Establishing a new specially-themed hitech accelerator in Jerusalem, designed to have as side-effect a re-branding of Israel with potentially strategic implications

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הקמת מאיץ הייטק חדש בירושלים, שתוצאתו הצדדית היא מיתוג מחדש של ישראל, עם השלכות אסטרטגיות אפשריות

לחברות הסטארט-אפ יהיה כמובן מודל עסקי טוב, אבל הקבלה למאיץ תהיה מוגבלת לאלו שיכולים לעזור להביא לתפיסה עולמית של ישראל לא רק כמעצמה טכנולוגית וצבאית מוצלחת, אלא כטובה לעולם - לאנשים באופן אינדיבידואלי, ובצורה קולקטיבית - במטרה להשפיע על עמדות פוליטיות ומדיניות חוץ

Problem: Israel has successfully re-branded itself as "the start-up nation" and as a military and economic power, and though it is strategically-useful to be respected or even feared, it is even better to - in addition to these - also be seen as an asset.

Proposal: To create a unique pro-active accelerator. The accelerator will:

1. solicit start-ups which - besides being profitable - also "help the world" ("tikkun olam");

2. catalyze the creation of HUBs to coordinate hitech "tikkun olam" products and services being developed worldwide; locate and assist the next Einstein/Steve Jobs who may be living in a village in a country without a hitech ecosystem; and more (see below)

3. leverage this world-benefiting aspect to actively work with all those bodies whose goal is to bring about a world-wide perception of Israel not just as a successful technological and military powerhouse but as a benefit to the world - to its people individually and collectively - with the goal being to thereby influence political attitudes and foreign policies.

Special emphasis will be placed on profit-motivated startups which also help fulfill humanistic aspects of Biblical commands, for example startups which help people taking care of their elderly parents, thereby fulfilling one of the ten commandments, or which help fulfill commandments by assist the blind and crippled etc. Associating these startups to the Bible makes it even easier to create a general perception of "Israel, land of the Bible, helping Humanity reach its potential and making the world a better place".

In addition: projects which enable Israel to strategically stay "one-step-ahead": The context for this aspect of the project is the challenge to Israel in the long-term. Over the years, the US moved from manufacturing to computer programming, then outsourced that to develop a service-economy. Japan post-WWII quite quickly went from manufacturing cheap items to world-class quality high-level goods, and recently China made the same transition. Israel went from growing oranges, then polishing diamonds, then sending specialty flowers to Europe, then exporting irrigation tech and experts, and now are leaders in hi-tech.

If Israel's economy is to stay ahead, it has to think ahead, how to be one step up the ladder. When India, Africa, South America and China realize their potential, then even if they will only have 1/10 the per-capita entrepreneurship of Israel but with 1,000 times the population, how will Israel stay somewhere in the top?

A "paradigm-pivot" as a possible solution: As economics goes at present, what would such a step-above be? Perhaps to become "the world's accelerator", helping other countries develop the way Israel did for itself, and using our brilliance to come up with business models which enable us to make more money this way than from being what we are now, the world's entrepreneurs. We can become the world's talent-finder and creativity-developer, as for example with the Africa-project outlined below. Israel can be a "meta-accelerator" by helping those who will found accelerators in their countries. Also, helping other countries re-brand themselves as Israel has successfully done for itself (one can start by inviting experts and mayors etc see what we do, and commission an Israeli company to to do it for them.). In this way, the world will see every success of Israel as a harbinger of their own success (הם יראו כל הצלחה שלנו כמבשר על הצלחה עתידית שלהם), and thus not only will they not be jealous, they will actively wish that Israel succeed and thrive.

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• Strategic side-benefit: connecting those Jews in the world who are attracted by the notion of tikkun olam to associate its tech applications with Israel;
• attracting support from the world’s hi-tech billionaires for this tikkun-olam hitech-accelerator and for its projects in order to make them feel closer to Israel.

(Example of a change in attitude and its potential effect: If a situation would develop where Iran conspired to destroy Israel with the open help of N. Korea, Pakistan, and as a result of an ensuing war they were half-destroyed and Israel completely vanished, most people in the world would sigh in relief. Surely it would be better if this would not be the case - if the people and nations of the world perceive Israel as a benefit to them, a resource which it would be a shame to lose, so that the leaders of non-enemy countries set their foreign policy accordingly, and prevent that destructive scenario.)

