Isabel Maxwell

Isabel Maxwell M.A. (Oxon); FRGS
President, Maxwell-Communications Network
President Emeritus, Commtouch Software (CTCH)

Isabel is founder and President of Maxwell-Communications, senior consultants on cross-border communications, funding and market research to leading Venture Capitalists and Hi Tech companies.  She is one of the early pioneers of the Portal Space and former long-time President of Commtouch Software (CTCH), the global messaging and anti-spam company.  She was CEO of Puresight, the Israeli content filtering company that she helped turn around in 2003, sold in 2005.  Ms. Maxwell is a Technology Pioneer of the World Economic Forum; and a Leading Woman Entrepreneur of The Star Group.  She has over 30 years of management and editorial experience in both the online corporate world and in traditional media, both in the U.S. and Israel; Ms Maxwell was co-Founder in 1992 of the pioneering directory and search engine portal, the Magellan Online Guide, that she sold to Excite in '96.  She is a former Director of BackWeb (BWEB) (long-time member of the Audit Committee) and currently on the Board of Jabber Technologies in the States with Intel and France Telecom.  She brings to her Board activities an excellent Rolodex, and long experience in assisting CEOs with their funding, business development, marketing and communication challenges.

Isabel has a previous 15 year career in the TV and Film industry, both for UK Independent Television and Film and Documentary production in the U.S.  She is a Founder Director and member of the British Academy of Film & TV Arts - Los Angeles (BAFTA-LA); and her credits include Producer of the Theatrical Feature Film, “ ‘68 “ for New World Pictures starring Neil Young; and Producer-Director of “Bhutan - A Strange Survival” for National PBS in 1982;  She is a freelance writer (Member of the National Union of Journalists, UK,  since 1978) and an invited speaker at International conferences on high tech, communications and Social Entrepreneuring.

She is on the Boards of the Peres Center for Peace; the American Friends of the Rabin Center and Israel21c.  She is also a very active Voting Member and Chairperson of Israel Venture Network’s Social Entrepreneur Fellowship Program because she believes passionately in the ability of individuals to make a lasting positive impact to social problems.  She is a keen environmentalist, hiker, biker and mountain climber; and traveler to far-off places.  French-born and Oxford educated (BA; MA Law; History & French St. Hilda’s College, Oxford; followed by Graduate Dip. Ed. Edinburgh University,), she has divided her time between Israel and California for the past 10 years.