tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14590584777515553172024-03-20T12:54:33.621+05:30Three quarters of a mile from civilizationViews, analysis & commentary - essentially on venture capital & pharmaceutical industryAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.comBlogger92125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-921101744919153962015-08-22T23:53:00.001+05:302015-09-01T22:25:29.796+05:30Why is India so ungodly?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Cleanliness is (<em style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">next only to</em>) Godliness- believed Mahatma Gandhi.</div>
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Why is it then that cleanliness is such an ignored aspect in India?, particularly in the context of the civic infrastructure about which I wrote in my earlier<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/article/right-quality-civic-infrastructure-fundamental-murali-apparaju/edit?trk=pulse-edit-nav_art" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">article</a> wherein I requested signing of an online petition demanding "<a href="https://www.change.org/p/prime-minister-of-india-include-right-to-quality-civic-infrastructure-to-the-list-of-fundamental-rights" rel="nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">right to quality civic infrastructure</a>' to be made a fundamental right (...<em style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">this petition incidentally is still struggling at a piddling 98 signatures after a week in existence</em>)</div>
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Despite the usual refrain one hears that Indians are such by nature, I'd say that our attitude towards cleanliness has been shaped over past many years by the complete lack of administrative focus on this essential aspect of providing uniformly clean civic infrastructure & diligent upkeep of the same - yathaa rajah, tathaa prajah!</div>
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The first step to changing our situation is to open our eyes to dirty reality around us & importantly make a habit of questioning it - what better way to achieve this awareness than utilizing the power of social media as a platform to enable social change?</div>
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What motivated me is the immense success of the "Ice Bucket Challenge" that went viral on social networks and helped create widespread awareness about a disease called ALS - What gives me hope is the fact that if awareness & action can be triggered for a disease that effects not more than 200,000 people worldwide, it is perhaps possible to achieve similar results for highlighting the disease called 'rotten civic infrastructure & upkeep' that impacts a billion plus Indians.</div>
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This is also a extension of the approach called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gandhigiri" rel="nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Gandhigiri</a>, a bollywood invention that went on to become part of popular Indian lexicon now - Gandhigiri is nothing but shaming a person/ an institution into action through a peaceful, legal and mockingly respectful form of protest.</div>
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It is time for affirmative action that forces the government to tackle this malaise immediately rather than wasting time trying to take political mileage out of this unfortunate situation through symbolic schemes like Swachh Bharat Campaign that hasn't yet been able to make the lethargic civic administration(s) clean-up its act even while exhorting the citizens to clean-up their neighborhoods themselves.</div>
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It is time the citizens do something other than perennially cribbing about the state of affairs - Like the later-age mahatma Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam once said "If you want to leave your footprints in the sands of time do not drag your feet"</div>
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This is where the Clean India Challenge comes into picture;</div>
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<strong style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">CLEAN INDIA CHALLENGE</strong></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNnrR-dxhgZsc914hsBtxx-J2CI3SsHw87P09h5lxtt1qKERdcQxBpBZBlCAXSETJVGAyHgvi1a9-Cj7ssROG3T6iW9ydHtL3eDvHf-5MzIfB_42N0fetEK4y7ZW6QukMlxJF3zJZjEi3v/s1600/CIC500+master+poster+1+-+CTAP.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="377" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNnrR-dxhgZsc914hsBtxx-J2CI3SsHw87P09h5lxtt1qKERdcQxBpBZBlCAXSETJVGAyHgvi1a9-Cj7ssROG3T6iW9ydHtL3eDvHf-5MzIfB_42N0fetEK4y7ZW6QukMlxJF3zJZjEi3v/s640/CIC500+master+poster+1+-+CTAP.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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While this challenge already started its rounds in a small way on Facebook, it will take a lot more to make this go viral so as to make an impact and change the status quo for all of us. </div>
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I call on all my fellow citizens to take up this online challenge in a big way and challenge the offline reality of the inadequate civic infrastructure & upkeep in India.</div>
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Let there be light!<br />
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<span class="underline" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;"><strong style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Update: 25th August 2015</strong></span></div>
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One of the comments below made it pertinent that I explain the Why, Who & How of this challenge - here goes;</div>
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WHO ARE WE SHAMING? ------> We are shaming "us' - which includes the people as well as the government</div>
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WHO DO WE WANT TO SHOW THESE PICTURES TO? ------> We want to show the pictures to 'us' and to world as such</div>
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The rationale behind this being that unless we face (& expose) the reality in all its glory we wouldn't be motivated nor compelled to act on it decisively. After all isn't acceptance of a 'need for change' key to changing?</div>
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HOW DO YOU ENVISION CHANGE HAPPENING THROUGH THIS? --------> I envision change happening through the following process;</div>