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מיתוג ישראל/ירושלים: במקום להפוך את ירושלים רק למקום היי-טק כללי, עוד נקודה

חמה, הרעיון שלי הוא: למנף (לצרכי היי-טק וכדי לקדם את פיתוח ירושלים) את

הצלחותיה של ישראל - להקים אקסלרטור עבור מייזמים למטרת רווח

א :שעוצבו גם למנף את

• הדימוי המקראי של ירושלים בעיני העולם כמקום הקשור לחזון התנ"כי ולעשרת הדברות ששכנו כאן
• "את הדימוי של היהודים כממוקדים ב"תיקון עולם
• "...כמו גם את הרעיון של ירושלים כמקור לשפע עולמי: "כי מציון תצא

.ב:שעוזרים למדינות העולם לבצע עבור עצמן מה שישׂראל הצליחה לבצע עבור עצמה

ג: שׁיוצרים פלטפורמות שמתרתם הוא לאגד את המאמצים היצירתיים של יזמים ברחבי העולם, אשר הסטארט-אפים שלהם מוקדש לשימוש בטכנולוגיה עבור מטרות אשר ניתן לסווגַם כתיקון עולם

[אף על פי ש"מטא-פרוייקט "זה לא יכלול חברות סטארט-אפ שרק מעודדות צרכנות, או מיועדות לפרסום, שיווק, אסתטיקה וכו ', זה לא אומר שהן לא צריכות להתקיים בירושלים, רק שהן לא יהיו כלול בקטגוריה זו.]

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What this accelerator does that others don't Alternate heading: ["of course...but"]³

Of course one can simply set up a website to highlight all the world-benefiting aspects of Israeli hitech in general, and the website of the accelerator I am proposing can include that, but the main benefit is that it will do many things that other accelerators don't, and will help Yerushalayim/Israel in ways the others don't:

• early startups which are doing something of benefit to the world, or people with ideas for startups, but who are in countries without a hitech infrastructure/ecosystem (eg under-developed countries) and they would fail without help, can benefit from the accelerator's remote-mentoring; in particular in countries with which Israel seeks a new relationship, for strategic reasons;
• ideas for startups would be suggested on the accelerator's website and entrepreneurs/teams from anywhere in the world could submit proposals for them; for example: an active project of the accelerator would be to help countries seek and develop their human capital 'diamonds', and proposals would be solicited for startups which can accomplish this; the accelerator would also actively solicit proposals for self-sustaining startups which help countries develop themselves; the same for teams which can come up with a way to implement various mitzvot in the Torah in a self-sustaining or profitable way, even if it would not generate sufficient returns to interest investors; see various examples below;
• the accelerator would accept start-ups whose business-model makes it self-sustaining but not profitable to investors, or profitable but not enough profit to interest investors, if the benefit to the world justifies the mentoring resources required;
• special projects, which are special not due to their greater profit potential but because of their greater good to humanity, could be offered better conditions than they would get in accelerators elsewhere, in order to attract them to Israel/Jerusalem, to contribute in this way to the branding aspect.
• the accelerator would seek volunteer experts from across the world to do remote mentoring for projects such as those mentioned above, with examples below.

Of course setting up such an accelerator costs money, but accelerators generally do cost money (ie they are non-profits) because although the startups have good business models, or these can be found, nevertheless investors are not yet interested. MassChallenge and others were set up with money from Government (Ministry for Jlm etc) because they added value to Yerushalayim, and the accelerator I am interested in initiating will have an added value as outlined in the website-description, and so the money to establish and run it would come from bodies interested in that objective.(Similarly, an accelerator uses limited resources such as the time of mentors, but the strategic benefit would justify this.)

Of course many accelerators in Jerusalem do not ask for equity but since this accelerator will find some projects which are only minimally profitable, the accelerator can specify that some profit would be taken from the very successful startups when they are successful later on, and funding can also be solicited from general sources interested in benefit to humanity (EU, USA, philanthropies etc), and Jewish philanthropists interested in the notion of Israel being the source for such projects, so that money is flowing to hitech in Israel from sources which would not otherwise be funding it.

