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Israel: The World's Second Silicon Valley
(Telegraph-UK) Emma Barnett - Israel, the 100th smallest country in the world, can fit into Europe 459 times. Yet it has the highest number of companies listed on the NASDAQ after America. It also has the highest number of high-tech start-ups outside of the U.S., estimated to be 3,500, ranging from Internet companies to software solutions. Snaptu, a mobile application platform (acquired earlier this year by Facebook for $60-70m) and ICQ, the first Internet instant messaging service (bought by AOL in 1998 for approximately $400m) are a couple of the high-profile Israeli start-ups to have been snapped up by major web players. Gilad Japhet, the founder and chief executive of a popular social networking site for families, noted: "Israelis are incredibly good at problem-solving. They are trained to never accept barriers and always try and solve an issue - no matter how difficult it is. This makes Israel very strong in technology....People here usually like to solve digital issues for businesses."