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However before I explain the process, I need to list the following assumptions I made;</div>
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<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Creating Quality Infrastructure is the primary responsibility of 'the state' - Maintenance of the same too the primary responsibility of 'the state'. The citizen’s contribution towards civic infrastructure is primarily by way of paying taxes as required.</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Citizen volunteerism towards maintaining cleaner neighborhoods can only be justified/ demanded/ expected ONLY when 'the state' did its job well - which I seriously doubt Indian civic administration does.</li>
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<em style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">*'the state' as defined in the constitution of India - I request you to read my petition on making 'right to quality civic infrastructure' a fundamental right to understand these assumptions more.</em></div>
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Stage 1: PROVOCATION OF CITIZEN OUTRAGE</div>
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Sensitizing Indian residents to the quality of their neighborhoods. Provoking a sense of outrage among the citizens to this casual disregard to their right to quality civic infrastructure & hence create a sense of entitlement. Thereby vastly increasing their propensity to challenge the status-quo and create a citizen vanguard of cleanliness.</div>
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Stage 2: CREATION OF A HALL OF SHAME</div>
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As the challenge catches up and more and more people upload pictures and hashtag them, a visual story the state of affairs in in each city, each colony will created - which will be the base-line for demand of change/ rectification</div>
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Stage 3: CHANNELING AWARENESS TO TARGET PUBLIC POLICY</div>
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Utilizing the emerging sense of entitlement among citizens & encourage more and more people to sign the online petition for making "right to quality civic infrastructure' a fundamental right. Please note this demand aimed at amending the constitution is a symbolic act of saying the change of attitude required is at the very core, that in this current world, 'right to live' alone doesn't suffice a 'right to a right quality of life' is equally important AND that our dirty neighborhoods don't afford us that at this time.</div>
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Stage 4: CHANNELING AWARENESS TO ACT AT A LOCAL LEVEL</div>
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Utilizing the hall of shame repository, the local neighborhoods can step up and demand the local civic authorities to clean-up their act & the neighborhoods in the bargain.</div>
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Stage 5: TRIGGER A FUNDAMENTAL CHANGE OF ATTITUDE </div>
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Through a sustained campaign bring about a social change that sustains than fizzle out after some fancy photo-ops</div>
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If one recalls/ searches up internet, the PM of India threw open a "Clean India Challenge" in October 2014 wherein he nominated a few CELEBRITIES?? (Sports, film et al) to pick up a broom clean their dirty neighborhoods and upload pictures (clean/ dirty) and tag other lesser celebrities to join - This was eventually supposed to have gone viral and in the bargain cleaned up India without a major burden on the government exchequer.</div>
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When did you last see this challenge in circulation: November 2014??? - This hasn't sustained since it played on cleaning up being a voluntary citizen act rather than the states responsibility & citizen entitlement - It failed since people realized this is more of a photo-op & a popularity contest (<em style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">to be hand-picked by the PM to participate</em>). Its unfortunate that none of the nominated celebrities bothered to asked the PM why they should also pay all the taxes and also wield the broom and why the local civic authorities never realized that their neighborhood needed some sprucing up?</div>
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This challenge is a relaunch of this misfired celebrity challenge. This Clean India Challenge 2.0 is our challenge, the peoples challenge and one based on facing reality before changing it & importantly one that puts the onus on the government first and then the citizen.</div>
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Finally, the worst thing that can be done to any voluntary social action is to let cynicism kill it. I exhort all to rest their doubts for this time and act instead - In a worst case scenario, this will be another aborted, ignored mission - but one that hopefully will leave a few more citizens with a higher sense of entitlement & responsibility.<br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-47132412115118592402015-08-22T23:47:00.000+05:302015-08-22T23:47:54.392+05:30'Right to Quality Civic Infrastructure' as a fundamental right<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmenAHseGOYUO3N_O0wH0Jf4vmFfq3pdJLaVAbVVyc0mnVHh_CLYnScSaeeqq_AW8-G3DYuKVEW0jZ_NnLymR_cSTOGKVCHGPHVKB6nS0E2AXRORCWtLCqQtPIsWWD94GVQsy87FeiQSkH/s1600/delhi-road.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="354" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmenAHseGOYUO3N_O0wH0Jf4vmFfq3pdJLaVAbVVyc0mnVHh_CLYnScSaeeqq_AW8-G3DYuKVEW0jZ_NnLymR_cSTOGKVCHGPHVKB6nS0E2AXRORCWtLCqQtPIsWWD94GVQsy87FeiQSkH/s640/delhi-road.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<em style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">This is a reproduction of the petition I published today on Change.org. For once, I'd be happy seeing more signatures on the petition there than seeing likes on my post here :-) - Happy Independence Day to all my compatriots. <a href="https://www.change.org/p/prime-minister-of-india-include-right-to-quality-civic-infrastructure-to-the-list-of-fundamental-rights" rel="nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">https://www.change.org/p/prime-minister-of-india-include-right-to-quality-civic-infrastructure-to-the-list-of-fundamental-rights</a></em></h3>
