I have often written about dozens of the Israeli start-ups and technical innovations.

Each time there are questions in the comments to a post: “Why are there so many inventions in Israel?”, “How can there be so many young entrepreneurs?”. Today I would like to answer these questions.

I think that very few people in Ukraine know about the most secret part of the Israeli army - Unit 8200. This unit is rightly called “the eyes and ears of Israel”.

It was the guys from 8200 who managed to hear telephone conversations between Egyptian President Nasser and King of Jordan Hussein during the Six Day War, 8200 members were able to tap Yasser Arafat’s phone call to the leader of the terrorist group, which seized a cruise ship in the Mediterranean Sea in 1985. They claim that it was 8200 that managed to disable the Syrian air defenses during the elimination operation of a suspected nuclear facility. The well-known computer virus Stunxet, which hit 45,000 industrial computers of Iran, including the ones on the nuclear facilities, was also a “surprise” from 8200. And these are only the wonders that can be told about...

There is practically no official information on the activities of Unit 8200, it is only known for certain that its prototype the Shim mem 2 department has been formed in 1948 during the British mandate in Palestine. Today in 8200 there are about 5 000 employees, each of which works with the most modern technology in an environment where you need to make decisions that affect the life or death and with a small number of instructions from above. The command sets the task and gives great freedom in its solving, in addition - the administrative division structure is such that each formation works relying on its own strength, like a startup. Often, different formations are not aware of the work of other colleagues.

People get into 8200 from school. In Israel, all citizens do military service and special division can choose anyone. They pay attention to the potential of a teenager, his aptitude for mathematics, information science, foreign languages, but the most important thing is an opportunity to learn quickly, adapt to changing conditions. Many employees of 8200 tell that they have been quite third-rate students in terms of school grades, but they have got in 8200 just because this unit evaluates the potential of what a person can become, rather than what they are right now.

So Israel has quickly realized that in the modern world it is impossible without the development of technologies and their own genius, has created the “incubator” for successful startups. Agree, for several years to solve the problem of the defense industry under conditions of war and with minimum input, but with an enormous freedom of action, people with such experience are not afraid of any risk or responsibility.

Avishai Avrahami, the founder of Wix, one of the leading cloud platform in the world, 31-year-old Ron Reuter has just recently sold his startup company Oracle for $ 50 million, 29-year-old Kira Radinsky who after army worked at Microsoft, where she created an algorithm that on the basis of historical data allowed to predict the first cholera outbreak for 130 years in Cuba. Later she founded the SalesPredist company... According to the Forbes magazine former employees of Unit 8200 have founded more than one thousand startups.

It is the answer to the question why there are so many successful projects and technical innovations in Israel. If you want a brilliant youth - raise it. It is one more reason to follow the example of Israel.