Tech talk: ISF closes $100 million fund

Israel Secondary Fund (ISF) has completed the closing of ISF II, a $100 million secondary fund. The investors in ISF II include Israeli and global institutional investors, family offices, and high net worth investors. Leading institutional investors in the fund include Halman Aldubi, Altshuler Shaham, Bank Hapoalim (TASE: POLI), IBI (TASE: IBI) and Union Bank of Israel (TASE: UNON). ISF II has already completed four investments from the new fund. ISF is a secondary fund focused on the Israeli market, which provides liquidity to the private equity and venture capital market through purchasing interests in funds and direct holdings in private companies. ISF engages in the full spectrum of secondary transactions: acquiring limited partner (LP) positions in Israeli venture capital and private equity funds, acquiring direct minority holdings in private companies from investors, founders and other shareholders and structured deals, providing capital to existing venture capital and private equity funds. Dror Glass, Nir Linchevski, and Shmuel Shilo manage the fund. Dror Glass, managing founding partner of ISF, has been active in the Israeli secondary market since 2001. Prior to ISF, Dror served as a managing director at Orama Investments, a member of the IDB Group, investment manager at Israel Corporation, investment banker at Evergreen and the executive director of the Wharton-Recanati Program at Tel Aviv University. Nir Linchevski joined ISF in 2014, after founding and serving as a partner at the private equity firm Shiraz Investments in 2007-2012 and as chairman of Altshuler Shaham, an asset management firm with over $15 billion in assets. Prior to that, he served as managing director at VantagePoint Capital Partners, a US venture firm, and was a partner in the Israeli venture capital firm Formula Ventures. Shmuel Shilo, a co-founder of ISF, is one of the founders of the Israeli secondary market and served as managing partner of Harvest Secondary Fund (Israel's first secondary fund), managing Harvest Fund I and Harvest Fund II in 1998-2005. ISF launched ISF II following the success of their inaugural fund, ISF I, which was founded in 2009. ISF I held direct and indirect stakes in more than 100 private companies, and has already realized 35 exits. The direct and indirect exits include the acquisition of Waze Ltd. by Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG), the IPO of SolarEdge Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ: SEDG) and the acquisition of SuperDimension by Covidien Ltd. (NYSE: COV). Other exits include the acquisition of PrimeSense Ltd. by Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL); the IPO of Enzymotec (NASDAQ: ENZY); the sale of WorkLight to IBM Inc. (NYSE: IBM); the sale of RedBend Software to Harman (NYSE: HAR) and the acquisition of Altair Semiconductor Ltd. by Sony Corporation (NYSE: SNE). Cellcom and Elron collaboration Cellcom and Elron, headed by Nir Stern and Ari Bronstein, have announced a collaboration of the two companies to identify promising startups in the fields of IoT and cyber security, both of which are at the forefront of the fastest growing global markets. The goal of the collaboration is to help enterprises grow and succeed in their early stages, including shaping their products and carrying out market validation. They will also help the startups by offering them communication equipment, temporary office space, and running a beta site to help them develop their products. Elron and Cellcom naturally complement each other, which is a huge help for start-ups. Elron is a seasoned investment firm that has been advising companies in early stages for years. It specializes in analyzing startups and realizing their business potential. Cellcom is an innovative telecommunications company that has access to a variety of advanced technologies, is an early adopter, and even recently launched the first IoT lab of its kind in Israel. If you run a young startup, have developed an interesting app or have a question, please feel free to contact info@social-wisdom.com. Translated by Hannah Hochner.

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