," he says.

Back to list of news