Israel is one of seven countries slated to participate in IBM’s SmartCamp competition for the world’s smartest start-ups.

The Israeli nominee will be chosen at a competition to be held at IBM Israel’s premises in the center of the country in Petah Tikva in June. The winners will receive exposure and access to IBM customers worldwide.

The six other countries participating in the competition are the US, China, India, Germany, France and the UK. Preliminary competitions for these countries will be held in Boston, San Francisco, London, Paris, Dublin and Stockholm.

In each city, five companies will be selected to spend one day networking with 25 world-class entrepreneurs, investors and industry experts. One selected company from each city will attend SmartCamp week in Dublin in November, where they will compete for the title of “The World’s Smartest Start-Up.”

Companies eligible for the Israeli competition are privately-owned start-ups less than three years old that are developing software that can be included in IBM’s Smarter Planet project.

IBM describes SmartCamp as part of the Smarter Planet project to encourage and foster next-generation start-ups in rapidly growing industries of energy, water, healthcare, telecommunications and administration.