Provigent picked as Israel’s most-promising start-up

Provigent is a fabless semiconductor company that provides best-of-breed system-on a-chip (SoC) solutions to vendors of broadband wireless equipment.

By SHMULIK SHELAH, GITIT PINCAS
Laptop 311 (photo credit: Courtesy)
Laptop 311
(photo credit: Courtesy)
“It’s all mathematics,” said Provigent Ltd. cofounder and CEO Dan Charash, to explain the start-up’s impressive success.
Provigent was named Israel’s most promising start-up for 2010 ahead of the Ernst & Young and Globes Israel Journey 2010 conference on the hitech, biotech and venture-capital industries.
Provigent is a fabless semiconductor company that provides best-of-breed system-on a-chip (SoC) solutions to vendors of broadband wireless equipment.
“We will be the leading chip company in the wireless infrastructures market,” Charash said.
Provigent, which has 120 employees, had $25 million revenue in 2009 and expects $40m.
in sales this year. It has been profitable for 18 months. It has raised $55m. from Lightspeed Ventures, Pitango Venture Capital, Sequoia Capital, Magma Venture Partners, Delta Ventures, Globespan Capital Partners, Ascend Technology Ventures and Stata Venture Partners.
Charash does not see Provigent entering another market at this time.
“In the coming years, we expect rapid organic growth, and we’ll focus on that,” he said. “We have no need for collaboration or acquisitions of other companies to find other opportunities. Later, we’ll seek more opportunities in other cellular markets, but we’ll stay in the field of wireless infrastructures.”
This is the sixth year that Globes has conducted a comprehensive survey of Israel’s promising start-ups that will shine in the industry in the years ahead, and the perspective of time has demonstrated that the selections have been accurate. Previous most-promising start-ups have gone on to hold IPOs, raise capital and achieve sales, in some cases of hundreds of millions of dollars. Since being named, the most-promising start-ups have raised $400m. among them, at least 10 have gone public and eight have been acquired for a total of $1.4 billion.
Next year will be a year of mergers, acquisitions and hopes of IPOs. Since the beginning of 2010, Israeli companies have been acquired for a total of $1.5b., including biomed company Medingo Ltd.; hitech firms Exanet Ltd., Storwize Inc. and Wintegra Inc.; and Internet company5min Ltd.
After Provigent, the other nine most promising start-ups for 2010 are: • PrimeSense Ltd., which develops 3-D sensing technology.
• Wix Ltd., which has developed a platform for people to create their own flash websites.
• Waze Ltd., which develops mobile GPS systems for mobile telephones, Twitter and other devices.
• Panaya Inc., which develops business impact analysis software.
• SolarEdge Ltd., which develops software for maximizing the power generation of photovoltaic solar panels.
• Broadlight Ltd., a fabless semiconductor company that supplies integrated circuit devices and solutions to equipment vendors for fiber to home applications.
• WorkLight Inc., which has a mobile application platform for smart phones, tablets and next-generation devices.
• LifeBond Ltd., which is developing next-generation woundclosure and homeostasis products.
• AeroScount Ltd., which develops unified asset visibility solutions for health-care, manufacturing, logistics and other industries.