The opening event of the year of the Circle of Friends of the Peres Center for Peace and Innovation for 2026, directed by Yona Bartel, was held at the impressive Microsoft campus in Herzliya Pituach, Israel.
With Hemi Peres, the center's chairman, Campus CEO Michal Bauman opened with a dazzling overview and Eran Yariv, head of artificial intelligence, revealed groundbreaking innovation andAdi Mor-Biran, Director of The Garage Israel, Middle East, Africa and India .
The Circle of Friends took a tour of the amazing building and was exposed to the latest developments in the field of AI. Among the participants: the Padani family, Michal Forer, Galia Albin, the Oren family, Reuven and Michaela Schiff, Brigadier General Nissim Barda, Baruch Shekalim, the Director of the Aerospace Industry, Dalia Neeman, Dana Margalit, Hedva Tzadikariou and more. Yona Bartel informed that this year marks the tenth anniversary of Peres' passing and that it will be full of special events, including the naming of a square in his name in Paris, with the main state event being on September 8th in the Greatest of the Nations section of the House of Lords in London. The visit was at the Microsoft Israel Research and Development campus in Herzliya.
Michal Braverman-Blumenstik, CEO of Microsoft Israel R&D and CTO of the Global Security Division. Michal's lecture was: The Next Generation of AI: What Will Collaboration Between Humans and AI Agents Look Like?
, presented Microsoft's Innovation Leadership Model to the Friends of the Peace Prize Circle. During the talk, she said: “Innovation is not a one-time event, but a culture. In the age of AI, when we give people the space to experiment, the smart tools, and the trust to dare – we don’t just develop products, we shape the future.”
Eran Yariv, Director of the Artificial Intelligence Research and Development Group at Microsoft Israel, lectured on the history of artificial intelligence from its inception 70 years ago and the evolution of large language models: from automatic completion to deep thinking
The Microsoft Herzliya, Israel, building is the only dog-friendly Microsoft building in the world; it also has a swimming pool and an ecological garden.
