This is the Jerusalem-based company’s 18th completed funding round since it began operations in October last year.

OurCrowd identifies companies seeking early stage investment and brings them to the attention of accredited investors in specific venture capital funding rounds. It was founded by Jon Medved, the investment fund’s CEO.

“Passing this funding milestone makes OurCrowd this year’s fastest-growing vehicle for angels and accredited investors to find and back early stage companies online. From our roots in Israel we have actually taken the global lead in funds raised,” said Medved, a former member of ISRAEL21c’s board of directors.

He added that while the fund initially focused on the Israeli early stage startup scene, it is now bringing together investors and companies from around the world.

Zula is developing a cloud-based mobile collaboration platform for teams. Company management includes Jacob Ner-David, who co-founded DeltaThree, and Pulver, a well-known early investor in Twitter and FourSquare.

“Not only did we raise our seed round online in less than a week, but we had people from all over the world invest in Zula thanks to this platform,” said Pulver.

Other companies that OurCrowd has raised money for include AbesMarket.com, Sherpa, TradeOS, Parko and Consumer Physics.

“Your site has a wealth of information and it is truly inspiring,” Sasson wrote to us, adding that “we might like to know” that she had just been named a first-place winner in the PBS LearningMedia and The Henry Ford Foundation Teacher Innovator Award competition.

Of course we wanted to know! We sent a “mazal tov” to Sasson right away.

“It is very nice to be recognized for my project, but I am most excited that Israel’s innovative character will also get some press,” she answered. “I discovered ISRAEL21c last year when I first developed the classroom project on Israeli innovations. Your site is a research source for my eighth-grade students. Students used the articles to help choose topics and gather information on various innovations.”

The nationwide contest recognized Pre-K-12th grade educators who best used digital media in new and unique ways to improve students’ learning across key subject areas.

Overall, 30 teachers won honors – but only the top 10 (Sasson included) will participate in a week-long “Innovation Immersion Experience” at The Henry Ford in Dearborn, Michigan, from July 27 to August 2, 2013, and receive a free PBS TeacherLine professional development course.

From agriculture to technology, environment to culture, Epstein’s students explored the revolutionary contributions Israel has made to society. Sasson – who was recognized by the US Department Education as an Education Innovator — introduced her students to Israeli advances with drip irrigation and then “inspired students to examine other areas of innovation in Israel, emerging from its scarcity of resources.”

The students learned about Waze, instant messaging technology, ReWalk, Dream Doctors Project, PillCam, electric vehicles, desalination and argan oil, among others. They then showcased their projects in an “Israel Innovations Expo.”

“Whether it was the group examining OoVoo, a video chatting application, or the students who explored eyeSight gesture recognition technology, they were fascinated about how much innovation from Israel can impact their lives here,” Sasson wrote for the PBS award site.

“Perhaps most rewarding was to see how the students applied new knowledge in the presentation of the innovation. Rather than just report on an exciting piece of art, the students fashioned it themselves.”

Sasson summed up: “I appreciate this recognition and I am grateful that as a result, I will now have the opportunity to participate in a week-long Innovation Immersion Experience at The Henry Ford in Michigan this summer. I am also excited that through the students’ projects, Israel’s innovative character, which was at the core of the winning entry, will receive attention too.”

Lexifone founder Ike Sagie signed a memorandum of understanding earlier this year with Changzhou Vice Mayor Fang Guoqiang in Tel Aviv.

Guoqiang was leading a high-level economic delegation from Changzhou, which has actively been forging business ties with Israeli startups and established companies for the past two years in cooperation with the PTL Group, founded in 2000 to help Israeli companies with logistics, manpower and financial services in the vast Chinese market.

“We intend to continue and expand cooperation with Israeli technology companies, to establish a complete Chinese-Israeli Technology Park in Changzhou,” said Guoqiang.

The vice mayor quipped that the book Start-Up Nation ought to be revised to include a chapter describing the intense activity of Israeli companies in the “Dragon City.”

China and Israel, 12 hours apart by air, established diplomatic relations in 1992 and business ties have been growing exponentially over the past decade.

Chinese-Hebrew interaction

Lexifone’s software already works in Chinese (as well as English, German, French, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish and other common languages), but the founders are eager to fine-tune its fluency to better facilitate transnational calls for the increasing number of people doing business with China.

“The entire world is trying to get into this field, including IBM, Lucent and Microsoft, but it’s very demanding in terms of technology,” says Lexifone VP for business development Itay Sagie, Ike’s son.

“The high accuracy we have achieved is because of a technology called linguistic optimization, our core IP,” Sagie tells ISRAEL21c. Lexifone’s eight-strong Haifa workforce built a voice-to-voice translation engine and a worldwide telephony platform.

“We need to work with local linguists and computer scientists to customize the software for Chinese market needs and to find proper use cases in the country — whether call centers, receptionists or government offices. They will work closely with our Israeli team in Haifa.”