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I was pleased when my city figured in the 100 shortlisted during the stage-1 of recently launched <a href="http://smartcities.gov.in/writereaddata/SmartCityGuidelines.pdf" rel="nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Smart City Mission</a>. I was baffled though when I realized that this 'smart upgrade' is primarily about attempting to implement the following 'features'</div>
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<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Adequate water supply,</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Assured electricity supply</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Sanitation, including solid waste management</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Efficient urban mobility and public transport</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Affordable housing, especially for the poor</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Robust IT connectivity and digitalization</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Good governance, especially e-Governance and citizen participation</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Sustainable environment</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Safety and security of citizens, particularly women, children and the elderly</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Health and education</li>
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Wait, aren’t the above 'core infrastructural elements' as labelled in this self acclaimed '<a href="http://smartcities.gov.in/writereaddata/SmartCityGuidelines.pdf" rel="nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">bold, new initiative</a>' in reality the default amenities any tax-paying citizen would/ should expect?, let alone one living in a city but even by those in a town or village?</div>
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As I reflected deeper on this apparent irony, I realized how in the past 44 years of my existence I haven’t yet once walked around my house without getting depressed about the apathetic layout, bad roads, lack of usable footpaths, absent green lungs, unreliable garbage & sewage management systems and the general lack of finesse around where I live. My childhood optimism that things would greatly improve when I grow up was shattered when I found out in a recent visit that my native town is a far worser dump than it was a good 30 years ago!</div>
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It's clearly not a lack of ideas nor a paucity of requisite engineering capability to develop infrastructure at par with world standards, a fact clearly demonstrated by the amazingly executed projects such as Bandra-Worli Sea link; the Pir Panjal tunnel dug through the Himalayas; the multitudes of express highways such as the fully elevated one between Mumbai, Pune; the top-rated airports & terminals operational in Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai et al. As a highway commuter in India, you wouldn't want to reach the destination too soon, the infrastructure within the destination invariably is always a let down - This dichotomy is perplexing.</div>
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This dichotomy isn't limited just to civic v/s high-way infrastructure. All the governments over the past seven decades have created & nurtured a class system of human habitats across the Indian republic - consider the following;</div>
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<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Within a city there are pockets that are highly developed while some are semi-developed and some are completely ignored for example the sheer difference in the layout and upkeep of Lodhi Estate v/s Shahdara in N. Delhi; Banjara Hills v/s Nallakunta in Hyderabad; Bandra Bandstand v/s Dadar in Mumbai et al. The difference in the amenities in the elite v/s middle-class localities is shamefully blatant - It's as though one has to pay a price for not being economically strong enough to acquire property in a posher locality. This discrimination doesn't make any sense considering the property tax collected so aggressively by the civic administration is calculated and charged using the same unit rates across all localities, elite or otherwise.</li>
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I am not sad anymore, I am now furious with this senseless state of affairs. I think I am as entitled to good civic infrastructure as the denizen of any other developed country is. As a citizen of India I believed it’s my right to be provided enabling civic infrastructure.... Or is it?</div>
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Propelled by this desire to better understand my entitlements as an Indian citizen I looked up for supporting information only to realize that;</div>
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<strong style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The word “infrastructure” occurs just twice in the <a href="http://india.gov.in/sites/upload_files/npi/files/coi_part_full.pdf" rel="nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Constitution of India</a>......</strong></div>
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<em style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">…….quite innocuously only in context of a district &/or a metropolitan planning committee preparing a ‘draft development plan’ and submitting to the GOI. (Ref: Part IXA.—The Municipalities.—Arts. 243ZB—243ZD.)</em></div>
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Neither the fundamental rights nor the directive principles touched upon this aspect in any specific detail.</div>
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I do understand the times were very different when our sacred constitution was drafted, adopted and enacted. I fully comprehend the fact that all aspects covered under fundamental rights and directive principles were of paramount importance for a nation that just liberated itself from alien rule & as a diverse people that were yet to get the full import of governing themselves and in understanding what it actually takes to behaving as a sovereign socialist secular democratic republic.</div>
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Sixty nine long years hence though the rights as perceived by an average globally-aware Indian citizen are far more evolved though not very frequently voiced. A mere ‘right to life’ won’t suffice no more, there has to be necessarily a ‘right to a right quality of life’.</div>
