New Micro-VC Lool Launches in Israel. Can Better Mentoring Boost the Country?s Returns?

Israel has had an amazing track record of producing startups and raking in returns-- better than most countries many times its size. The problem is the returns have fallen off dramatically in the last ten years as industries Israel excelled at have become mature. Meanwhile, it's failed to generate many big consumer Web hits, aside from MyHeritage and a few others.

I've traveled to Israel several times and met dozens of entrepreneurs, investors and startup boosters. In my experience, there are generally two kinds of Israelis: Those who blindly talk up everything Israel, going rabid if you dare point out the obvious decline in returns, and those who have a clear grasp of the country's strengths and weaknesses and actively play to the strengths to combat the weaknesses.

Yaniv Golan and Avichay Nissenbaum are the latter.

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