Last Updated on December 8, 2021
5 top Israeli companies sold in 2018 for over $1 billion.
On the eve of Israel’s 71st birthday, we can ask ourselves if this small little country of ours is a start-up nation or an industrial powerhouse? Israel currently has a population of just over 9 million people. Israel has the highest ratio of university degrees to the population in the world. 4.5 percent of Israel’s GDP goes to research and development, the highest proportion in the world. Israel also has largest number of startups per capita in the world – approximately 1 startup for every 1,400 people. Not all of them are success stories and every year, about 80% of them fail.
Who are the top Israeli companies?
But lots of startups means a lot of innovation and entrepreneurship (and lots of employment opportunities) as well as a lot of global attention and investment.
Here are 5 success stories – the top Israeli companies sold to international companies in 2018 for over $ 1 billion.
Orbotech electronic devices was acquired by KLA-Tencor for $3.4 billion
Imperva cyber secsurity was acquired by Thoma Bravo for $2.1 billion
Mazor Robotics medical devices was acquired by Medtronic for $1.6 billion
Fruitarom flavors and fragrances was acquired by International Flavors & Fragrances (IFF) for $ 7 billion
Soda Stream flavored and natural sparkling water was acquired by PepsiCo for $ 3.2 billion
Let us not forget the ‘smaller’ companies that were sold for less than $ 1 billion, these are a few of them
- Datorama marketing analytics was acquired by Salesforce for $850m
- Avgol non-woven fabric was acquired by Indorama for $314m
- EPD Solutions cardiac mapping was acquired by Philips for $294m
- Sygniacyber security was acquired by Temasek for $250m
- Dome9 cloud security was acquired by Check Point for $179m
Our little country is an appealing market for overseas investors. Mega US manufacturers like including General Electric, General Motors, Microsoft, IBM, Google, Apple and others, have R&D centers in Israel and many other overseas companies have an R&D presence in Israel.
Looking back on some of Israel’s notable inventions