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Even if as a symbolic gesture towards triggering an attitudinal change that we so badly need to make, I as a citizen of India request the prime minister of India & ‘the state’ (<em style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">as defined in constitution of India</em>) to initiate an amendment to the constitution that;</div>
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<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Expands the list of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_rights_in_India" rel="nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Fundamental Rights</a> by including of “Right to quality civic infrastructure”</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Expands the bandwidth of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directive_Principles_in_India" rel="nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Directive Principles</a> to reflect the above inclusion as a necessary duty of the state</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Expands the scope of Fundamental Duties to make maintenance & upkeep of civic infrastructure as much a duty of the citizen as it is of the state</li>
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Let's give the rational & ambitious gen-Y of our country a more compelling reason to be proud of their country than continuing to burden them with an expectation of unquestioned nationalistic pride.</div>
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<strong style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">I request all my fellow citizens to support this petition by signing it (& sharing it on their social networks) thereby making a meaningful impact on the 69th Indian Independence day!</strong></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-78976759247222948122015-08-22T23:42:00.001+05:302015-08-22T23:42:47.647+05:30The cat's on the prowl<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieNigAc2rYARPd03Qd7dYqceGza8F3mtXuHfnfQ6xHJiNPuK7GC1ssBUuPeRygRTaGyuafWAEEVmp9B_7onGrysfOmNeRtoxBxQSaZ8iUJV_5Miksf65pm1i7oQtoJT8RFqKXS0VRR5vnl/s1600/calicoeyes.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="384" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieNigAc2rYARPd03Qd7dYqceGza8F3mtXuHfnfQ6xHJiNPuK7GC1ssBUuPeRygRTaGyuafWAEEVmp9B_7onGrysfOmNeRtoxBxQSaZ8iUJV_5Miksf65pm1i7oQtoJT8RFqKXS0VRR5vnl/s640/calicoeyes.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>First published on Linkedin on 10 July 2015</i></span></div>
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On 9/11/14 I published a rather longish speculation on <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20140911130929-16107339-forget-ageing-let-google-manage-you?trk=mp-reader-card" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Calico</a>.</div>
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Almost an year since then, while nothing earth shattering some serious stuff is surely happening at Calico.</div>
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Towards making its journey to tackling ageing a smooth affair, Calico has started to identify some fun-n-fit travel-mates, hoard the essentials, chart-out the best road to take & mark-out the detours to make.</div>
<ul style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.701961); font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 30px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 35px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Partnered with The Buck Institute, which is the foremost <a href="http://www.geroscienceonline.org/research.php" rel="nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Geroscience</a>institution & works on aspects as diverse as understanding & altering neurodegenerative processes; Dietary Restriction as a way to modulate ageing to pinpointing Stochastic aspects of cellular degeneration.</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Collaborating with UCSF primarily on their focus area on understanding<a href="http://walterlab.ucsf.edu/about.html#section1" rel="nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Integrated Stress Response</a> (ISR)</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Partnered with <a href="http://qb3.org/startups/companies" rel="nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Q3B</a>, which is pursuing the biomedical promise by way of seeding dozens of start-ups in its incubators</li>
<li style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 32px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Collaborating with Broad Institute that’s crisping up the human genome by resolving the operational portion of it & importantly is developing a new way to discover & <a href="http://www.broadinstitute.org/blog/cancer-drug-wears-many-hats" rel="nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #8c68cb; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">re-purpose</a> drugs</li>
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The above partnerships are a mix of investment into longer-term scientific breakthroughs and shorter-term stake in innovative biomedical start-ups challenging the routine (Q3B) and showcase Calico’s adherence to its core purpose. But looking at the high focus on neurodegenerative research at Buck Institute (6 out of 9 research components) and UCSF, it's likely the first milestone Calico wishes to reach is tackling cognitive decline linked to ageing.</div>
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Make it fast Art, age is catching up!</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-5706400624705575462015-06-08T16:52:00.001+05:302015-06-08T17:59:50.469+05:30Don’t serve noodles al Dente<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCJPZAK3CG-oYQ_XlYCJ_1WKjYuwa3WkVN3V-WaU8t64IWO23H-61mdqTvLG4a-cxLCs35w1f2L7RfZFkt4BLGTJ-qgU0rvPRBkbRPClE-UF3IBFUvW6hEtY1Mo0KqceMzVOBl8U6bNALO/s1600/Noodles1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="369" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCJPZAK3CG-oYQ_XlYCJ_1WKjYuwa3WkVN3V-WaU8t64IWO23H-61mdqTvLG4a-cxLCs35w1f2L7RfZFkt4BLGTJ-qgU0rvPRBkbRPClE-UF3IBFUvW6hEtY1Mo0KqceMzVOBl8U6bNALO/s640/Noodles1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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Like for most of my generation & the later ones, Maggi has been an integral part of my growing up and I felt it’s my nostalgic duty to put up a defense in favor of its beleaguered maker. However as more details started emerging, it became clear to me that an outright defense will be an aberration. So here I go serving up a steaming bowl of instant wisdom to Nestle.</div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">React don’t respond</strong></div>
