After working at the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center for 12 years, Heiblum returned in 1990 to Israel and established at the Weizmann Institute, with the support of Professor Yoseph Imry, the Joseph H. and Belle R. Braun Center for Submicron Research with the mission to "study and develop submicron semiconductor structures working in the mesoscopic regime." The initial investment for the Submicron Center was approximately $16 million. Heiblum has headed the Submicron Center since its founding in 1990. That same year he was appointed a full professor at the Weizmann Institute. He established the Department of Condensed Matter Physics at the Weizmann Institute and was its first director from 1993 to 1996 and from 2007 to 2012 he was again its director. In 2000 he was appointed to the Alex and Ida Susan Professorial Chair of Submicron Studies.