Yigal Erlich is the founder and managing partner of Yozma, which was established in 1992 as a $100M VC fund sponsored by the government of Israel. Yozma founded ten new venture funds that were the building blocks of the vibrant venture capital industry in Israel. Following its privatization in 1997, Yozma establish two more funds, managed over US $ 220 million and has invested in over 45 Portfolio companies. Between 1984 and 1992, Mr. Erlich served as the Chief Scientist of Israel’s Ministry of Industry and Trade, with an annual budget of $200 million, primarily directed at R&D projects of high-tech companies. In addition, Mr. Erlich started the Technology Incubator Program that led to the creation of 24 Incubation Centers throughout Israel and initiated the establishment of several bi-national industrial and technology R&D cooperation agreements with Canada, France, the Netherlands, Singapore, Spain, and more. Mr. Erlich was the Deputy Chairman of the National Research & Development Council of Israel and co-founder and first Chairman of the Israel VC Association. During his tenure in the government, Mr. Erlich was a Director of major government companies (Dead Sea Works, Israel Chemicals, Israel Oil Refineries). He was a Director and Chairman at Hadassah’s commercialization company – Hadassit & HBC as well as in many boards of portfolio companies that Yozma invested in. A Board Member (five years) of the Russian Venture Capital Company (RVC), a $1 billion government fund of funds and was a consultant to several governments. Together with local partner he established Yozma Korea which invest in Israeli and Korean companies, already reached more than $300M. As of today, Erlich and Yozma 5 is a Venture Capital consulting and investments company in Israel and abroad Mr. Erlich holds a B.Sc. from Bar Ilan University, an M.Sc. in Chemistry, and an MBA from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.