Washington Jewish Week Buy Israel Week : Page 5
BuyIsraelWeek ECONOMY from previous page There’s another category of creative talent that British-born Nikki Jason is working to publicize. She’s formed Co’motion (como-tiongrp.com), a “super agency” comprised of 14 Israeli providers offering a full range of sales, marketing, promotional and branding services to overseas companies, including some Fortune 500 A-listers. “This is a wonderful example of how you can get creative, top-notch business services at lower cost from Israel,” says Shalev. Jason explains that while living in Israel, she established a branding agency to help Is-raeli companies develop export strategies for marketing and branding. Now she’s expand-ing the concept. “Israel is very isolated and restricted in terms of growth because it’s such a small market, so I turned to our collaborators and put together services for every field in busi-ness. We are helping HP launch new tech-nologies and products, and we recently helped Apple launch its flat screens in Eu-rope,” says Jason. “We realized the capabilities of Israeli cre-ativity are not limited to technology. We have package designers, print production ex-perts, web developers, social media and ecommerce specialists, top photographers, and more. If you bought the same level of services in Manhattan, it would cost tens of thousands of dollars, but you can buy them in Israel for a fraction of the price.” The Israeli government is supporting this effort, which represents some 150 employees working in Israel. “My mission for Co’mo-tion is to make sure we can sell creative serv-ices the same way technology is selling Israeli innovation,” she says. “I feel that the way to support Israel is not [just] through philanthropy but through the work we do so well, sometimes in surprising areas.” Abigail Klein Leichman writes for the New Jersey Jewish Standard. Israel Bonds, the ultimate buy S ometimes a consumer can make one pur-chase cover a great deal of ground. When it comes a “good buy” where Israel is concerned, the purchase of an Israel Bond covers more than its share of purchasing power. “An Israel Bond is an investment,” says Jordan (Jody) Harburger, executive director of Israel Bonds Greater Washington D.C. re-gion. “It’s a security that one purchases. It’s a way that individual supporters of Israel are making a financial connection with the State of Israel and the people of Israel. We are casting our lot with the people of Israel.” Harburger said that because the bonds are called general obligation bonds, they can fund practically anything Israel needs to fi-nance. So the next time you are in Israel and you purchase a bottle of water, there is a good chance that water was processed from a de-salinization plant financed with Israel Bonds. Or if you purchase foods, especially fruits and vegetables, chances are the irriga-tion of those foods came from the same de-salinizaiton process funded by the bonds. Israel Bonds, according to Harburger, pro-vides capital for business start-ups, innova-tors and venture capitalists. “There are products that you can buy every day from Israel made possible by the technological advances we fund,” said Har-burger. “Cell phones have chips invented and created and developed in Israel. It’s the same with laptop computers, the processors in these computers were invented in Israel and funded by Israel Bonds.” Harburger added that in the area of agri-Jordan (Jody) Harburger, executive director of Israel Bonds Greater Washington D.C. culture, Israel Bonds has provided funding for hot houses and irrigation technology. One of the more recent businesses to de-velop with the support of Israel Bonds are the new electric cars. “It’s beyond a concept now,” he said. “It’s absolutely happening.” State of Israel Bonds can be found in the portfolios of an entire array of investors, in-cluding state and municipal governments, national and local unions, foundations, cor-porations and financial institutions. To date, worldwide sales of bonds has ex-ceeded $32 billion. Buy Israel Week Washington Jewish Week • November 17, 2011 B5
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