Professor Eugene Kandel is the CEO of Start-Up Nation Central, a non-profit dedicated to strengthening Israel’s innovation ecosystem and connecting world business, government, and NGO leaders to the people and technologies in Israel that can help them solve their most pressing problems.
Between 2009 and 2015 Professor Kandel served as the Head of the National Economic Council and as the Economic Adviser to the Prime Minister, and played a central role in all the major decisions on economic policy.
Kandel is the Emil Spyer Professor of Economics and Finance at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He holds a BA and an MA from the Hebrew University, and an MBA and a Ph.D. in Economics from the Graduate School of Business at the University of Chicago. Professor Kandel’s primary area of expertise is Financial Markets and Financial Intermediaries, and his research has been published in various world-leading Finance and Economics journals. His research was instrumental in the 1997 redesign of the Nasdaq trading rules.
Wendy Singer has served as Executive Director of Start-Up Nation Central since its founding in 2013.
She worked with the US-based funders to build the infrastructure and professional team in Israel, and to launch its initial activities – connecting Israel’s innovation ecosystem with government and business leaders around the world. Today she heads SNC’s Jerusalem operation and manages its engagements with foreign government leaders.
Before joining SNC, Wendy concluded a 23-year career at AIPAC. She was Director of AIPAC's Israel Office for sixteen years. In that role, she and her team curated educational seminars in Israel for several dozen senior US lawmakers and political leaders annually. Wendy maintained relationships with Israeli ministers and senior government leaders, members of the opposition, and a wide range of MKs, in addition to US diplomats, and Palestinian officials. She reported to AIPAC-Washington on policy, security and political developments in Israel.
Prior to emigrating to Israel, Wendy served as a registered lobbyist on Capitol Hill, where she was the lead contact for 20 Senators and 70 House Members. She also served as a staff aide for three Members of Congress, focusing on foreign policy issues.
Mr. Gabai is the VP of Strategy of Start-Up Nation Central (SNC). This role includes overseeing strategy, policy, and data and research activities in Start-Up Nation Central. He is also in charge of the human capital operations of the organization and specifically hi-tech training programs for the ultra-orthodox and Arab populations.
Prior to this role, Mr. Gabai served for seven years as the Chief Strategy Officer and Head of the strategy and economic division in the Israel Innovation Authority (previously the office of the chief scientist in the Israeli Ministry of Economy and Industry, or OCS). He has led the division since its establishment in October 2011, focusing on strategy, evaluation, budget planning, and research. In this role, he also led the transformation from the OCS to the Israel Innovation Authority, including an in-depth strategic, institutional and organizational change.
For five years before that appointment, Mr. Gabai was a senior economist at the National Economic Council in the Prime Minister’s Office. At the National Economic Council, he led the Macroeconomic team and was involved in several government initiatives, among which, a new fiscal rule for the Government of Israel, a 7 billion USD program for transportation infrastructure, a reform in the entitlement criteria for elderly citizens and more.
Mr. Gabai is a regular participant in international forums dealing with innovation policy and lectures regularly on Israel's emergence as a leading country in technological innovation.
In addition to his public position, Mr. Gabai is teaching courses in economics, focusing on the economics of innovation and theoretical economics.
Mr. Gabai holds a bachelor’s degree in economics and computer sciences from the Hebrew University, as well as a Master of Economics also from the Hebrew University, specializing in game theory.
With 21 years of experience in digital and broadcast media, Chico Menashe previously managed Reshet Bet, Israel Broadcasting Authority’s news radio station. He also served as deputy editor-in-chief at the Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation (IPBC), overseeing news programs across digital, television and radio platforms.
During his journalism tenure, he covered a variety of news beats, including foreign relations, health, environment, transportation and aviation for Israeli television stations Channel 2 and Chanel 10.
In the past, Menashe was involved in e-learning in the high-tech sector; he is currently also a lecturer at the School of Communications at IDC Herzliya.
