While Israel’s hi-tech sector soars, breaking its own fundraising records every month, companies are having trouble recruiting the talent they need to catch up with their ambitions.
Israeli start-ups have raised more than $10.8 billion in investment capital since the start of the year and are on pace to raise more than twice as much as a year ago. However, the tech sector has as many as 13,000 open positions it could not fill, and 60% of Israeli hi-tech firms say they have trouble recruiting for R&D positions, according to a recent report by the Israel Innovation Authority and Start-Up Nation Central.
Hundreds of companies around the Tel Aviv area, Israel’s hi-tech center, are currently looking to hire. Among them is Verbit, which has developed an AI-powered, real-time transcription and captioning platform and recently raised $157 million at a $1b. valuation. It aims to recruit 200 employees by the end of the year for a wide range of positions, such as business and product roles, support research and development and help prepare the company for a public offering.
AppsFlyer, a mobile marketing-analytics platform, is planning on recruiting 300 new employees in Israel by the end of the year. Most of those will be for the company’s R&D departments, which currently include 400 employees, developing its marketing measurement software.
Cybersecurity company Cybereason is currently recruiting for more than 150 positions in Israel, including C ++ developers, Backend developers, Frontend, JAVA, DevOps experts, product managers, Big Data experts, UX designers and more.
OpenWeb, which offers a social-engagement platform that builds online communities around digital content, aims to recruit 100 employees by the end of the year for various positions. The company’s product is used by some 100 million monthly active users across more than 900 publishers.
Cato Networks, another unicorn in the field of cloud communications and security services, is looking to recruit more than 100 engineers in Israel. Fintech powerhouse Payoneer, which is planning an IPO on the Nasdaq market in the coming months, is looking to hire more than 300 employees. B2B data company Zoominfo, which develops go-to-market intelligence solutions, plans to recruit more than 180 employees in Israel.
And the list goes on. For experienced engineers, it is definitely a job-seekers’ market in Israel right now.