CTech's Sunday Roundup of Israeli Tech News

SodaStream investigation transcripts: you made a killing today, lunch is on you. SodaStream’s former CEO Daniel Birnbaum is being investigated under suspicion of providing insider trading tips to a close acquaintance on three separate occasions, enabling her to make profits of around $55,000. Read more

The merged Taboola-Outbrain wants to take on Facebook and Google. The industry’s two largest content distribution companies have announced a merger agreement Thursday. Read more

Daniel Birnbaum

Interview | To reach unicorn status, some companies make great compromises, Says Oren Zeev. In an interview with Calcalist, leading angel investor Oren Zeev talks about his investment approach and the end of the extreme valuations bubble. Read more

Benny Landa's Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds. The printing multi-millionaire’s newest venture has him cooking diamonds in a central Israel lab, in a process he describes as “alchemy”. Read more

WeWork to cut 2,000 jobs by end of month, report says. The co-working company is cutting its workforce following its catastrophic IPO attempt, Bloomberg reported Thursday. Read more

Elbit nabs $153 million contract with Southeast Asian army. The company will supply the army of the unnamed Asian country with an array of unmanned aircraft systems over a 22-months period. Read more

Security was perfect—they just forgot about the smart aquarium. Michal Braverman-Blumenstyk, the chief technology officer of the cloud and AI division of Microsoft, spoke with Calcalist about the public concern over security breaches of IoT devices. Read more

British retailer Tesco partners With no-checkout shopping startup Trigo. Trigo uses in-store ceiling-mounted cameras to identify items picked up by customers, automatically charging them as they leave the store to create a no-checkout shopping experience. Read more

Traffic optimization startup Waycare raises $7.3 million. Waycare develops an artificial intelligence-based transportation management service that aggregates historical and real-time data from various sources, including vehicle systems, weather monitors, video cameras, and road sensors, to allow first responders to act before accidents develop into traffic jams. Read more

Brief | Food allergy detection startup Allerguard raises $1.5 million. Allerguard develops a handheld device that scans and analyzes the food vapors to determine the presence of allergens. Read more