Jeremie Kletzkine, VP of Business Development at Start-Up Nation Central. Jeremie is an entrepreneur and executive with technological expertise. He previously served as the Director of Worldwide Business Development at PrimeSense (acquired by Apple). Over the course of the last decade, Jeremie founded 2 startups, has mentored, and advised several VCs, accelerators and sits on the boards of various technology companies.
Karin Gattegno is the Chief Business Officer of Start-Up Nation Central, connecting multinational corporations, businesses, governments, and entrepreneurs from around the world to Israel’s innovation and tech ecosystem.
Karin has over a decade of experience working with high-tech companies. Prior to joining Start-Up Nation Central, she headed the high-tech business development department at PwC Israel, working with hundreds of startups and advising them on various issues, including fundraising, mergers and acquisitions.
Prior to her role at PwC Israel, Karin worked at Tamir Fishman, an Israeli investment house, as an investment banker in the corporate finance department, and later, as the head of operations and investor relations of DFJ-Tamir Fishman, the local affiliate of Draper Fisher Jurvetson.
Dana Pollak Wasserman has more than 15 years of experience in HR management, and leads all HR aspects of Start-Up Nation Central, including recruitment, training, employee and management development, welfare, and HR strategy. During the eight years prior to coming here, she worked at Gvahim as VP HR and head of the careers program, which assists highly-skilled immigrants (olim) in their professional integration in Israel. Previously, she worked for five years as a recruitment manager in the technology unit in the office of the Israeli Prime Minister, and also held a senior HR management position at Keinan-Sheffy, a leading recruitment agency in Israel.
Dana holds an M.A. in Labor Studies from Tel-Aviv University, and a B.A. in Sociology and Human-Resources from Haifa University.
Laura Gilinski is VP of Philanthropic Partnerships at Start-Up Nation Central.
In this capacity, she is responsible for all Start-Up Nation Central’s development related issues including partner cultivation, retention, and support. Prior to Start-Up Nation Central, Laura served as Deputy Director for Development and International Relations at the Israel Museum (IMJ), where she was responsible for development operations including cultivation and growth of 16 international friends’ organizations; and direct fundraising from foundations, and individuals. Prior to IMJ, Laura served as Chief Development and Public Relations Officer at the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem, where she worked closely with the Institute’s network of partners, individual donors, foundations and philanthropic organizations, helping Hartman to double its revenue base during the years of her employment.
Laura worked for over a decade in the Israeli high-tech sector as Director of Corporate Marketing Communications at the Ex Libris Group and as Director of Product Marketing at Wizcom Technologies. Laura brings over twenty years of experience in communications, public relations, branding, and fund-raising in the corporate and non-profit sectors.
Terms and Conditions
Welcome to www.startupnationcentral.org (together with its subdomains, the “Site“, and together with the Content, Marks (defined below) and any services, the “Service”).
Please read the following Terms of Use carefully before using this Site so that you are aware of your legal rights and obligations with respect to Start-Up Nation Central Ltd. (CC) (“Start-Up Nation Central“, “we“, “our” or “us“) and/or the Site. By accessing or using the Site, you expressly acknowledge and agree that you are entering a legal agreement with us and have understood and agree to comply with, and be legally bound by, these Terms of Use, together with the Privacy Policy (the “Terms“). You hereby waive any applicable rights to require an original (non-electronic) signature or delivery or retention of non-electronic records, to the extent not prohibited under applicable law. If you do not agree to be bound by these Terms please do not access or use the Site.
Last updated: January 2018
At Start-Up Nation Central Ltd. (CC) (“Start-Up Nation Central”), we recognize that your privacy is very important and take it seriously. This Privacy Policy describes Start-Up Nation Central’s policies and procedures on the collection, use and disclosure of your information when you use the Start-Up Nation Central Service. We will not use or share your information with anyone except as described in this Privacy Policy. This Privacy Policy does not apply to information we collect by other means (including offline) or from other sources. Capitalized terms that are not defined in this Privacy Policy have the meaning given them in our Terms of Service
How We Protect Your Information
Start-Up Nation Central uses commercially reasonable physical, managerial, and technical safeguards to preserve the integrity and security of your personal information. We cannot, however, ensure or warrant the security of any information you transmit to Start-Up Nation Central or guarantee that your information on the Service may not be accessed, disclosed, altered, or destroyed by breach of any of our physical, technical, or managerial safeguards.
