CTech's Tuesday Roundup of Israeli Tech News

Boutique hostel company Selina to open multiple Israeli locations; Israeli securities watchdog goes after blockchain-touting solar energy company

Boutique hostel company Selina to open multiple Israeli locations. The chain, which currently offers 10,000 beds worldwide, aims to reach 100,000 by 2022, according to Selina Israel head Yossi Mautner. Read more

A Selina location. Photo: Agustin Munoz

 

 

Israeli securities watchdog goes after blockchain-touting solar energy company. In 2017, Tel Aviv-listed Apollo announced a successful experiment in harnessing surplus solar energy to power crypto-mining machines, leading it to jump 38% on the exchange before divulging its system was not actually at a capacity to do so. Read more

 

Calcalist’s New York conference to host Pitango’s $1 million startup competition. Calcalist’s annual Mind the Tech Conference will take place on April 10-12 for the third consecutive year. Read more

 

Venture capital firm Target Global raises mobility fund. The Berlin and Tel Aviv-based firm intends to raise several hundreds of millions of dollars for the fund, looking to harness its ties with German automotive companies and Israeli mobility startups. Read more 

 

These goggles enable surgeons to see right through you. The headset by Israel-based Augmedics projects X ray-like 3D visualization of the patient in real time, allowing surgeons to "see" through the patient's skin, muscle tissue, and bone. Read more

 

Cancer screening company Check-Cap crashes on $7.5 million Nasdaq direct offering. The company announced the discounted offering Monday, closing 27.62% down on the exchange. Read more

 

Nir Blumberger to Manage Facebook's Investments in EMEA. As part of his role, Blumberger will work out of Facebook's Tel Aviv offices and will be in charge of investments and acquisitions of Israeli startups. Read more

 

Israel reinstitutes export license of probed drone maker Aeronautics. In 2017, the Ministry of Defense halted Aeronautics' license to export a loiter munition UAV system to an unnamed client. Read more

 

Outbrain announces new appointments in northern Europe. The online content distribution company promoted Stephanie Himoff to the role of vice president of global publishers and platforms, following a series of partnership deals signed by Outbrain in the past few months, including with Eurosport, The Guardian, and the Daily Express. Read more

 

Genetic crop design company Evogene appoints former Bayer exec to board. Nasdaq and Tel Aviv-listed Evogene uses computational predictive biology to develop novel crop strains and pesticides. Read more

 

Eurofins Agro, Consumer Physics partner to provide U.K. farmers with instant feed analysis. The two companies will market Consumer Physics’ SCiO a hand-held device capable of analyzing a variety of silage types, in less than a minute. Read more

 

Cybersecurity startup CyberInt appoints new CEO. Itai Margalit, previously CEO of Switzerland-based network optimization company Starhome Mach, will serve as the CyberInt’s new CEO, the company announced Monday. Read more