On Israel visit, Wiz investor commits to back local entrepreneurs and startups
New York-based venture firm Insight Partners, which opened its Tel Aviv office in 2019, has invested close to $6 billion in the Israeli tech ecosystem over the past two decades
Sharon Wrobel is a tech reporter for The Times of Israel
New York-based private equity firm Insight Partners remains committed to investing in Israeli startups and tech firms, not despite the ongoing war woes and internal judicial jitters, but because of the resilience, talent, and entrepreneurship emerging from Israel, co-founder Jeff Horing conveyed during a visit to Israel.
“We are very excited about the Israeli tech community, and it still is magic to us,” Horing said in a rare meeting in Tel Aviv on Tuesday. “There’s no other consistent environment where the confidence level in the entrepreneurs is so high.”
“The probability of finding the right mix of high integrity, hard work, smarts, and hustle – it’s better than just about anywhere else in the world,” Horing remarked.
Founded in 1995, Insight has over $90 billion of assets under management and has invested in more than 800 companies worldwide. More than 55 of those companies have gone public through initial public offerings, the firm said.
The US venture capital and private equity firm has invested in Israeli technology for over two decades, opening its first office outside New York in Tel Aviv in 2019. Over the years, Insight has grown into one of the biggest and most active foreign investors in Israeli software and technology companies. The private equity firm’s investments into the local tech ecosystem have increased from around $700 million in 2019 to more than $5.8 billion, backing over 125 Israeli companies.
In 2024, Insight made mostly follow-on investments in over 25 Israel-based or Israeli-founded companies. Among the firm’s most notable investments are Israeli-founded cybersecurity unicorn Wiz, which sealed a deal in March to be bought by search giant Google for a staggering $32 billion, as well as publicly-listed Israeli workplace management firm Monday.com.
Other investments include Israeli startups Run:ai and Deci, which were both acquired by US gaming and computer graphics giant Nvidia. Another is digital adoption platform WalkMe, which German business software maker SAP last year bought for $1.5 billion.
Talking about Insight’s first investments in Israel, Horing recounted that “a seminal moment was meeting with the Wiz founders back in 2010/2011.”
“The founders were folks I had never met before in terms of their creativity, smarts, they were savvy in building a business and partnering with the financial ecosystem,” said Horing, “It became a wonderful relationship and through that relationship, I was introduced to a whole bunch of other prospects.”
Wiz was co-founded by Assaf Rappaport, Yinon Costica, Ami Luttwak and Roy Reznik, the same team that founded the firm Adallom, which was sold to Microsoft for $320 million in 2015. They also led Microsoft Azure’s Cloud Security Group.
Horing said he visits Israel several times a year to attend board meetings of local companies the fund has invested in, and meet up with Israeli entrepreneurs and CEOs, as well as with founders of prospective startups. The current visit is Horing’s third since war broke out following the onslaught by the Hamas terror group on southern communities on October 7, 2023.
“Israel has a really good entrepreneurial culture – it’s as good as Silicon Valley in every way,” said Horing. “You have the military, and certain industries like cyber, that keep [Israel] ahead of the world.”
“If anything, we are doing more in Israel than in California at this point…Our success rate in Israel has been astronomically good, but we have also been through a few failures,” he remarked.
While investment into high-growth, software technology companies drove much of Insight’s activity over the years, Horing said that Insight has also set its sights on backing young Israeli startups and has shifted its focus to early-stage and Series A funding rounds.
“My first passion is for companies that are solving a difficult problem that’s substantive,” said Horing. “Israel has got just tons of smart folk who are thinking about exactly that kind of issue.”
Speaking about innovation and the AI revolution, Horing acknowledged that Israel was somewhat lagging behind other global innovation hubs.
“It’s not an area to date that Israel has had marquee breakouts,” said Horing. “It’s still early innings, but I am incredibly optimistic.”
“We have done 15 AI-related investment deals in the last two years in Israel, so we see it happening in very focused niches, which we are very excited about,” he enthused.
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