Most people who manage real networking without it feeling forced do one simple thing: they show up with no agenda. That's exactly Elad Kobi's method, a man people describe as connecting people "for no reason, on pure intuition." The road there didn't run through a marketing course. It ran through a combat injury, a small bar in Modiin, and an acquisition deal that collapsed at the last second.

From a Combat Engineering Injury to a Bar in Modiin

At 21, Elad Kobi left the army with a complex injury, having lost a vertebra in his neck while serving as a combat engineer. No degree plan, no instruction manual. His deepest fear wasn't the pain: "I was afraid of being left behind, that everyone would keep moving forward and I'd be stuck."

Instead of the big post-army trip to clear his head, he scraped together his discharge savings and opened a bar in Modiin. Behind the counter, he saw people without filters: "who's generous, who only thinks about themselves, who stays till the end to help close up. I learned people remember how you made them feel, far more than what you told them." That insight, that a regular customer comes back for the conversation and not the beer, stayed with him later across the table from CEOs of major companies.

Real Networking, No Agenda: Elad Kobi's Rules

Rule one: "Don't come with an agenda. Come with curiosity." Ask questions, try to actually help, whether through shared thinking or just getting to know the other side. Business only gets discussed once it's clear both sides win, and if there's no fit, Elad simply connects people to someone else in his network who's a better match.

Rule two is about timing: "Show up even when nobody needs you to. A birthday message, a coffee for no reason." In his view, networking sounds cold because people treat it like a transaction. For him it's just a slightly shallower friendship, with the same WhatsApp threads. It's close to the philosophy Yaron Flint calls "harvesters" over "miners", building social capital without expecting an immediate return.

The Term Sheet That Collapsed, and the Fall Forward Talk

After years at GKI Group, Elad co-founded Cecilia.ai and spent 3.5 years working the Israel-US line with brands like Bacardi and the Miami Heat. By his count, 30% of closing a deal was technology, 70% was trust: "they want to get to know you first, see how you act, and grow from there."

Then came the peak, a signed acquisition Term Sheet, which collapsed in the final moment. "There were weeks, maybe months, that weren't easy, I won't lie." But the injury had already taught him that falling isn't the end, just the next starting point. That's where the talk "Fall Forward" came from, the insight that whether you like it or not, you will fall, but you need to fall forward. Recovering from business failure, for him, meant deciding to build things himself and surround himself with people of similar DNA.

From Moveo to M.ai: The Anthropic Partnership

What drew him to the Moveo Group was its DNA: a group that grew for over a decade on real revenue, never waiting for the next funding round. "The world is moving from SaaS to services. Organizations don't need another tool, they need someone who delivers results." Today he's CEO of M.ai, the group's AI arm, which launched in January, grew to 45 employees, and became Anthropic's official partner in Israel. On managing that fast growth, he says only this: "Surround yourself with good, capable people you can trust. A strong leadership team, no ego, no gimmicks, that's worth as much as winning the lottery."

What Elad Is Looking For

Elad is mainly looking for good people to grow alongside: organizations currently working through bringing AI into their daily operations, anyone who needs help with US go-to-market, and anyone who just wants to grab a coffee or a beer. "You learn solutions exist, but every client arrives at a different stage, and you need to understand what fits them." If that's you, reach out, he's available in the comments.