The Marker magazine - The 100 Most Influential People in Israel

The Marker magazine September 2008

The 100 Most Influential People in Israel

The Ones who Influence the Environment

Without them Israel – and the planet Earth – would be less green: the people who search for solutions in the field of alternative energy and water are on the environmental watch on our behalf.

By Avi Bar Eli

David Shertzer

Founder and CEO of UET

David Shertzer spent 14 years as chief engineer at Bromine Compounds Ltd. On one of his trips to a gold mine in Australia he noticed the problem of lime scale and corrosion in the mine’s water facilities and an idea popped into his head: someone should develop a mechanism that would remove minerals from the water, which could then be reused, over and over again. In 1992 he resigned from his job and set up UET Ltd, which was initially engaged in water system planning and engineering solutions. “I resigned from Bromine Compounds after I discovered something as great as the discovery made by Archimedes...” he laughs, “I developed the first mathematical formula of its kind, which makes it possible to solve the problem of lime scale and corrosion by natural means. Therefore, the next obvious step was to turn the dream and the discovery into a reality.”

After five years of research and experiments, Shertzer managed to develop a reactor that removes the components of the lime scale from the water circulation, by means of an electrical process alone, without the involvement of chemicals. This environmental solution was quickly adopted by the Israeli industry. By now, most of the industry has installed UET systems. In the meantime, the company has also approached markets in the US, Japan, South Africa and Germany. The company’s potential did not escape the attention of Al Schwimmer, founder of Israel Aircraft Industries, Professor Uriel Reichman and his wife Nira, and Yaakov Shapira, one of the veteran figures at the Ministry of Defense. They invested in the company some three years ago, and today its value is estimated within a range of $15 - $20 million