A two-day gathering bringing together leaders in innovation and business with young Jewish professionals from Europe and Israel took place in Berlin.
“The aim of the event was to explore the true meaning of innovation, creativity and success in today’s challenging economic, social and political environment, and inspire the participants through hearing about success stories of Jewish innovators and entrepreneurs,” said Tamar Shchory, the executive director of the Leadel organization, a project of the European Jewish Congress (EJC) which aims to inspire a multigenerational Jewish movement.
“Since the time of the first Jews, innovation has always been at the forefront of Jewish activity, even during times of great persecution,’’ Shchory added, citing Einstein, Spinoza, Freud, Chagall, Kafka, Mahler, Heine, Durkheim and other great innovators in their respective fields.
Over 260 participants attended the conference from Germany, the UK, France and Switzerland.
Speakers at the event included Yanki Margalit, an Israeli entrepreneur and speaker best known for starting Aladdin Knowledge Systems and currently Chairman of SpaceIL, a non-profit space technology organization and Jeff Pulver, an American Internet entrepreneur, known for his work as founder and chief executive of pulver.com and co-founder in Vonage.
EJC President Moshe Kantor said : ‘’This was the ‘Start-Up Nation’ meeting Europe and I hope that the event helped the younger generation, through meeting with entrepreneurs and inspiring and successful businessmen, to connect to being Jewish through business innovation and success. Through the presentation of Jewish models of success, whose Judaism is a significant part of their identity, the event will take European Jewish and Israeli innovation to the next level.”