Elon Ganor

Elon A. Ganor (; born 1950) is an Israeli entrepreneur known for his role as one of the world's first VoIP pioneers. He served as chairman and CEO of VocalTec Ltd (Nasdaq: CALL), the company behind the creation of "Internet Phone", the world's first commercial software product that enabled voice communication over the internet, known initially as "Internet Telephony" and later as VoIP.

Biography Elon Ganor was born in Geneva, Switzerland. He grew up in Tel Aviv, and graduated from Tel Aviv University Sackler Medical school in 1975.

Business career After years of practicing medicine Ganor entered the technology industry. His first company was Virovahl SA- a Swiss-based biotechnology company founded in 1987 with a group of Swedish virologists. The company's laboratory was located in Gothenburg, Sweden. Virovahl SA developed the world's first HIV synthetic peptide based on diagnostic test. Under his guidance as President of Virovahl, the test was licensed exclusively to Pharmacia AB from Uppsala, Sweden (later merged with Upjohn). The software was based on an invention by Haramaty and Cohen, the Audio Transceiver and developed by a group of developers including Ofer Kahana (later the founder of Kagoor that was sold to Juniper), Elad Sion (served in Israel TOP 8200 Intelligence army unit, died young in a car accident), Ofer Shem Tov (a software developer in Israel) VocalTec under Ganor invested the initial $500,000 and gave a credit of $1 million in VoIP Gateway equipment in exchange for 19.9% of the new company; AT&T followed with an additional investment. ITXC became the world's largest VoIP carrier, reaching a market cap of about $8 billion as a Nasdaq company in 2000 (prior to the 2008 financial crisis).

In 2008 Ganor became the founder, investor and CEO (with Danny Frumkin, PhD and Adam Wasserstrom, PhD as co-founders) of Nucleix. Nucleix Ltd is a Biotechnology epigenetic company involved in the development of bio-markers and technologies for forensic medicine. The company developed a product for the authentication of DNA.

Art career Ganor left VocalTec in 2006 to study art at Beit Berl College. He graduated in 2008, majoring in photography.

Among his works, "Wall Street" a series of staged photographs shot in New York and Israel expressing criticism of Wall Street practices (first exhibited in 2008 just before the Lehman Brothers collapse). Also among other series, "The Box" (exhibited in 2009 at Volta show in Switzerland) and Earl King (exhibited in October 2010). Ganor's work can be found in many art collections including the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Shpilman institute Photography collection, the Israel Museum in Jerusalem and private collections. Die Zeit, Wall Street Journal, BusinessWeek, Newsweek, Von Magazine, Computer Business, WebWeek, The Industry Standard, and Time. He has appeared on CNN, and participated as a panelist at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

Public positions Member of the Board of Governors, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheba, Israel. Member of the Board of Governors and lecturer, Tel Aviv-Yafo Academic college.