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Characteristics of the startups: To be accepted by the accelerator, the startups need to be brandable in a way which connects this up to Israel /Jerusalem. (They will will of course be for-profit, with solid business models, but the resulting product or service will also possess the following features: it benefits the world (so it can be considered part of 'tikun-olam'), and it can be related in a recognizable way to aspects of Jewish Heritage and the Bible.)

The accelerator will then undertake to brand each such product/service. Example: A for-profit project which targets the children of elderly people, helping them enable their elderly parent stay in their own home independently by equipping that home with a complete integrated system of devices and apps clearly embodies 'tikkun olan', and is Biblically-branded via its name: "5thCommandment.com" [developing a hi-tech coordination-hub to coordinate the efforts of entrepreneurs worldwide in elder-care and "ageing-in-place", hi-tech solutions marketed to the children of the elderly; with the eventual goal of disrupting the industry by making elder-aides and elder-homes obsolete].

As mentioned, the Israel/Jerusalem-branding would be the responsibility of the accelerator rather than on the start-up. For example:

Branding Jerusalem

The connection to Israel/Jerusalem can be established in various ways. For example for the elder-care project outlined above, by the fact that the tablets with the ten commandments rested for a one thousand years in Jerusalem's Temple, as well as by the fact that this project was created in Israel (possibly with the assistance of the Israeli government).

Such a message can be conveyed for example via a GIF like the following:

The projects listed above are meant both as an act of tikun olam, reflecting Jewish values and Biblical concepts, centered in Jerusalem, as well as being profit-based hi-tech projects. (Of course one needs to think about creating a business model which will make these activities profitable, not just philanthropy and public relations).

They also exemplify a model which can help Israel stay 'a step ahead', for example by remote-mentoring of those establishing an accelerator abroad. And in general, projects geared to getting people to think of Israel as an asset to the world, to them, to their country.

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Project categories illustrated above:

• The accelerator will invite proposals and solicit teams to develop projects which advance a specific goal outlined on the accelerator's site, eg a HUB for the blind;
• teams developing startups fitting a general category which the accelerator solicits (eg fulfilling a Biblical commandment);
• platforms to organize the work of others around the world (HUBs, remote-mentoring etc), or to develop a specific country's capabilities (in Africa, S America etc);
• startups which help countries develop in ways Israel has;
• [the accelerator's website will also feature those Israeli startups in general which accomplish 'tikkun olam', stressing the 'Biblical' aspects they help fulfill.]

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Examples of remote-mentoring and virtual accelerators

[I included the urls rather than just links because in some of the cases the URL tells the story.]

• http://gsl.mit.edu/ : gsl= global startup labs
• https://worldbusinessincubation.wordpress.com/world-virtual-business-incubators/
• https://www.startersquad.com/blog/startersquad-launchlab-building-a-virtual-startup-incubator/
• One Million by One Million (1Mby1M) is the first global virtual accelerator,
• http://efactory.missouristate.edu/
• http://incubator.al/entrepreneurs-virtual-mentoring/

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Project "Accelerating Africa"

Branding Israel as "A bridge between Africa and the rest of the world"

Israel can identify and polish Africa's true 'diamonds', the brilliant young minds among the almost 1 billion people in Africa, who are now seeking a channel to achieve their potential, and to do so in ways which directly benefit Africa, while of course close relations with Africa can have strategic benefit for Israel.

This can be accomplished in situ or via a "remote-accelerator" with mentoring-at-a-distance - see discussion further below.

Public Relations slogan: Catalyzing the collective wisdom of Africa....

SubSaharan Africa has about 0.9 billion people, and so there are 900 one-in-a-million geniuses, 9K one-in-100,000 geniuses etc, some of them perhaps with ideas for startups, many of whom are likely untapped as yet.

Marketing Israel as historically-relevant via the following hook: When walking/driving out of Africa to anywhere else by land today, there is only one country which one MUST pass through - Israel.

Explanation: If you wanted to walk out of Africa today, as can be seen from the map below you must pass through the African country of Egypt, there is no other land--route out (Morroco and Spain are very close, but separated by water, and the same for Yemen and the Horn of Africa).

