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The Fiber
Of Success

A Jerusalem start-up is
projecting huge growth
as companies snap up its
unique new lighting
technology.

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NICKY BLACKBURN
Special to The Jewish News

hen the Jerusalem start-
up Elam Ltd. proudly
announces in its compa-
ny brochure that "your
imagination is our limit," it's not exag-
gerating.
After just four years spent develop-
ing a unique and flexible new lighting
technology called Livewire, the com-
pany has already seen the product used
in a variety of applications ranging
corn the serious to the silly — from
hazard lighting and safety jackets to
flashing jeans and shoelaces.
It is this very product adaptability
that makes the company's technology
so appealing, and such a success. Sales
of Livewire — a thin electrolumines-
cent (EL) fiber that looks like a cable
and has the same versatility — only
a egan in the last quarter of 1996, but
already the company has sold an esti-
mated $2 million in 1997. Next year
this figure is slated to rise to $6.5 mil-
lion, while by 2000, according to Yoel
Ganor, Elam's operational manager,
sales will reach $20 million.
The company also has grown rapid-
1y. It now employs 43 people, many of
whom are Russian immigrants, and
other 17 or so will be added during
1998.
To support this growth, Elam is in
the process of moving from its present
cramped facility to a new $3 million
building. In this building, five new
production lines will be built, increas-
ing output from the current 100 kilo-
meters of fiber a month to "many hun-
dreds of kilometers" a month.
The idea for Livewire came from
two Russian scientists, Dr. Israel
Baumberg and Dr. Moshe
Voskoboinik, both doctors in semi-
conductor physics. When 'they first
arrived in Israel, they had already
begun work on the product, but were
forced to abandon it temporarily to
take jobs as cleaners in order to survive.

4

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