Governor Jack Markell is headed overseas again and this time he’ll be in Israel.
Markell is scheduled to meet with multiple companies in the high-tech field, as well as business leaders and government officials as he seeks to further the state's Israeli business partnerships during the week-long trip.
Thousands of businesses from the country have incorporated in Delaware already, but the governor says many of these companies may look to bigger states when they relocate to the U.S. and may not consider the First State.
“A big part of our focus on this trip is to make sure that Delaware is very much on their radar screen," said Markell. "We’re going to do that by talking about Delaware, our advantages in terms of not only the corporate governance arena, but also in terms of our workforce, the quality of life and the like.”
Markell made other international trips in recent months to India and South Korea and forged stronger economic ties with Morocco and Peru.
Delaware Economic Development Office Director Alan Levin is among those accompanying Markell on this trip. Levin says international trips like these provide great opportunities to develop business relationships with other countries.
“We’ve seen the value of that through our trips to Chile, to Morocco, the governor’s trip to Germany," said Levin Each of those cemented our relationships with the Chilean people, with the Moroccan fruit growers and in Germany with the Fraunhofer Institute.”
Markell is also Delaware’s first Jewish governor, but says this trip is solely for business purposes.
A University of Delaware representative will join state officials on the trip. The group will arrive in Israel Friday and return July 12th.