And from the map above one can also see that, when continuing the journey-by-foot, you must pass through Egypt's Sinai peninsula, the location of Mt Sinai of ten-commandment fame. And from the map below,

it is clear that to walk out of Africa one must pass through Israel. Israel is the only Non-African country which one MUST pass through in order to leave Africa on foot.

Indeed, according to science, humans emerged in Africa, and all non-Africans in the world are descended from Africans who walked out of Africa, either via "the Northern route" through what later became Israel, and/or via a land-bridge or a "crossing of the red sea" at the Bab el Mandab Straits which then had shallow water.

The journey via the "Northern route" took generations, and small groups migrated outward slowly, sojourning for a while in Israel, and continuing on, ending up - after many generations - in Europe, Asia and - in those times when it was possible to walk across what is now the Bering Straits, to North and South America.

Israel is therefore the land-bridge connecting the rest of the world to its ancestral homeland.... (so it is an act of kibud av va'em to help Africa!), and so it is very appropriate that in our days Israel is Africa's bridge to hi-tech & the new economy all over the world.

[Perhaps it is no surprise that Sinai and Israel are the home-origin of the Bible and its stories of the earliest humans, and of the oldest nations and their earliest national-homes.

[We can (with help from the EU, UN, OAU etc] help Egypt and Saudi Arabia and the Gulf region with Yemen market itself in this way, jointly with Israel, helping to provide employment in the two troubled regions of Sinai & Yemen; prosperity there could be conducive to stability and the rule of law, which could be of strategic value to Israel.]

[Create a GIF illustrating these ideas.]

Explore possibilities of executing these projects in conjunction with:

· JDC?

· Bureau of African Affairs, US state dept ?

· UN?

· EU: Entrepreneurship in Africa: Supporting Small and Medium Enterprises to Ensure Sustainable Growth

http://www.un.org/africarenewal/magazine/april-2016/africa-looks-its-entrepreneurs

• African Development Bank, https://www.afdb.org/en/: G20, African countries explore opportunities to increase investments in Africa at Berlin conference

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• Perhaps Israel can also be the accelerator for Burma/Myanmar, Cuba, S. America.
• Can we help Japan restart its economy?
• S Korea looks to Jews for advice, so maybe set out a tender competition for projects which will solve their problems in a profit-based way.
• eventually Venezuela and South Africa will have new governments and come aboard.

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Ideas (and questions to explore)

1) Remote-accelerator & mentoring-at-a-distance:

Question: Can an accelerator accept founders who are elsewhere, and are on a video-screen rather than being physically-present, is it possible to work this way? If so: two options:

A) For profit: These accelerators can take a profit rather than being free, but: why would it be worth the time for Israelis if there are so many innovators here?

Answer: If one can successfully identify the 1 in a million there, those people might be superior to most of what is here, and since the potential there is untapped, maybe that's possible.

B) Not-for profit: A website to enable successful Israeli business people to utilize their experience to do mentoring-at-a-distance for innovators in Africa and elsewhere - it could be rewarding and interesting even if not so profitable, an extra-curricular activity mentoring a brilliant African (or Asian or South American) - there is a large pool of people abroad in underdeveloped countries but who have internet access. .

Innovators would be selected by accelerator-staff, as would be Israeli and perhaps business people from elsewhere who filled out a profile (maybe some individuals would be solicited), and then they would be matched (personally or via an algorithm) to make relevant pairs.

Since government policy considers ties to Africa as a strategic matter, and the leaders of underdeveloped countries now see Israel as Startup Nation (and probably the innovators in those countries also feel the same way), it can be worthwhile for the government to sponsor such a project, eg it can be funded by the Foreign Ministry just as they fund experts sent abroad on agriculture, leadership-training etc (but this project does not envision time spent on location there, or perhaps only minimal such time).

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2. Project: Website to facilitate crafting a collaborative founder-team: Setting up a successful startup requires a founder and a team. Many developing countries can have unusual individuals who have ideas, they can be founders, but the country does not have the human-capital infrastructure to have the relevant ecology of programmers, design people, engineers, managers, MBAs etc. So they are more likely to be 'orphan-founders', ie working on their own.

Taking time off from work is very difficult in poorer countries, so they need some financial support, but to grant this one needs to be assessed at a greater degree of likelihood of success than for accelerators in Western countries.

