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> General Content >

Innovation

Israel-India

> Business Guide >

2017

D

iplomatic relations between India

and Israel began 25 years ago,

back in 1992, and this gave a fillip

to commercial activities between the two

countries.As mutual trade rises year by year,

there is still huge potential for technological

collaboration, yet untapped.

The compatibility between the Indian and

Israeli economies is verymuch complementary:

India is being perceived as a waking giant

that requires new solutions for sectors in

which Israel specializes. As in the rest of the

world, more and more companies in Israel

also allocate resources to help penetrate the

Indian market.

Bridging the ‘Innovation Gap’

between Israel & India

Israel is a unique case."The Startup Nation",

established on a tiny area (less than a half

the size of Haryana) with a population equal

to that of Bengaluru, has more than 6,000

Startup companies, innovative technology

in various sectors, and an export-oriented

business outlook.Israel’s key exports globally,

among others are: IT, Renewable Energy,

Water,and Agriculture technologies,all from

sectors in which the Indian market is eager

for innovative solutions.

However,technology transfer is still a major

challenge between the two countries.Even

though there is growing interest among

large and medium-sized Indian companies

in the solutions that Israeli companies have

to offer,the number of success stories is still

rather small.

Over our years of doing business between

our two nations, we’ve identified a few key

reasons for the challenges in bridging the

‘InnovationGap’

between the countries,and

these should be carefully elaborated upon.

1)The risk of innovative technology:

Israeli

ventures usually propose high-end cutting

edge technologies. Being export-oriented,

Israeli solutions target the global market and

not the Israeli market at all, hence the first

phase of penetrating foreignmarkets usually

occurs without any sales registered.In addition,

in many cases the Israeli company tries to

locate foreign investors to invest in the last

stage of product development before initial

sales are made.

The Indian market, having a long-term

perspective combined with characteristics

of risk- avoidance,most likely when adopting

foreign technologies, avoids being the“first

mover” and investing in a foreign venture

with no significant sales record. The Indian

Helping Israeli and Indian

companies build long-

standing relationships

Ofir Mizrahi, Yuval Susskind

Israeli drip irrigation technology used widely across Indian farmlands/orchards

photo: Naan-Dan Jain