Israel’s population, including Jews and non-Jews alike, was recently counted at just over 8.5 million people. There are roughly as many citizens of Israel as there are inhabitants of New York City, and fewer Israelis than there are residents of Moscow, Istanbul, and Beijing. The city of Shanghai has nearly three times as many people as the Jewish State altogether.
And yet, this small country, under constant military threat, facing persistent ideological opposition, with whole sectors of the economy still languishing under the socialist legacy of Israel’s early years, the Israeli economy emerged as one of the most dynamic, creative, and entrepreneurial economies in the world.
In 2009, Israel was the home of research and development operations for 126 multinational corporations and the home to more investment dollars per capita than any other country. Since then, that number has almost tripled.
How did this happen? What in Israeli education, Israeli immigration, and Israeli culture is the creative source of Israel’s innovative economy? How does it sustain the entrepreneurial eco-system that has transformed global high-tech and ushered in a water revolution?
Join Dan Senor, author of Start-Up Nation, and Seth Siegel, author of Let There Be Water, both active entrepreneurs, to learn about the creativity that fuels the Israeli economy and that is sought after by the most innovative corporations in the world.
Dan Senor
Daniel S. Senor is a bestselling author and a co-founder and member of the board of directors of the Foreign Policy Initiative. His most recent government position was in the administration of George W. Bush, where Mr. Senor served as chief spokesman and senior adviser to the Coalition in Iraq. One of the longest-serving civilian officials in Iraq, Mr. Senor also served as a Pentagon adviser to U.S. Central Command in Qatar and as a foreign policy and communications aide in the U.S. Senate. He has also advised a number of candidates for U.S. Senate. During the 2012 presidential election, Mr. Senor was a senior foreign policy adviser to Governor Mitt Romney. His analytical pieces have been published by the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Weekly Standard, Time, and Newsweek. He is co-author of Start-Up Nation: The Story of Israel’s Economic Miracle (2011), a New York Times Business Bestseller. From 2001 to 2003, Mr. Senor worked as an investment banker at the Carlyle Group. He earned a B.A. in History from the University of Western Ontario and an M.B.A from Harvard.
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Seth M. Siegel
Seth M. Siegel is the author of the New York Times bestseller Let There Be Water: Israel’s Solution for a Water-Starved World. His essays on water and other issues have appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and in leading publications in Europe and Asia. Seth is a Senior Advisor to Start-Up Nation Central, an Israeli non-profit that connects government, NGO, and business leaders to the relevant people, companies, and technologies in Israel.
Seth is the co-founder of several companies, including Beanstalk, the world’s leading trademark brand extension company, which he sold to Ford Motor Company. He was also a Producer of the Tony Award-nominated Broadway revival of Man of La Mancha. Seth sits on the board of several not-for-profit organizations and he is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.