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When trust issues like these crop-up, a quick reaction from the effected brand, however half-baked, will still help assuage the consumer fears than a measured but delayed response would – a typical consumer will only view this time-lag as hesitation (<em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">stemming from guilt..</em>) and hence lose faith.</div>
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Now again, even this measured response shouldn’t come across as an ill-articulated stand that raises more questions than it answers. CEO Paul Buckle says “Nestlé’s safety measures and standards are same all over the world” - Safety measures, perhaps yes but this statement can’t be factual when it comes to standards as these can differ depending on the market – If Paul meant to say Nestlé’s compliance adherence is the same all over the world, he should say that. This clarity becomes that much more significant given the lack of clear-set of applicable standards in the Indian context & hence one sees FSSAI oft-quoting FDA while interpreting various facets of the results.</div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Screw brevity, be verbose</strong></div>
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Any attorney worth his salt will vouch for the fact that there are no short cuts to drafting safe harbor clauses & the more verbose; the lower is the chance of it being interpreted unsuitably.</div>
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It’s perhaps not a lie when Nestle says ‘No MSG added” & it is absolutely possible that the proteins within the noodles & taste-maker put together can throw up a peak for glutamic acid on the chromatogram. But considering FDA clearly considers this label as misbranding and as misleading the consumer, Nestle should’ve used some discretion and printed a more elaborate disclaimer to the effect</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">‘No MSG has been added to this product during manufacture. It is however possible that the product does contain trace quantities of Glutamic acid that occurs naturally in many proteins’</em></div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Challenge the rulebook, but before breaking the rule</strong></div>
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I believe there is some merit in Nestle contesting the test method(s) used by FSSAI et al to ascertain lead-content in Maggi and its good they want to ‘engage with the authorities’ on the same. Why wasn’t this done early on Paul? I’m sure the inadequacy of the method prescribed by FSSAI &/or BSI was crystal clear to Nestle for over two decades as compared to their probably superior internal STP – what’s the consequence of talking about method integrity after failing?</div>
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It is also a valid contention that applying lead-limit set for noodles to the separately-packed taste-maker isn't logical and that it should be sufficient if the combined ingredients meet the limit. But again it's not clear why Nestle chose to ignore this potential risk of regulator considering both as separate products while enforcing limits. </div>
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Finally, isn’t it a regulatory thumb rule that in order to comply with a specific standard, product should be tested using the prescribed method of the regulator & not by the manufacturer’s internal method?</div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Don’t serve noodles al Dente</strong></div>
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That’s for pasta. <span style="line-height: 23.9999980926514px;">So rather than quoting technicalities, tell the consumer clearly what they can expect and expect consistently. The consumer deserves to know that your latest variant is approved or if it is still a test marketed item.</span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 23.9999980926514px;">Trusted brands need to work on keeping the consumer trust – it’s a double edged sword. No company let alone a top brand like Nestle can afford to get complacent in any market about quality, compliance and transparency however lackadaisical the enforcement is &/or however half-aware the consumers there are of their rights - This is tantamount to a brand-harakiri & for no noble purpose either.</span></div>
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Since my intention was a defense to start with I would still close it thus – I believe Nestle has the requisite stature, maturity and still sufficient consumer trust to pull itself up from this mess and shine again.</div>
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This war-on-Maggi by the Indian regulators will hopefully stir other slumbering giants in food & pharma industry who have gotten used to using the Indian regulatory lacunae & its ineffective enforcement to their advantage and instead start prioritizing consumer interest above all.</div>
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As for the warring lords in the Indian regulatory arena, my appeal is three fold</div>
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<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Keep up the heat and not just on Nestle</span></li>
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Demand compliance but only after setting & implementing standards</span></li>
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Let science prevail not sentiment</span></li>
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Wake-up and smell the soup!</div>
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<span class="underline" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;"><strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Post thought - 08 June '15</strong></span></div>
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It's imminent that the Maggi saga will rake-up a huge public debate with respect to the general quality of the mostly uncontrolled unprocessed food out there in India. While this sounds great, I’m worried this unplanned extrapolation may bloat-up the debate & dilute its impact.</div>
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Before throwing in unprocessed food into the simmering pot of processed-food debate, it should be noted that the challenges with unprocessed foods are a very different devil and it's more an public distribution issue while Maggi noodle fuss is all about enforcement & adherence to quality standards for processed food.</div>
