Three stories are dominating the Israeli tech conversation this week: a planned CEO transition at Similarweb, rapid growth at a Tel Aviv cybersecurity startup, and an Israeli breakthrough in biochip technology.
Similarweb: Or Offer to Step Down, CEO Search Underway
Or Offer, founder and CEO of Similarweb (NYSE: SMWB), announced he will step down in May 2027 after nearly 20 years leading the company he founded. According to a report by Globes, Offer will spend the coming year searching for a successor and managing an orderly transition.
"Similarweb has been my life's work," Offer told Globes. "When I founded the company almost 20 years ago, I thought the best time to plan the next chapter in my life would be after two decades of leadership. We are close to that point. The company continues to perform strongly, and I believe the coming year will be good."
Similarweb, headquartered in Givatayim just outside Tel Aviv, provides market data based on Internet user behavior. The company went public on the NYSE in May 2021 at a valuation of $1.6 billion, raising $165 million. Its current market cap stands at $362 million — 81% below the IPO price.
Like many software companies, Similarweb has been hit by the so-called "SaaSpocalypse" — investor fears that AI will upend the business models of traditional SaaS companies. Fellow Israeli software stocks have suffered similar fates: Monday.com is down 46% year-to-date, Wix has fallen 49%, and Fiverr is down 44%. On a brighter note, Similarweb's stock has rallied 77% in recent weeks, outperforming the broader IGV software index which rose about 26%.
Zenity: Securing AI Agents — The Next Hot Market
Israeli cybersecurity company Zenity, led by co-founder and CEO Ben Kliger, is growing rapidly in one of the hottest segments in cybersecurity: AI agent security. Founded in 2021 by Kliger and Michael Bargury — both alumni of Microsoft and IDF intelligence Unit 8200 — the company protects organizations against rogue AI agents.
"Zenity is the world's first and leading company for securing AI agents, which connect to all systems and can operate autonomously," Kliger said in an interview with Globes. "Most large enterprises are already far into the process of installing agents but are having a hard time controlling them. We're here to make sure they don't go crazy and that hackers don't take over."
The company has approximately 230 employees, about 150 of them in Israel. Revenue is in the tens of millions of dollars. Kliger, who worked under Assaf Rappaport and Yinon Costica (later the founders of Wiz) at Microsoft, said he aims to build a company of similar scale.
Global Award for Israeli Biochip Pioneer
Prof. Yosi Shacham-Diamand, head of the Scojen Institute for Synthetic Biology at Reichman University, received the Global Industry Leader Award at ChipEx 2026, Israel's premier annual conference for the semiconductor and AI industries. The award recognizes individuals who have made exceptional contributions to the industry; previous recipients include Prof. Andrew Viterbi, co-founder of Qualcomm, and Dr. Henry Samueli, co-founder of Broadcom.
Shacham-Diamand develops miniature chips that integrate chemical compounds, antibodies, and even living cells. These biochips can monitor plants, detect contaminants in drinking water, and track medical conditions — including continuous glucose monitoring. The wearable medical sensor market alone is estimated at roughly $20 billion.
According to the judges, the award recognized "his vision and leadership in reshaping the semiconductor industry." Shacham-Diamand's vision is to position Israel as a global leader in biochip technology.
AI at Work: Research Reveals the Intimate Side of Chatbots
A collaborative research project between Natural Intelligence, an Israeli intent marketing company, and Tel Aviv University's AI Lab conducted an in-depth study of AI integration in the workplace. The findings reveal that AI is creating unexpected organizational dynamics.
"With AI, each employee effectively has their own private team," said Prof. Lior Zalmanson, head of the Department of Technology, Management and Information Systems at Tel Aviv University. "Isolated islands are being created in organizations, where people work by themselves."
The research, supported by the EU, found that while AI tools can save employees 5-20 hours of work per week, they also introduce new tensions around knowledge sharing. Employees are reluctant to share their personal prompts — viewed as an extension of their professional identity — creating an unexpected organizational challenge that companies are only beginning to understand.
