Board of Directors

Nechemia (Chemi) Peres is a Founder and Chairman of Amelia Investments.  He is a Managing General Partner and Co-Founder of Pitango Venture Capital, the largest venture capital group in Israel, with over $1.4 Billion under management. Mr. Peres is also Chairman of the board of the Al-Bawader Fund, Israel’s first VC & PE fund focused on the Israeli Minority communities. In 1992 he founded and managed the Mofet Israel Technology Fund, one of Israel’s first VC funds, traded on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE).
 
Chemi gained extensive experience in the high technology Industry in Israel and abroad. He was an investor and a board member of several publicly traded companies on NASDAQ and NYSE such as Aladdin Knowledge Systems, AudioCodes Technologies, BackWeb Technologies, Orckit Communications and Voltaire Communications to mention a few. Mr. Peres also served as a board member at Koor Industries, one of Israel’s largest conglomerates. He currently serves on the boards of numerous companies such as Focal Energy, Olive Software, Pythagoras Solar, Radwin and Speedbit among others.

Prior to his Venture Capital activities Mr. Peres was VP for new Business development at Decision Systems Israel (DSI), and a senior consultant to Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI).
 
Mr. Peres holds an MBA degree and a Bachelor of Science degree in Industrial Engineering & Management from Tel Aviv University (TAU). He continues to be involved in TAU, by serving on the Board of Directors of Ramot, the commercial arm of the University, and as Chairman of the Advisory Board of the Faculty of Management.  Chemi also serves on the Board of Governors of the Weizmann Institute of Science, and Bezalel Academy of Arts & Design, Jerusalem. Mr. Peres is a board member at the Friends Association of the Inter-Disciplinary Center (IDC), Herzliya.

Mr. Peres was a co-founder of the Israel Venture Association, IVA (Now known as High Tech Industry Association, HTIA) and served as Chairman of the Board (2003-2004). For 3 years he served as Chairman of the Israel America Chamber of Commerce (2008-2011). Mr. Peres is a board member in additional non-for-profit organizations among them is Matan - Investing in the Community, the Rothschild Caesarea Foundation and the Peres Center for Peace.

Assaf (Asi) Shariv is Amelia Investments CEO and a member of the Board of Directors.  Mr. Shariv is the founder and principal of TZ.U.M Shariv Consulting – a strategic consulting and political analysis firm. Previously, he served as Israel's Consul-General in New York from 2007-2010.  Mr. Shariv was the Director of Media and Public Affairs to Prime Ministers Ehud Olmert and Ariel Sharon where he was responsible for the Government’s Press Office and Advertising Bureau. In 2002, when Shariv joined the Prime Minister’s Office he was instrumental in formalizing the MOU between Israel and the United States regarding the Road Map for Peace. He was also a member of the special task force that dealt with issues such as the route of the security fence, the disengagement from Gaza and the U.S. guarantees on Israeli bonds.  Mr. Shariv was an attorney with the Tel Aviv law firm Weisglass-Almagor from 1997-2002.  Previously, he served as a deputy editor of Israel's leading business daily publication, Globes Magazine.  Shariv received an LLB at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzeliya, Israel.  He is an Executive Committee member of the Chaim Hertzog Institute for Media, Politics and Society and a member of the Board of Directors of Vehadarta: the National Council for the Advancement of the Elderly.  Mr. Shariv also serves on the Advisory Board for Education and Public Relations of the Israel Football Association.

Jonathan Kolber is a General Partner of Viola Private Equity, a technology buyout and growth capital fund that is an affiliate of the Viola Group, Israel’s largest private investment house with $2 billion under management.  Mr Kolber founded and managed Claridge Israel, together with the Canadian Bronfman family, from 1986 to 1997.  Claridge Israel was, for many years, the largest foreign private equity firm in Israel and it made a series of highly successful investments in Teva Pharmaceuticals, ECI Telecom, Osem  and Optrotech.  In 1998 Mr Kolber became CEO of Koor Industries, Israel’s largest conglomerate, with investments in the agrochemical, telecommunications and defense industries.  During his tenure at Koor, Mr Kolber weathered the telecom meltdown, implementing a comprehensive restructuring plan that helped rejuvenate Koor and lead to a successful exit to IDB.  Mr Kolber has served as Chairman, CEO and Director in over 40 public and private companies in Israel and North America.  He has a Bachelors Degree in Near Eastern Language and Literature from Harvard University and a Certificate of Advanced Arabic Language from the American University of Cairo.  Mr Kolber is a Director of the Peres Center for Peace and the Chairman of the Friends of the Tel Aviv Medical Center.