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Also, this is a more immediately addressable consumer rights issue as problem with quality of processed food amounts to a breach of contract between seller/ maker & buyer/ consumer. A much complex scenario however will be in play for unprocessed food where such clear definition of roles isn’t easy and the debate cannot solely happen on the merit of what an end-consumer expects.</div>
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For the sake of efficiency I think it'd be ideal for regulators & activists alike to channel the current enthusiasm towards addressing the gaps in processed food segment first - else it could be a classic case of biting off more than one can chew.</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-46135964706902143272015-03-07T16:03:00.000+05:302015-03-07T16:07:29.120+05:30The Negative yield ecosystem<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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In the Fynbos shrub lands of South Africa, an occasional forest fire is essential for survival of majority plant species there since their seed is released from its woody encasement only after being burnt (<a href="http://plantsinaction.science.uq.edu.au/edition1/?q=content/19-3-4-obligate-seeders-and-resprouters-perennial-plants-seed-or-resprout-after-re" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">obligate seeders</a>). By analogy, the on-going negative yield inferno that’s rapidly destroying investor wealth too may crack open a few seeds of hope and redemption - The core assumption of a fiscal conflagration ecosystem.</div>
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Unlike in a natural phenomenon though, any positive outcome from this dismal fiscal scenario has to be necessarily a derivative of human behavior in face of risk. <a href="http://prospect-theory.behaviouralfinance.net/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">The Prospect theory</a> explains this when it says ‘the decision makers will be risk averse when choosing between gains and risk seeking when choosing between losses’ – This could mean the investing universe over next few months (<a href="http://www.cnbc.com/id/102081595" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank"><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">& once the ECB buy-back bubble in 2016 too is suitably burst…</em></a>) would stop sinking more money in government, sovereign bonds and look at riskier options like equity that don’t at least start with a chilling promise of sub-zero return – many articles like <a href="http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/e45ef9be-b1f8-11e4-b380-00144feab7de.html#axzz3TViyjV00" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">here</a>, <a href="http://www.cnbc.com/id/102466720#." rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">here</a> &<a href="http://davidstockmanscontracorner.com/draghi/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank"> here</a>covered this possibility quite convincingly.</div>
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But again, just as forest fire burns down dry tinder first & then progressively dehydrates and engulfs vegetation that was relatively less-drier & safer before, the investors’ new found appetite for risk gradually could expose the relatively self-correcting equity and other asset classes to the risk of long-term under performance. While this eventuality may not be completely unanticipated by the investing junta, the reason why they’d still ignore it in the shorter term once again is explained by the prospect theory’s ‘reference level dependence’ characteristic, whereby a poor performance of a much riskier equity investment would still look eminently better than a known negative yield of a bond.</div>
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So if it isn't even equity, what seeds of hope would crack open?</div>
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<a href="https://www.jpmorganfunds.com/cm/Satellite?UserFriendlyURL=diguidetomarkets&pagename=jpmfVanityWrapper&vanity=diguidetomarkets&Source=Guide_to_the_Markets#top" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; clear: left; color: #96999c; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank"><img alt="" class="center" data-loading-tracked="true" height="208" src="https://media.licdn.com/mpr/mpr/shrinknp_400_400/AAEAAQAAAAAAAAJrAAAAJDY5YjY1OTg1LTIxZjktNDQ0ZC1iYWQ2LTc3ZTg4ZGNlOTUwMg.jpg" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; display: block; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; height: auto; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px auto 15px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="line-height: 23.9999980926514px;">In their quest for the feel-good investments, it is likely the investor interest in PE will spike in the short to longer-term. This expansion of the PE pie will of course be helped by its historically steadier IRR as compared to other asset classes (@ annual return of 15% calculated across 10 years)</span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 23.9999980926514px;">While any such incremental flows into the PE may still be a blip compared to what’s at stake in traditional asset classes, considering the critical nature of capital availability in building/ growing companies that’d eventually feed the future equity market, I’d think Private Equity in its glow of new found investor love will turn out to be the quintessential seed that’ll regenerate the fiscal ecosystem.</span></div>
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Well it just might be that the hot winds of negative yields could prove a windfall for the VCs & FoFs currently raising funds.</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-37201861038215210492015-03-04T14:42:00.001+05:302015-03-04T14:43:39.163+05:30#TheDress gave me #EcomStress<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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.....I tentatively responded when my sister shared the now viral picture of #TheDress. I soon realized I was the odd ducky (in my sister's words..) in a family/ gene-pool that firmly stood behind the blue n black verdict.</div>
