Senior representatives from large Singapore-based companies visited Israel this week to participate in a 2-day event organized by EDB and investment platform OurCrowd, the most active venture firm in Israel. Six large Singapore-based companies – Flex, HP Inc, Meiban, SingHealth, ST Engineering, and UOB – had the opportunity to meet with more than 40 Israeli startups, most of them from OurCrowd’s portfolio.
The Israeli startups explored investments and collaboration opportunities with these companies from Singapore in diverse fields, including Health and Med-Tech, Precision Engineering, Sustainability and more. Among the startups that participated in the meetings are DreamMed, OncoHost 3D Signals, Genopore, Largix, Hailo, and D-ID.
The event marks the beginning of an important partnership between EDB and OurCrowd. This is part of EDB’s efforts under the Global Innovation Alliance (GIA), which is an initiative by the Singapore Government to catalyse cross-border partnerships between Singapore and major innovation hubs globally. EDB and Enterprise Singapore (ESG) jointly oversee the GIA activities that seek to connect Singapore-based enterprises with overseas partners for R&D and innovation collaborations, with EDB focusing on large Singapore-based corporates and ESG focusing on helping Singaporean Small Medium Enterprises and startups to connect with innovation hubs overseas.
The collaboration with OurCrowd will provide thousands of startups with the opportunity to partner with Singapore-based companies in the manufacturing and services sectors, including healthcare, precision engineering and chemicals. OurCrowd and the EDB will hold a series of in-person meetings and virtual programs, including networking meetings and bespoke demo days.
“The arrival of the delegation is welcome news for the Israeli high tech industry, as it opens doors to one of the strongest and most influential economies in Asia,” said Yakir Machluf, recently appointed Head of Business Development at OurCrowd. “The large Singapore-based corporates are always looking for new pathways to innovation and creativity, and the Israeli startups demonstrated admirable abilities in all sectors of technology and verticals. I have no doubt that the meetings that took place will lead to concrete and promising collaborations in the near future.”
Lily Phua, Vice President, Innovation Economy, EDB added “EDB is pleased to partner with OurCrowd to organize this series of events in Israel, which provides large Singapore-based corporates the opportunity to meet with Israeli startups to discuss innovation collaborations to suit their business needs. This is part of EDB’s efforts to enhance our large companies’ capacity to create new products and businesses out of Singapore. These companies will be able to leverage OurCrowd’s extensive networks and deep understanding of technology capabilities in the Israeli startup ecosystem, which will further strengthen innovation ties between the two countries.”
“The in-person event in Israel has been a great success in facilitating the partnership between Singapore corporates and the Israeli startup ecosystem,” commented Mr. Malcolm Chua, Head, ST Engineering Ventures Israel. “At ST Engineering, our aim is to build successful, collaborative relationships with our startups, where we take a minority stake and collaborate with them, combining technologies and expertise to co-create breakthrough solutions. Our startups will have the opportunity to integrate into our global business ecosystems, networks, and distribution channels, and tap on our expertise and resources as a leading technology, defence and engineering group.”
