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Israeli-Arab entrepreneur Reem Younis has mastered a survival skill in her turbulent country: No TV and no newspapers.
She focuses on biotech company Alpha Omega, the firm she co-founded and runs with her husband. Instead of paying attention to sometimes-depressing headlines, she cultivates her vision and brand: Encouraging business innovation and education among Arab Israelis, especially women.
“I keep looking at the good things,” she said at Atlanta‘s Congregation Bet Haverim before around 85 people. “I don’t think we have the luxury of despair.”
[pullquote]”I don’t think we have the luxury of despair.”[/pullquote]
Alpha Omega — based in Nazareth with offices in Alpharetta and Germany — is a success story in a land known for its high-tech scene. The Arab-owned company went into business in 1993 when Jewish-owned startups dominated Israel, starting as a subcontractor for neuroscientists who needed systems to measure neural activity in animals for their research.
“Little by little, we moved into the medical field,” Ms. Younis said.
The company received subsidies from Israel’s chief scientist office for research and development projects and now develops and sells medical devices for neurosurgery and neuroscience. One device assists neurosurgeons in finding the exact location inside the brain – “like a brain GPS.”
With its 70 diverse employees — Muslim and Christian and Jewish, Alpha Omega serves more than 600 customers worldwide.
Ms. Younis was born and reared in the predominantly Arab city of Nazareth by parents who preached that “the future is the university.” She attended Haifa‘s prestigious Technion — Israel Institute of Technology — and met her husband Imad there.
Now, she has become a trailblazer for other female entrepreneurs, especially Arabs, which are more prevalent now but still too scarce in her view.
“Jewish people need to see me and Arab people need to see me,” she said, noting that she tries to get out and speak as much as possible.
Alpha Omega has a particular interest in helping Arab youth to stay in Israel and not leave their communities to seek work, noting that hers is one of the few firms that hires people without experience and trains them.
“We have huge challenges with education,” she said. “We want more Arabs to go into universities and get degrees” in needed subjects, then start companies in their communities.
Younis’ talk was sponsored by the New Israel Fund, a group that fights for equality between Jews and Arabs and for democracy. She now sits on its board.
Her talk comes as Israel works to foster startups and infrastructure growth in its Arab community.
Israel’s Ministry of Economy and Industry recently announced the launching of Hybrid, an initiative promoting new startups in the Arab community at the Nazareth Business Incubator. The program will work with other corporate entities, including Coca-Cola Co., which operates The Bridge, a program funding innovative Israeli startups. Conexx, the America Israel Business Connector in Atlanta, last month hosted a talk by the director of a nearly $4 billion government initiative to help develop Arab and other minority communities, citing the Arab community as the “next engine” of growth.
There are some joint Jewish-Arab startups in Israel, but Ms. Younis said there aren’t enough.
She cited interaction over the Green Line between the high-tech cultures of Arab Israelis and West Bank Palestinians. She says there are more start-ups in Ramallah than Arab Israel. Younis has met with people in the West Bank and once tried outsourcing in Ramallah. It didn’t work.
“I would love to try to outsource again,” she said.
She mentions the work of Yadin Kaufmann, an Israeli entrepreneur who brings engineers from the Palestinian lands to internships in Israel. She said big companies in Israel are doing a great job hiring Arab talent. Intel was one of the first companies during the ‘80s that hired Arab engineers.
At Bet Haverim, she was asked about the “Nakba,” the Arab word for catastrophe and the term for the fleeing or expulsion of Palestinian Arabs in 1948 that led to the founding of Israel.
She said the Nakba is part of her history, not her future.
“It happened. We’re beyond that. What’s the future?” she said.
She is well-aware of the challenges for Arabs in Israel, but said she chooses to embrace optimism based on a can-do spirit and religious faith. A Catholic, she says the serenity prayer from the late American theologian Reinhold Niebuhr gives her focus: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”
Ms. Younis and her husband’s families have been in Palestine and Israel for centuries. She wants her land to be a safe place for her children. “I have no other place to go,” she said, “though lots of things need to be changed.”
She said people are tired of politics and that “if we had a fully democratic Israel, we’d have our heaven.”
In the meantime, she’s keeping her eyes trained on the positive.
“I keep looking at good things. It’s the only way to keep dreaming.”
Learn more about the company at www.alphaomega-eng.com.
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