Links to Other Web Sites
We are not responsible for the practices employed by websites linked to or from the Service, nor the information or content contained therein. Please remember that when you use a link to go from the Service to another website, our Privacy Policy is no longer in effect. Your browsing and interaction on any other website, including those that have a link on our website, is subject to that website’s own rules and policies.
User-Provided Information: You provide us information about yourself, such as your name and e-mail address, organization and job title if you register for a member account with the Service. Your name and other information you choose to add to your profile will be available for public viewing on the Service. We may use your email address to send you Service-related notices (including any notices required by law, in lieu of communication by postal mail) and to respond to “Contact Us” requests. We may also use your contact information to send you marketing messages. If you do not want to receive such messages, you may unsubscribe to such marketing messages. Please note that even if you opt out of receiving the marketing emails, we may still send you a response to any “Contact Us” request as well as administrative emails (for example, in connection with a password reset request) that are necessary to facilitate your use of the Service. If you correspond with us by email, we may retain the content of your email messages, your email address and our responses.
You also provide us information in User Submissions you post (or send to us to post) to the Service. Your questions, answers, participating in blog discussions (and corresponding social profile) and other contributions on the Service, and metadata about them (such as when you posted them), are publicly viewable on the Service, along with your name (unless the Service permits you to post anonymously).This information may be searched by search engines and be republished elsewhere on the Web in accordance with our Terms of Service.
If you choose to use our invitation service to invite a friend to the Service, we will ask you for that person’s email address and automatically send an email invitation. Start-Up Nation Central stores this information to send this email, to register your friend if your invitation is accepted, and to track the success of our invitation service.
Cookies: When you visit the Service, we may send one or more “cookies” – small data files – to your computer to uniquely identify your browser and let Start-Up Nation Central help you log in faster and enhance your navigation through the Service. A cookie may convey anonymous information about how you browse the Service to us, but does not collect personal information about you. A persistent cookie remains on your computer after you close your browser so that it can be used by your browser on subsequent visits to the Service. Persistent cookies can be removed by following your web browser’s directions. A session cookie is temporary and disappears after you close your browser. You can reset your web browser to refuse all cookies or to indicate when a cookie is being sent. However, some features of the Service may not function properly if the ability to accept cookies is disabled.
Log Files: Log file information is automatically reported by your browser each time you access a web page. When you use the Service, our servers automatically record certain information that your web browser sends whenever you visit any website. These server logs may include information such as your web request, Internet Protocol (“IP“) address, browser type, referring / exit pages and URLs, number of clicks, domain names, landing pages, pages viewed, and other such information.
Clear GIFs Information: When you use the Service, we may employ clear GIFs (also known as web beacons) which are used to track the online usage patterns of our users anonymously. No personally identifiable information from your Start-Up Nation Central account is collected using these clear GIFs. In addition, we may also use clear GIFs in HTML-based emails sent to our users to track which emails are opened by recipients. The information is used to enable more accurate reporting and make Start-Up Nation Central better for our users.
Analytic Services: Start-Up Nation Central may use various tools which analyze users on the Service, including a tool called “Google Analytics” to collect information about use of Start-Up Nation Central’s Site. Google Analytics collects information such as how often users visit the Site, what pages they visit when they do so, and what other sites they used prior to coming the Site. We use the information we get from Google Analytics to maintain and improve the Site and the Service. We do not combine the information collected through the use of Google Analytics with personally identifiable information. Google’s ability to use and share information collected by Google Analytics about your visits to the Site is restricted by the Google Analytics Terms of Service, available at https://www.google.com/analytics/terms/us.html, and the Google Privacy Policy, available at https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/. You may learn more about how Google collects and processes data specifically in connection with Google Analytics at https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/partners/. You may prevent your data from being used by Google Analytics by downloading and installing the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on, available at https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout/.
