According to this link in Globes, the Israeli Business newspaper, Google is going to open up an R&D center in Israel in the second quarter. The center will be led by Dr. Yoelle Maarek, a long time (17 years) veteran of IBM’s research labs and will be located in the northern city of Haifa (near the Technion, surprise surprise)

The only company out of the big 3, a.k.a, GYM (Google, Yahoo, Microsoft), that has an R&D center in Israel is Microsoft. Yahoo had something in the first bubble and after the explosion of the first bubble it was quickly closed.

This comes a little bit after Google opened an office for marketing purposes in Israel and is now hiring.

Its going to be very interesting from a few points of view:

  1. Microsoft’s R&D center in Israel is located in Haifa as well.
  2. IBM’s Research Labs are also located in Haifa
  3. The Technion, Israel’s leading technical university is also located in Haifa, meaning, plenty of Software Engineers from the top of the line of the academy in Israel.

Microsoft’s R&D center mainly focuses on security and, if I’m not mistaken, was the place of birth for COM+ and some other interesting technologies. While no one knows for sure what Google will develop in Israel, I wonder how Microsoft is going to react to that.

It’s also going to be very interesting as to what Yahoo will do with this and if they are willing to take another shot at Israel.

The arena in Israel is heating up, that’s for sure.