Basically part of the idea is to leverage the strengths of those countries (the large population and therefore the plentiful 1 in a million innovators) to defeat the weaknesses (lack of tech-ecology).

For example: Setting up a founder in one city or country with team-members in other cities or countries, coordinated via a Mentor in the accelerator in Jerusalem.

[One can combine the orphan-founder collaborative-team aspect with the mentoring-at-a-distance or accelerator-at-a-distance, so that individual founders in under-developed ecosystems have access both to mentoring and to excellent team-mates.]

An alternate possibility, where teams are not possible: five founders matched for complementary skills/abilities, and they work on all 5 projects under the Mentor's coordination.

One can think of it as "working on a different project each day of the week", one day a week for each project, with maybe 40% of the founder's project going to them., plus 10% for each of the other 4 founders, and 20% to the accelerator.

The founders are probably very unusually capable and so are better at what they do than the average person in that field, and so the team will be very strong.

The projects take more time, but they will get developed.

Most of the founders in those countries will not have the ability to take off a year or two without working, and will be without any guidance and will make mistakes that cost years, and so in this method might actually bring success in the same amount of time (or even less), and will in any case greatly increase the likelihood of success.

Also: even if their own project fails, there is a good likelihood that they will end op owning 10% of a successful company, or of two.

Maybe the first project they work on won't be so big, but this trains them for the next project, which can be in coordination with a project being developed in the West, at much larger scale etc.

Satellite in-situ branch accelerators: If they are located geographically in the same place, a venue for an accelerator can be acquired: Given the likely inability of people in those countries to support themselves if they are not working (in order to work full time on the projects), they can be given free room & board in a dormitory with cafeteria, on the accelerator's premises.

PR aspect: Since many accelerators in Israel are free, one can present this for-equity accelerator as: a valuable and costly service Israelis give free to citizens of their country; also: it doesn't include the free room & board in Israel, this is investment of capital, which comes at a cost.

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3) Israel has developed programs to identify geniuses within itself, for special schools and for the military (combat units, pilots, hi-tech, intelligence & cyber units etc). And there are nowadays sophisticated algorithms and data mining techniques etc which can perhaps help do this remotely; also, contests can be created to attract unique individuals etc.

If a means can be designed to identify unusually-capable people - eg from school data, from comments on the internet, resumes posted online etc - they can be very valuable human-capital. Rewards can even be given to local people who identify someone who becomes a successful candidate.

Note: re ideas: The people with hi-tech ideas who have started to push them may well be more unusual that those doing the same in the West.

Re existing small businesses: Maybe identify very small existing businesses whose innovative model indicates that the person is actually capable of accomplishing much more - had they been in the West that business would have been a large one.

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3. Being the world's identifier of genius, and the world's accelerators for those geniuses, and doing it in a way that is of importance for strategic-ties, and leverages the strengths of those countries (their large population and therefore the plentiful 1 in a million).

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4. Re-branding the problematic notion of the Jews as "the chosen people" by tying Israel to the notion of using tech/business to fix problems in the world, via Biblical passages from genesis which in Jewish Tradition represent humanity's mandate.

The below passages are about Adam & Eve, not about Jews - our message is that all humanity is entrusted with this: as R Shlomo Carlebach said: "We are the people who were chosen to tell the all people that they are chosen".

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Examples of Biblical commandments which are in the category of "tikun olam":

• "Lifnei iver...": for-profit projects to benefit the blind
• "Shoftim veShotrim..." "Tzedek tzedek tirdof": for-profit projects helping to assure justice in courts, and to increase the rule of law;

Tza'ar ba'alei chayim (literally means: "the suffering of living creatures"^[1]) is a Jewish commandment which bans causing animals unnecessary^[2] suffering. This concept is not clearly enunciated in the written Torah, but was accepted by the Talmud (Bava Metzia 32b) as being a Biblical mandate. It is linked in the Talmud from the Biblical law requiring people to assist in unloading burdens from animals (Exodus 23:5).

Saving lives: VeNishmartem Me'od leNafshotechem; The Jewish tradition mandates an obligation to save and preserve life (called in Jewish legal sources:pikuach nefesh) based on an interpretation of Leviticus 18:5, “You shall keep My laws and My rules, by the pursuit of which man shall live: I am the Lord (See Babylonian Talmud Sanhedrin 74a).” Jewish law forbids us from knowingly harming ourselves (Leviticus 19:28).

