Committed to a Thriving South

Israel's founding father and first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, famously declared that "Israel's future lies in the Negev." He would undoubtedly have been thrilled to see that his namesake university is still strongly committed to fulfilling this vision – especially during the past challenging year.

Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) is the beating heart of Israel's southern region. The university serves as the epicenter of academic, cultural, and economic life not only for Beer-Sheva but for the entire Negev. Its 20,000 students and thousands of faculty members and employees live in cities, towns and kibbutzim throughout southern Israel, and the main campus in Beer-Sheva plays a key role in boosting the city as well as the entire region. "BGU has a large footprint in the Negev, and it is one of the largest employers in the region," confirms Josh Peleg, CEO of BGN, Ben-Gurion University's Technology Transfer Company.

Responding to October 7

As a result of its physical location and important regional role, Ben-Gurion University was very deeply impacted by the horrific events of October 7, 2023. A staggering number of people connected to BGU were directly affected by the atrocities committed by Hamas on that day: 111 students, faculty members and alumni, and their immediate family members, were killed. Five were taken hostage and are still being held in captivity in Gaza, including Engineering student Noa Argamani, and recent graduates Sasha Trupanov and Avinatan Or, who both completed degrees in BGU's Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

More than 6,600 students and faculty members, men and women, were called up for lengthy emergency reserve duty. They spent months actively fighting in Gaza and along the confrontation line in northern Israel. Today, approximately 400 students and faculty are still serving in the army. In addition to those who were killed in combat, many soldiers associated with Ben-Gurion University were wounded on October 7 and during the ensuing war, and are still in the hospital or undergoing lengthy rehabilitation treatments. Moreover, hundreds of faculty members and students were evacuated from their homes and have been contending with the ramifications of long-term displacement.

The university played a central role during those early days of the war, and, in fact, ever since – leading efforts to support the local community. As soon as the first sirens sounded early on the morning of October 7, BGU medical students rushed to nearby Soroka University Medical Center – the hospital where most of the wounded were taken that day – to help out. The students assisted the hospital's overwhelmed medical staff for days, helping to treat the wounded and saving lives – and demonstrating the university's significance in the region.

Ben-Gurion University immediately took steps to help its students and the rest of the larger BGU community cope with this unprecedented catastrophe, determined to do everything it could to support those who were most seriously affected. Altogether, the university allocated over NIS 60 million in emergency funding because of the war. Much of the money was used for supporting employees and students who were evacuated from their homes, and students serving in the reserves. Each BGU student called to reserve duty during the war received a special grant. Funds were also allocated for the immediate establishment of a mental health helpline open to all members of the university community. Staffed by volunteers, the helpline fielded hundreds of calls, providing support and assistance mainly to students in the reserves and those who were evacuated.

Even though the beginning of the current academic year was delayed by two and a half months, many students serving in the reserves were unable to join the rest of their peers when classes finally started. The university added extra courses and even created a special tuition-free summer semester to enable students to catch up.

Impact on research

Ben-Gurion University is one of Israel's most active hubs of cutting-edge research and development, responsible for numerous inventions that span a wide range of fields. BGN, the university's technology transfer company, is the driving force that supports the cultivation of a rich high-tech ecosystem that impacts not only the university and Beer-Sheva but the entire Negev region. BGN mentors and helps the University's researchers bring their inventions from the lab to the market, and fosters research collaborations and entrepreneurship among the university's faculty and students. In the past decade, BGN has been instrumental in founding over 100 start-up companies, as well as creating partnerships with tech incubators, accelerators, and dozens of Israeli and multinational companies, among them global giants such as Deutsche Telekom, Dell-EMC, IBM, Toshiba, PayPal, Lenovo, Fujitsu, and Facebook.

Josh Peleg acknowledges that the last seven months have been difficult, but he is proud of the spirit of resilience which led to many achievements despite the challenges. "Of course, the war impacted what we do. Many of our researchers and students were in the reserves for the first months of the war and most international students went home. It was hard to find any interaction that wasn't affected in some way," he recalls. As for the start-ups nurtured by BGN, "it's difficult to run a company when you're serving in Gaza," Peleg notes dryly.

The local entrepreneurial community was particularly shaken by the death of Adam Bismut, the founder and CEO of the start-up SightBit that developed a system to save people from drowning, which he established as a Ben-Gurion University student with the help of the university's "Yazamut 360" Entrepreneurship Center four years ago. Bismut, an advanced master sergeant in the reserves, was killed in action in Gaza together with another 20 soldiers in January 2024.

Nevertheless, BGU's researchers have demonstrated remarkable resilience, and ongoing research projects, including multi-year collaborations with large multinationals, have proceeded on track despite the considerable challenges. Peleg says that there has been an impact, however, on new industry-funded research projects. "In general, funding has been difficult to obtain since the beginning of the war. Many Israeli companies have reduced their R&D budgets for university research; and venture capital has all but disappeared, creating problems for start-ups in obtaining the funding they need to grow," he adds. "Yet despite all these challenges, our researchers have not stopped their work and continue to produce new inventions that have the potential to make a positive impact on the world."

High-tech hub

Thanks in part to BGN's efforts over the past decade, Beer-Sheva is increasingly recognized as an important high-tech hub. In the past three years alone, BGN has helped found 20 new start-ups, including two in 2024. Many of them are in multidisciplinary fields that bring together engineering – one of Ben-Gurion University's major strengths – with other disciplines, such as biotechnology and climate tech. Many of the start-ups incorporate aspects of artificial intelligence, as well as robotics, materials and sensing technologies. The number of defense-related initiatives is on the rise, especially since October 7. These include not only developing ways to improve the response to missile attacks or to detect tunnel systems, but also to address the urgent challenges faced by communities in the Negev, particularly those on the border with Gaza.

The start-ups BGN supports are a crucial economic anchor that are playing a key role in revitalizing the local population. In addition to providing high-quality employment opportunities for the area's residents, they also attract many BGU graduates and encourage them to remain in the south rather than move to the Tel Aviv area. "We are quickly approaching a critical mass of start-ups and R&D activity that is putting Beer-Sheva on the map for the wider investor community," Peleg continues.

One of the start-ups established by BGN is Madrigal Mental Care Ltd., based in Kibbutz Reim – site of the ill-fated Nova Music Festival. Ironically, the company developed a ground-breaking technology for treating victims of post-traumatic stress disorder. The company's management team, all of whom are residents of Reim, have been living and working as evacuees for over seven months.

Looking towards the future

Following the horrendous events of October 7, Israel's southern region has been attracting a great deal of attention. The government and many other entities are now focusing on the future of the south – specifically how to support the local population and economy and rebuild the region. BGN has been representing the region's business community during these discussions.

In particular, BGN has been actively promoting innovation and entrepreneurship in the Negev post-October 7, and has been advancing projects to build new infrastructure to help the south flourish. As such, BGN is a partner in two important new initiatives recently announced by the Israel Innovation Authority: DesertTech and SeaNovation. Based in Beer-Sheva, DesertTech will advance climate technologies and desert agriculture. SeaNovation in Eilat will focus on biotechnology and marine agriculture.

In addition to direct initiatives, Ben-Gurion University and BGN are playing a vital role in rehabilitating Israel's southern region through the new technologies that they are helping develop and market. The impact of this intensive research and development can be felt throughout the Negev and beyond – by creating new workplaces and boosting the local economy.

Looking towards the future, BGN is already busy preparing for next year and is searching for new partners to help fulfill David Ben-Gurion's vision of a flourishing and productive Negev.

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Partnered with BGN