Israeli tech founder sells Rivery to Boomi after being wounded in Gaza

Itamar Ben Hemo was not supposed to join the war. At 49, the Israeli tech entrepreneur was well outside the scope of mandatory service. But after last year October 7 attack By Hamas, Ben Hamo signed up as a reservist in 2006, convinced that his combat experience as a paratrooper in Lebanon made him valuable to his country.

In January, during a quick mission to Gaza to help a wounded soldier, Ben Hemo said he remembers hearing a gunshot and feeling a searing pain. He was hit by a bullet that missed his protective vest. Several organs were damaged.

Ben Hemo was rushed to the hospital. He remembers thinking he couldn’t.

As Ben Hemo recovered, the tech industry was in the midst of a fast-moving generational renewal driven by artificial intelligence. Businesses of all shapes and sizes continue to look for ways to integrate technology into customer service, marketing and sales.

Rivery, which Ben Hemon helped launch in 2019, plays right into that theme by specializing in software integration through artificial intelligence. Through Ben Hemo’s hospital stay, surgeries and rehabilitation, Rivery continued to serve customers with the confidence of other company executives.

Last week, nearly 11 months after Ben Hemo was hospitalized, was his debut got it By a Pennsylvania cloud software company called Boomi. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but Boomi CEO Steve Lucas told CNBC it was “close to $100 million.”

Lucas Boomin”Google “Translation for business” takes the different types of software a company uses, regardless of programming language, and integrates them all into a single functional system. What makes Rivery so attractive, he says, is that by doing so, it helps advance software integration. in real-time in the cloud using artificial intelligence to do.

During his three-month recovery, Ben Hemo held company meetings and spoke to investors from his hospital bed.

“To me, anyone with that kind of robustness has what it takes to make the software work,” Lucas said.

Rivery has about 100 employees and 450 customers from all over the world. Ben Hemo said he was approached by several other bidders but wasn’t looking for a deal until Boomi emailed his investors. Key early backers include Entrée Capital, State of Mind and Tiger Global Management.

According to Lucas, developments in artificial intelligence are happening so fast that there are risks if companies are slow to adopt the technology properly.

“If you’re a CEO and you don’t think about how your company can have divisions run by an AI enterprise, you could be the next Blockbuster,” Lucas said. death of the once dominant video rental service.

Lucas says that adding Rivery to Boomi will allow the combined company to keep its AI on track, and when it goes astray, it will be able to recognize it and bring in a human to quickly resolve any customer service issues that arise.

“No, there is no artificial intelligence without incomplete or scattered data,” Ben Hemo said. “We found a way to solve that when the data comes in, translating and organizing it for customers.”

Still, Lucas says he’s well aware of the risks of making a significant investment in Israel.

The war that started with the occupation of Hamas more than 14 months ago is still not over. Israel is still the target of rockets fired from Gaza and ballistic missiles from as far away as Yemen. More than 100 hostages taken from Israel remain in captivity, and it is unclear how many are still alive.

The human and financial costs in Gaza are incalculable, but Hamas claims more than 40,000 people have been killed. Images from the area show that few buildings remain intact due to the ongoing war.

“I’d be lying if I said we didn’t consider the risks of doing business in Israel,” Lucas said, “But some of the best technology in the world has come out of Israel.”

Shortly after Ben Hamo was shot, another Rivery employee, Itay Galea, was killed while on duty in northern Israel, where the country is fighting Iran-backed Hezbollah. Galea, a 38-year-old reservist, was given shares in Rivery so that his surviving family would benefit from the Boomi deal.

According to the Israel Innovation Organization, part of the Israeli government, about 15% of tech workers left their jobs to join the military because of the war. Foreign investors stopped buying and investing.

But there are signs of a reversal.

A recent report from PwC Israel shows that total exits from Israeli startups surpassed 2023, and the average deal size now exceeds the 2022 figure. Rotem Eldar of Israeli venture firm 10D said, “The fundraising numbers in 2024 are now starting to match the pre-war numbers.” 10D’s report found that cybersecurity companies are the biggest area of ​​focus for investors.

A revival was also observed in Israel’s stock market Tel Aviv Stock Exchange It has more than doubled since October 2023.

For Ben Hemo, the sale to Boomi marks his second successful outing as CEO and founder. He says his wounds are now fully healed.

“I have the energy to do it,” he said. “I’m very excited, we all understand the gift of this opportunity.”

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