Destroying the environment: There is a midrash (Rabbinic commentary on the Bible) which Jewish environmentalists are fond of quoting: “When God created the first human beings, God led them around the Garden of Eden and said: “Look at my works! See how beautiful they are—how excellent! For your sake I created them all. See to it that you do not spoil and destroy My world; for if you do, there will be no one else to repair it.” (Midrash Kohelet Rabbah, 1 on Ecclesiastes 7:13)

The Torah says, "When you besiege a city for many days to wage war against it to capture it, you shall not destroy its trees by wielding an ax against them, for you may eat from them, but you shall not cut them down" (Deuteronomy 20:19). From this verse we derive that we may not uproot or cut down a fruit tree if we do not have an acceptable reason to do so.

The twentieth chapter of Deuteronomy contains many of the laws of warfare. One of them involves the cutting down of fruit trees:

"When you besiege a city for many days to wage war against it to capture it, you shall not destroy its trees by wielding an ax against them, for you may eat from them, but you shall not cut them down. Is the tree of the field a man, to go into the siege before you? However, a tree you know is not a food tree, you may destroy and cut down, and you shall build bulwarks against the city that makes war with you, until its submission."1

Our Sages explain this to mean that when it is not necessary to cut down fruit trees for the war effort – it is possible to build bulwarks from non-fruit-bearing trees – it is prohibited to cut them down. In this case, the only purpose of chopping down the fruit trees would be to scare the enemy and take vengeance upon them, and therefore it is not proper.2

When we waste resources we are violating the mitzvah (commandment) of Bal Tashchit (“Do not destroy”). It is based on Deuteronomy 20:19-20:

“When in your war against a city you have to besiege it a long time in order to capture it, you must not destroy its trees, wielding the ax against them. You may eat of them, but you must not cut them down. Are trees of the field human to withdraw before you into the besieged city? Only trees that you know do no yield food may be destroyed; you may cut them down for constructing siege works against the city that is waging war on you, until it has been reduced.”

This law was expanded in later Jewish legal sources to include the prohibition of the wanton destruction of household goods, clothes, buildings, springs, food or the wasteful consumption of anything (see Rambam, Mishneh Torah, Laws of Kings and Wars 6:8, 10; Samson Raphael Hirsch,Horeb, 279-80).

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Project: Moses's Tablets/10 commandments:

https://ntwrong.wordpress.com/2016/04/

A hi-tech project whose goal is tikkun olam, ...especially the 10 commandments (SInce 1 ,2 ,3 are challenging, maybe use the notion of the two tablets having parallel ideas, ie the applicaiton to human society of the commandments on the first tablet, which explains why there were two tablets not one, thus there are really 5 not 10)

• Hi-tech social engineering: An app which measure quality of life, encouraging and enabling spending more time and resources on the meaningful in our lives, time with children, volunteering, improving the quality of marriages etc
• App plus wearable tech and communication device with mentor etc to control violent urges, destructive behavior (for kids, teenagers, and some adults) [can work with insurance companies, alternatives to juvenile detention, jails etc]
• app to count how much time was spent each day, week on peaceful activity, restful, etc (shabbat), on higher pursuit (anochi),
• personal lie detector wearable tech; records your mood after, can see how much better you feel when tell the truth?!
• analyzing phrases and terms to identify those used frequently by lying manipulating ads to sucker investors, consumers etc, and using this to create protective-software, etc;
• who are the people in your life or strangers in a distant land, whose good fortune will make you feel better - help them! (as an act that is beneficial to YOU!)

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A Jewish understanding of the creation account and humanity's purpose:

"And God said to humanity: 'So, you want a perfected world? DIY!'"

Phrases in passages in the Genesis creation & Eden accounts which according to Jewish Tradition are optimistic, humanity-centered calls to use our initiative & creativity to complete - and protect - the world, which today can be accomplished by assisting the world in scientific & technological advance :

וַיָּשֶׂם שָׁם, אֶת-הָאָדָם אֲשֶׁר יָצָר...לְעָבְדָהּ וּלְשָׁמְרָהּ.

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