Innovation, Determination Brings High-Tech to Negev
Innovation, Determination Brings High-Tech to Negev
August 28, 2013
Business & Management, Homeland & Cyber Security, Negev Development & Community Programs, Robotics & High-Tech
By BGU President Prof. Rivka Carmi, M.D.
The Jerusalem Post — On Tuesday, September 3, 2103, the prime minister of Israel will cut the ribbon and thus officially open the new Advanced Technologies Park (ATP) in the Negev.
The photos will show happy people – including myself, the mayor of Beer-Sheva, and many other government dignitaries and high-tech industry and business leaders from Israel and around the world – celebrating an achievement that will have a profound impact on the State of Israel.
Covering an area of some 23 acres adjacent to the Marcus Family Campus of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Soroka University Medical Center and the planned base of the Israel Defense Forces’ (IDF) elite technology units, it is slated to become Israel’s new “Silicon Wadi” and “Cyber Alley,” building on the exceptional entrepreneurial Israeli spirit that was so articulately outlined in the book Start Up Nation.
Without a doubt, the synergy of a high-tech industrial center that leverages the know-how and research potential of BGU researchers and students is creating an academia-industry ecosystem conducive to innovation and excellence.
Despite the shared belief that the ATP and the move of the IDF is part of a greater vision to move Israel’s high-tech capital to the Negev, it has taken more than 13 years to bring the plan to fruition.
How did we overcome these obstacles in the Negev? With a lot determination and “out of the box” thinking, nurtured and supported by an array of international friends who simply wouldn’t accept “no” as an answer.