(Photo By: Courtesy)
By: Simona Shemer - March 8, 2021
The ultra-Orthodox community has long been severely underrepresented in Israel’s innovation ecosystem. A joint survey compiled by the Israel Advanced Technology Industries (IATI) with Haredi employment NGO KamaTech last year, showed that in 2018, ultra-Orthodox workers made up only about three percent of Israel’s entire tech workforce, though significant strides have been made in the past six years.
According to the report, ultra-Orthodox Jews working in the country’s tech sector had jumped 52 percent in the years 2014 to 2018, with women leading the way. Of the 9,700 Haredi tech workers that made up the industry, 6,900 of them were women.
Meanwhile, Israel continues to suffer from a chronic deficit of high-tech workers. Seeking to build on the soaring figures of ultra-Orthodox women entering the tech workforce, while addressing the high-tech industry’s human capital challenges, Start-Up Nation Central affiliate Scale-Up Velocity created Adva, a pilot program that trains female students enrolled in religious seminaries to become practical software engineers and high-tech developers.
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