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It wasn't the dearth of any other more-pressing topics to deal with (like my brand new car's freshly smashed front bumper) but I too rapidly contracted this abundant online virus and embarked upon a quest to prove to myself (and to my sis’ n others...) the correctness of MY color perception, only to realize that I'm barking up the wrong tree this time around - <a href="http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2015/02/150227-blue-white-dress-optical-illusion-science/" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">National Geographic</a>, <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2971953/The-Great-Dress-Debate-New-photo-shows-really-black-blue-sorry-Kim-saw-gold.html" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Dailymail</a>, <a href="http://www.wired.com/2015/02/science-one-agrees-color-dress/" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Wired</a>, <a href="http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/03/150302134235.htm" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">ScienceDirect</a> all said the same… damn! No amount of coaxing could make my retina change its perspective nor my brain it's opinion.</div>
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Even as I started bothering myself less and less about what made my brain/ retina perceive the blue as white & black as gold & made me a color-duh, I decided I will never ever trust myself again with online purchase of clothes.</div>
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Amazon, the loss is yours and yeah do blame Facebook & Google for it!</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-67995073376975736022015-02-27T23:05:00.000+05:302015-03-13T23:52:01.037+05:30What about these anomalies Mr Jaitley?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggDoV2s2vqSgYMs6Ffaq431dkDWmgPE0onyOlQpKqcZaO93Lud12WKOGbQJLHdRm9taH5UX1IDTrkpuDI_SARM0oPFu0RJVoTP9_cA52ulswLKmQERfxJv-qQE-_MMFeHhllA4NFdi13Ah/s1600/IMG_20150218_115218968_mod.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggDoV2s2vqSgYMs6Ffaq431dkDWmgPE0onyOlQpKqcZaO93Lud12WKOGbQJLHdRm9taH5UX1IDTrkpuDI_SARM0oPFu0RJVoTP9_cA52ulswLKmQERfxJv-qQE-_MMFeHhllA4NFdi13Ah/s1600/IMG_20150218_115218968_mod.jpg" height="368" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit;">Since it is such a polarizing issue right now, it’d probably help to make my position clear upfront - I believe that in order to achieve industrial &/or infrastructural development, land acquisition is a necessary evil any country would've to learn to deal with & any amendments made to the law by a pragmatic regime towards making acquisition easier shouldn't necessarily make the exercise anymore capitalistic than it already is.</span></div>
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Having said that, a brief review of the key changes proposed through “<a href="http://www.prsindia.org/uploads/media/Land%20and%20R%20and%20R/LARR%20bill%202015.pdf" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">The Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Amendment) Bill, 2015</a>” indicates that certain overtly simplistic assumptions were made while proposing the amendment & buried amidst all the text is an unhappy irony;</div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">AMENDMENTS</strong></div>
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Exemption of five categories of land use: (i) Defence, (ii) Rural infrastructure, (iii) Affordable housing, (iv) Industrial corridors, and (v) Infrastructure projects including Public Private Partnership (PPP) projects from key provisions thereby making the following possible;</div>
<ul style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 30px 40px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Land acquisition can be initiated even when an overwhelming majority (say 99%..) of the land-owners of the region are against it</li>
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">No social impact assessment needs to be conducted by the mega corporations (public, private & PPP) proposing these mega projects falling under the above categories</li>
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The provisions governing the return of unutilized land expanded (from the earlier unutilized beyond 5 years clause) to make it possible that;</div>
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<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Any entity (not just the above five categories) can hold-on to the land for a long duration by merely stating upfront the estimated time of it being not utilized (say 10 years..)</li>
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Amendment to include/ make possible acquisition of land for private hospitals and private educational institutions</div>
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That any project that can be interpreted, even if remotely, as nationalistic is automatically deemed to have a higher purpose and hence need not seek mundane clearances</div>
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That the project being a PPP makes it automatically beyond review &/or reproach</div>
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That reassigning irrigated crop-lands for the above categories is much more justified than say, for assigning them to a seed processing center</div>
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That there is no inherent malintent in an entity that wants to possess land (crop-land, barren otherwise..) but keep it unutilized beyond five years</div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">THE IRONY</strong></div>
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It so appears that a company like <a href="http://www.finmeccanica.com/en/business-mercati-markets/settori/sistemi-difesa/wass" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Finmeccanica</a>* aiming to set-up a Torpedo manufacturing unit in Assam can get its 1000 acres of land on a platter while a <a href="http://www.sankaranethralaya.org/snapps/Feedback.aspx" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Sankara Nethralaya</a>* wanting to set-up a 100 acre campus in Noida may have to do a full-fledged social impact assessment at high cost and invest in a long-drawn negotiation exercise to obtain consent from 80% of the highly realty-savvy land-owners there. (<em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">*just to illustrate the case, not real investments</em>)</div>
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For me the most glaring aspect here is the casualness with which <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_impact_assessment" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">SIA</a> is eliminated for all mega projects that actually can impact and alter a social ecosystem AND the inexplicably negligent approach of not wanting to limit conversion of fertile crop-lands to industrial campuses.</div>
