Former IDF chief of staff goes high tech

After retiring from the IDF, former Chief of Staff Benny Gantz is embarking on a new career in the world of high tech. On Monday, reports emerged that Gantz had been named chairman of a new start-up, called Fifth Dimension, which is dedicated to “unveiling the hidden value in big data.”

Fifth Dimension — headed by Guy Caspi, former CEO of Tamares Telecom, was established a year ago, and has reportedly gotten funding from US venture capital fund Columbus Nova. According to reports in Israeli media, the secretive company has dozens of workers, most of them mathematicians.

Gantz, who retired from service in the Israel Defense Forces after 38 years, was succceded by Lt. Gen. Gadi Eisenkot.

Gantz is not the first former IDF bigwig to join the high-tech world; earlier this year, former prime minister Ehud Barak joined the board of directors of FST Biometrics, a company that specializes in biometric identification technology. FST, which combines facial recognition and body behavior biometric analytics to prevent unauthorized access, recently installed its security system at the entrance to the Israeli Diamond Exchange.

Commenting on his new job, Gantz said in a statement that Fifth Dimension has developed a unique method of analyzing big data in real time, using advanced artificial intelligence technology.

“As someone who has headed an organization that processed large amounts of different types of data, I realize that the challenges in the cyber world have changed,” he said. “We have moved beyond the era of just gathering data to an era of analyzing data.”