"There's a lot of spill over between the Israel ecosystem and the New York ecosystem."

“I know that many people are following the figures, looking at the charts, seeing which companies are doing better, which companies are not doing that great, seeing that cyber and fintech companies are doing pretty well now and some of the other types of companies are not doing as well,” explained Anat Katz, Economic Minister, North America, Israel, at the Economic Mission to the USA. “I think that it's important to look and compare that to how companies in these subsectors are doing globally before one makes decisions or conclusions about the Israel ecosystem in itself.”

Katz is part of the Ministry of Economy and Industry's network of economic missions. It is one of 45 economic missions around the world, and the goal is to support Israeli companies that are looking to export out of Israel and draw investments. She joined CTech at Calcalist and Bank Leumi’s Mind The Tech in New York to discuss the reputation of Israeli companies in business in North America.

“I will say that there's a lot of spill over between the Israel ecosystem and the New York ecosystem. The New York innovative ecosystem is comprised by a large chunk by Israelis, not necessarily Israeli companies, but absolutely and very definitely Israelis. I think it's overrepresented.”

While the observation was anecdotal, she maintained that “it has to do with the upbringing with the culture, with what we bring with us.”

You can watch the entire exchange in the video above.