Iron Nation: Emergency fund supporting Israeli early-stage startups

“We realized that the biggest challenge that startup companies will face is a financial one. We have to remember the general context: the previous year before the war was not very easy in terms of the ability to raise funds. It was a global thing, not specific to Israel, but in Israel it took us more time to go back to normal because of our internal political issues. And then the war started,” says Ilan Tevet, Co-Founder and CMO at Iron Nation, speaking to CTech at Calcalist’s 2024 Forecasts event in Tel Aviv.

Iron Nation is a VC focusing on early stage tech startups that was established three days after Hamas’ 7/10 attacks, in anticipation of the economic impact that the war would have on Israel’s startup ecosystem. “We realized that startup companies, specifically the early-stage ones, would have significant challenges and we decided to establish a fund that would help them.”

“It's not just about financing, it's also about the fact that a large part of the founders and key members of these startup companies are actually still serving in reserves,” says Tevet of the roughly 15-25% of tech employees who are serving in reserve units in Israel’s ongoing war. “Because startups are small, every missing person is very significant in their ability to execute and fulfill, and this is another way that Iron Nation can help by providing mentorship and stepping in to help these companies and make sure that the money that is invested in them can be maximized and help them pass this challenging period,” explained Tevet.

You can watch the full interview in the video above.