Sagie says the help of PTL is critical to the success of the venture in China.

“I took some lessons in Chinese language and culture, but I have not yet been there,” he says, noting that like Israelis, the Chinese move quickly to implement new ideas with a handshake and verbal understanding.

However, the conservative Chinese culture demands conformity to certain norms that are difficult for Israelis to grasp.

“Israelis lack the confidence to do business there, so we developed a support system to deal with those problems for them,” says Zvi Shalgo, CEO of PTL and chairman of the Israeli Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai.

“When a company has the vision to enter China, we help them get a foot in the market, helping them get local teams for production and local investment in their business.”

PTL has helped set up many manufacturing partnerships between Israel and China, and now is adding R&D centers in Changzhou to the mix. The Changzhou government is investing heavily in this initiative, Shalgo tells ISRAEL21c.

Recruiting Chinese talent

The first Israeli company that is establishing an R&D center in Changzhou is software developer Matrix Global, which has already recruited its first batch of Chinese engineers for a six-month retraining session run by Israel-based John Bryce Training.

“We intend to do that for many more companies,” says Shalgo, who organized a “Go China” high-tech conference at Tel Aviv University for the Chinese VIPs in cooperation with the MIT Entrepreneurship Forum.

“We also set up a joint VC investment fund to invest in Israeli companies,” he continues. “We’ve signed agreements with the first two companies. They can use the money as they want, but of course we prefer to help companies intending to operate in China. We can help them come to the market and not wait till they can do it by themselves.”

Under PTL’s Changzhou Industrial Incubation Initiative (CI3), two Israeli companies in the medical devices field have already begun manufacturing. Through another of PTL’s programs, Israeli nutritional supplement company LycoRed built a turnkey factory in Changzhou three years ago.

Chinese officials visit Israel four or five times a year to encourage continued cooperative ventures.

“There is a lot of activity,” says Shalgo. “The local government announced [Changzhou] as an Israeli-China development area. It looks promising.”

Using two optical sensors, and another special high-tech tool, he’s developed the world’s first “watch” that can just about tell when your time may be up.

It’s no joke: Oxitone was developed to cheat fate.

Eisen tells ISRAEL21c that about half of the people who die from cardiac or pulmonary arrest would be alive if someone had been there to get them to the hospital in time. Oxitone is made to be worn on the wrist to provide a heads-up for someone to get medical assistance on their own, before it’s too late.

With all the technology out there — personal monitoring devices, crocodile clips for your finger, even those panic buttons — nothing helps if the user is not able to mobilize these devices in time. And many patients may not be able to read the signs that cardiac arrest is imminent.

That’s why Eisen developed a wearable watch-like mobile device –– synched with Bluetooth, Android or iPhone devices –– that takes minute-by-minute readings of heart rate and oxygen levels in the blood.

So potentially “disruptive” is this advance that Oxitone recently was chosen from 400 applicants to be among 13 companies – and the only Israeli one — in GE Healthcare’s Start-Up Health Academy Entrepreneurship Program. The three-year program provides healthcare entrepreneurs the tools to propel their product into the healthcare market.

Pain-free, always on duty

“Oxitone takes the pinch out; it’s worn on the wrist instead of the fingertip to provide continuous, wireless non-stop monitoring while you are walking, eating, sleeping or doing sports,” Eisen says.

Blood-oxygen levels are a critical parameter in monitoring COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), which can prevent patients from getting enough air into their lungs.

COPD also accompanies chronic bronchitis, asthma and emphysema, leading to shortness of breath. It is estimated that COPD is the third-highest cause of death in the United States.

Oxitone non-invasively determines if a cardiac event is imminent by following blood-oxygen levels. It may also help people who suffer from sleep apnea, giving peace of mind to the wearer and their loved ones.

When heart rates change and oxygen levels drop, Oxitone sends alerts to pre-determined locations. It can also be used for long-term care, as physicians can access ongoing records to see how a patient is doing over time.

“My product facilitates an early clinical response for cardiac or pulmonary attack,” Eisen explains. “Because it is continuously monitoring, we can provide an emergency alert. With our device, people will feel better because they understand they are protected. This is the breakthrough.”

A telltale heart

Eisen is looking for a $3 million investment and looks forward to starting clinical trials on the device in Israel and the UK. Early R&D trials have already been done, he says. There is also a working prototype in hand, but just how the final Oxitone will look is yet to be determined.

Eisen was trained originally as a physicist. The 46-year-old moved to Israel from Moscow in 1999 and obtained a doctorate from Israel’s famed Weizmann Institute of Science. He then did a post-doc at Bar-Ilan University, where he learned about optical lasers. This work of several years enchanted him, and made him curious about applied sciences.

He started working as a freelancer, building various projects and sensors for high-tech companies.