Personally Identifiable Information: Start-Up Nation Central may share your personally identifiable information with third parties for the purpose of providing the Service to you. If we do this, such third parties’ use of your information will be bound by this Privacy Policy. We may store personal information in locations outside the direct control of Start-Up Nation Central (for instance, on servers or databases co-located with hosting providers).
As we develop our business, we may buy or sell assets or business offerings. Customer, email, and visitor information is generally one of the transferred business assets in these types of transactions. We may also transfer or assign such information in the course of corporate divestitures, mergers, or dissolution.
We may share or disclose your information with your consent, such as if you choose to sign on to the Service through a third-party service. We cannot control third parties’ use of your information.
Start-Up Nation Central may disclose your personal information if required to do so by law or subpoena or if we believe that it is reasonably necessary or helpful to comply with a law, regulation or legal request; to protect the safety or rights of any person; to address fraud, security or technical issues; or to protect Start-Up Nation Central’s rights or property.
Non-Personally Identifiable Information: We may share non-personally identifiable information (such as anonymous usage data, referring/exit pages and URLs, platform types, number of clicks, etc.) with interested third parties to help them understand the usage patterns for certain Start-Up Nation Central services.
Start-Up Nation Central may allow third-party ad servers or ad networks to serve advertisements on the Service. These third-party ad servers or ad networks use technology to send, directly to your browser, the advertisements and links that appear on Start-Up Nation Central. They automatically receive your IP address when this happens. They may also use other technologies (such as cookies, JavaScript, or web beacons) to measure the effectiveness of their advertisements and to personalize the advertising content. Start-Up Nation Central does not provide any personally identifiable information to these third-party ad servers or ad networks without your consent. However, please note that if an advertiser asks Start-Up Nation Central to show an advertisement to a certain audience and you respond to that advertisement, the advertiser or ad server may conclude that you fit the description of the audience they are trying to reach. The Start-Up Nation Central Privacy Policy does not apply to, and we cannot control the activities of, third-party advertisers. Please consult the respective privacy policies of such advertisers for more information.
Information Collection and Use
Start-Up Nation Central uses information we collect to analyze how the Service is used, diagnose service or technical problems, maintain security, personalize content, remember information to help you efficiently access your account, monitor aggregate metrics such as total number of visitors, traffic, and demographic patterns to comply with the applicable laws.
Your Choices About Your Information
You may, of course, decline to submit personally identifiable information through the Service, in which case Start-Up Nation Central may not be able to provide certain services to you. You may update or correct your account information and email preferences at any time by logging in to your account.
Children’s Privacy
Protecting the privacy of young children is especially important. Start-Up Nation Central does not knowingly collect or solicit personal information from anyone under the age of 13 or knowingly allow such persons to register with the Service. If we become aware that we have collected personal information from a child under age 13 without verification of parental consent, we take steps to remove that information.
Our California Do Not Track Notice
We do not currently respond or take any action with respect to web browser “do not track” signals or other mechanisms that provide consumers the ability to exercise choice regarding the collection of personally identifiable information about an individual consumer’s online activities over time and across third-party web sites or online services. We may allow third parties, such as companies that provide us with analytics tools, to collect personally identifiable information about an individual consumer’s online activities over time and across different web sites when a consumer uses the Service.
Deletion of Content from California Residents
If you are a California resident under the age of 18 and a registered user, California Business and Professions Code Section 22581 permits you to remove content or personal information you have publicly posted. If you wish to remove such content or personal information and you specify which content or personal information you wish to be removed, we will do so in accordance with applicable law. Please be aware that after removal you will not be able to restore removed content. In addition, such removal does not ensure complete or comprehensive removal of the content or personal information you have posted and that there may be circumstances in which the law does not require us to enable removal of content.
Changes to Our Privacy Policy
If we change our privacy policies and procedures, we will post those changes on this page to keep you aware of what information we collect, how we use it and under what circumstances we may disclose it. Changes to this Privacy Policy are effective when they are posted on this page. If you have any comments or questions regarding our Privacy Policy, or your personal information that we may be storing and using, please contact us at [email protected]
Last Updated: January, 2018