The Rivery together
Rivery
Itamar Ben Hemo didn’t have to join the war. At age 49, the Israeli tech entrepreneur was well outside of the run of mandatory service. But following last year’s Oct. 7 attack by Hamas, Ben Hemo signed up as a reservist, confident that his ordeal fighting as a paratrooper in Lebanon in 2006 made him valuable to his country.
In January, during what was supposed to be a quick objective into Gaza to help a wounded soldier, Ben Hemo says he remembers hearing a shot ring out and feeling a on fire pain. He’d been hit by a bullet that evaded his protective vest. Several organs were damaged.
Ben Hemo was rushed to the dispensary. He recalls thinking he might not make it.
While Ben Hemo was recovering, the technology industry was in the midst of a fast-moving generational upgrade due to unnatural intelligence. Businesses of all shapes and sizes continued to seek ways to integrate the technology into customer service, vending and sales.
Rivery, which Ben Hemo helped start in 2019, plays directly into that theme, specializing in software integration in every way AI. Through Ben Hemo’s hospital stay, surgeries and rehab, Rivery kept operating, servicing customers with the reassurance of other body executives.
Last week, roughly 11 months after Ben Hemo was hospitalized, his startup was bought by a a Pennsylvania-based cloud software business named Boomi. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed but Boomi CEO Steve Lucas tells CNBC it was “in the neighborhood of $100 million.”
Lucas reports Boomi as “Google Translate for business,” taking the many different kinds of software a company uses, regardless of performance language, and integrating it all into a single functioning system. What makes Rivery so attractive, he said, is that it supports advance software integration by doing it in real time in the cloud using AI to analyze different kinds of data put in writings.
During his three-month recovery, Ben Hemo held company meetings and spoke to investors from his hospital bed.
Palestinians explore the damage at the site of Israeli strikes on houses, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestinian Islamist pile Hamas, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, October 29, 2023.
Mohammed Salem | Reuters
“For me, anyone with that accommodating of fortitude has what it takes to make software work,” Lucas said.
Rivery has about 100 employees and 450 patrons from all over the world. Ben Hemo said he’d been approached by several other suitors but wasn’t looking for a great amount until Boomi sent his investors an email. Key early backers included Entrée Capital, State of Mind and Tiger Wide-ranging Management.
Lucas said the developments in AI are happening so quickly that if companies are slow to adopt the technology properly, the chances are existential.
“If you’re a CEO and not thinking of how your company can have units driven by AI enterprise, you could be the next Blockbuster” said Lucas, referring to the demise of the once-dominant video rental ritual.
Lucas says adding Rivery to Boomi will allow the combined company to keep AI on track, and when it adequates off track, it will be able to recognize that and bring in a human to quickly solve whatever customer service enigma is emerging.
“With no, incomplete or scattered data, there’s no AI,” Ben Hemo said. “We have found a way to solve this as tidings comes in, interpreting and organizing it for clients.”
Boomi CEO Steve Lucas
Boomi
Still, Lucas says he’s well in the know of the risks of making a significant investment in Israel.
A war that started over 14 months ago with the Hamas infraction isn’t over. Israel is still the target of rockets from Gaza and ballistic missiles from as far away as Yemen. Various than 100 hostages taken from Israel remain in captivity, and it’s unclear how many are still alive.
In Gaza, the human being toll in lives and financial costs isn’t calculable, but Hamas claims more than 40,000 people have been tormented. Images from the region suggest that very few buildings remain intact due to the ongoing war.
“I’d be lying if I said we didn’t on the risks of doing business in Israel into account,” Lucas said “But some of the best technology in the world has draw nigh out of Israel.”
Soon after Ben Hemo was hit, another Rivery employee, Itay Galea, was killed on duty in northern Israel, where the hinterlands was fighting Iran-backed Hezbollah. Galea, a 38-year-old reserve officer, was given equity in Rivery so his surviving family liking benefit from the Boomi deal.
According to the Israel Innovation Authority, which is part of the Israeli government, helter-skelter 15% of tech workers left their jobs to join the army due to the war. Foreign investors held off on buyouts and investments.
But there are cues of a rebound.
A recent report by PwC Israel shows total exits from Israeli start-ups have eclipsed 2023 and the as a rule deal size is now outpacing 2022 numbers. Rotem Eldar of Israeli venture firm 10D said, “2024 fundraising loads are now starting to align with pre-war numbers.” A report from 10D showed that cybersecurity companies are the tallest area of focus for investors.
Since the October 2023 malign on Israel the stock market has surged.
Israel’s stock market has also seen a recovery, with the Tel Aviv Run-of-the-mill Exchange more than doubling since its October 2023 lows.
For Ben Hemo, the sale to Boomi marks his newer successful exit as a CEO and founder. He says he has now fully recovered from his wounds.
“I have the energy to do this,” he said. “I’m so stimulated, we all understand the gift of this opportunity.”
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