In 2010, Eisen joined Israel’s startup nation culture by founding Oxitone, the name of the company as well as the device. The company is based in Ashkelon, inside the ATI incubator.

The “watch” will cost an estimated $200, plus a monthly service fee depending on use.

The newspaper business may be in dire straits but I’m still one of those people with a daily subscription. I like to hold the newspaper, flip through it and re-read certain sections. And when I go away, I share this now old-fashioned habit with people I don’t even know.

In Israel, you don’t just freeze your subscription when you head off on vacation. Instead, you can donate it.

The newspaper companies have a list of charities, hospitals, old-age homes, facilities for youth-at-risk, rehabilitation centers and homes for the disabled just waiting to accept your newspaper for the days you’re away.

Anyone who has spent time in any one of the places listed above knows that having something current to read to pass the time is a godsend.

As such, my to-do checklist before I go away always includes donating my subscription.

I found out about this initiative about 10 years back when I called to freeze my payment. Until then I had only given away old, out-of-date magazines to libraries, hospitals and schools.

The customer service agent told me about this program. Though I remember doubting the idea at first – I assumed it was too good to be true and that somehow I was going to be charged double – I agreed just the same.

Instead of delivering the newspaper to my address it goes to someone available to read it. It’s a win-win situation – the newspaper keeps its readership up and the person going away gets that fuzzy warm feeling of doing something for the good.

Although I do not travel all that often, when I do go away, I always call to offer up my newspaper. And every time the agent thanks me profusely (even if he is reading a pre-written blurb) and notes that it’s not something everyone does.

Which – in my mind – can only mean that people just don’t know about this project. Who wouldn’t want to give away a newspaper they’re not going to read anyway?

As for those who aren’t going away but still want to recycle their newspapers and magazines: Schools and kindergartens love old magazines for art projects, and animal shelters will almost never turn down old newsprint.

“Building your startup is a daily struggle,” says the 35-year-old co-founder of Geekmedia, which operates Geektime, the largest tech blog In Israel, as well as the two-year-old startup accelerator VentureGeeks.

“Knowing that you made a difference, even in only one person’s life, is the reason we continue to create and our motivation to succeed,” she tells ISRAEL21c.

Bar discovered her inner geek while serving in a highly regarded military computer unit, and later earned certification as a Microsoft systems engineer. Raised in suburban Ramat Gan north of Tel Aviv, she also earned a law degree and worked for the Ministry of Justice in specialty areas such as digital signatures and children’s online privacy rights.

ISRAEL21c e-chatted with Bar while she was in New York in April for the all-important TechCrunch Disrupt conference, along with every other serious geek from across the globe.

ISRAEL21c: Do Israeli women feel comfortable and welcome in the high-tech world?

Moran Bar: Being a woman was an advantage, in fact, as the clients remembered me. But the struggle for an equal salary, and to be treated the same way as men in my profession, were in fact obstacles I had to deal with on a daily basis as a young woman.

I21c: What was your goal in starting Geekmedia, Venturegeeks and Geektime?

MB: We (my partner Yaniv Feldman and I) started the company and blog after we discovered that the niche of the tech world was not being covered by tech people. The big newspapers deal only with the finance side, and startup reviews were made only by foreign blogs. We brought the tech world, with our own unique perspective, to the Israeli audience. When a geek writes about technology, it is so different than a writer writing on the same topic.

I21c: What accomplishment makes you feel most proud?

MB: I think that we have created a different blog, and most important – a great and welcoming home for the tech community. Today, we are a source for breaking news from Israel to all of the major blogs and important media worldwide. As a company of seven people, we are financially stable and I’m very proud of my team.

I21c: Where do you see yourself in five years?

MB: We are now on the verge of expanding internationally, with an English version that we are planning to launch at the end of May. I look forward to seeing where I will be in five years. As the tech world is a very dynamic one, who can predict the future? We are busy in creating it right now.

I21c: Why the trip to New York?

MB: New York is the capital of media. I’m here to make sure that everyone that needs to know, will know about the Israeli startup scene and about Newsgeek being the best place to get the information about leading companies from Israel. Later this year we will make some big announcements on that matter.

I21c: Please share some details about your family.

MB: I come from a supportive and humble family, which helped me understand from a young age that I can accomplish everything I wish for and want. A supportive family is the foundation of everything great that I’ve done in my life, and I feel lucky to have a loving partner, two brothers and parents who give me the energy to keep on doing what I love doing.

I21c: How does your “Israeli-ness” impact your business and personal style?

MB: Personally, I’m very ambitious and focused on the success of anything that I do. I believe that me being an Israeli also has a part in the fact that I’m a survivor — which is crucial in the startup world. I think that being an Israeli is all about having the right connections and friends everywhere. It’s a very powerful and united community that will be there for you wherever you go.