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Even if the purported anarchists; pseudo/ neo-socialists are ignored & even if the finance minister is indeed justified in claiming the amendment only corrects the <a href="http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/arun-jaitley-slams-upas-land-acquisition-law-calls-it-a-threat-to-national-security/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">anomalies left out by UPA</a> in the 2013 bill, the government should still explain the above 'new anomalies' introduced by them in the proposed amendment before steamrolling the bill through to legislation.</div>
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After all, acche’ din (<em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">good times</em>) need a saccha irada (<em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">noble intention</em>) to ride-in on.<br />
<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</strong><br />
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<span class="underline" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;"><strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Update 12th March 2015</strong></span></div>
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Even as the bill got passed, the amendments made/ circulated on 09th march give some comfort that there's a conscious attempt at correcting the above anomalies I pointed out.</div>
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The anomalies (of earlier draft) & corrections of 09th March (in itlaics):</div>
<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Land acquisition can be initiated even when an overwhelming majority (say 99%..) of the land-owners of the region are against it</span></div>
<ul style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin: 0px 0px 30px 40px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The amendments state that the LARR Authority must hold its hearing in the district where the land acquisition is taking place, after receiving a reference from the Collector and giving notice of this reference to all concerned parties</em></li>
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<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">No social impact assessment needs to be conducted by the mega corporations (public, private & PPP) proposing these mega projects falling under the above categories</span></div>
<ul style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin: 0px 0px 30px 40px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The amendments add that before issuing this notification (for exemption), the government must ensure that the extent of land being acquired is in keeping with the minimum land required for such a project.</em></li>
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<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Unlimited acquisition of irrigated multi-cropped land</span></div>
<ul style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin: 0px 0px 30px 40px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The amendments add that before issuing this notification, the government must ensure that the extent of land being acquired is in keeping with the minimum land required for such a project.</span></li>
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<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">&</span></div>
<ul style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin: 0px 0px 30px 40px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The amendments add that the government must conduct a survey of its wasteland including arid land, and maintain a record containing details of such land, as may be prescribed by the government</em></li>
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<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The full text of amendments can be accessed <a href="http://www.prsindia.org/uploads/media/Land%20and%20R%20and%20R/Note%20on%20Amendments%20of%20LARR%20Bill,%202015.pdf" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">here</a></span></div>
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Not too bad!</div>
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<a class="share-button share-twitter" data-li-uetrk-action="share" data-li-uetrk-click="share-twtr" data-share-text=""What about these anomalies Mr. Jaitley?" by @Vishrasayan on @LinkedIn" data-share-type="twitter" href="https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Fpulse%2Fwhat-anomalies-mr-jaitley-murali-apparaju&text=%22What%20about%20these%20anomalies%20Mr.%20Jaitley%3F%22%20by%20%40Vishrasayan%20on%20%40LinkedIn" role="button" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #96999c; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="label" style="border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-source: initial; border-image-width: initial; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); display: inline !important; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; height: 1px; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; position: absolute !important; vertical-align: baseline; width: 1px;">Share on Twitter</span></a></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-1571570912495053782014-12-22T13:10:00.000+05:302014-12-22T13:18:58.912+05:30Big Idea 2015: Haute Apothicaire<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjR0Vb9uOgn5ETYWkR3Vun7nViIZOH0n-uNI92b9yZGgWrXPPlXG9UZ9ZWJhP0SSLo7aatBmUkM21YZsPdmX8E-pTUGU-IsUfjkYjxiy8JLtaDg4TTz0ZlClX9SS1DdldQ-yGOl_VKaRg-i/s1600/personalized+medicine+(NYASorg).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjR0Vb9uOgn5ETYWkR3Vun7nViIZOH0n-uNI92b9yZGgWrXPPlXG9UZ9ZWJhP0SSLo7aatBmUkM21YZsPdmX8E-pTUGU-IsUfjkYjxiy8JLtaDg4TTz0ZlClX9SS1DdldQ-yGOl_VKaRg-i/s1600/personalized+medicine+(NYASorg).jpg" height="366" width="640" /></a></div>
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<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: italic; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin: 0px 0px 30px; padding: 0px 5px 0px 40px; quotes: none; vertical-align: baseline;">
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">There are medicines & then there is Haute Apothicaire</strong></blockquote>
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From what’s written on the wall, 2015 could well be the year when good old medicine finally goes designer chic. Even if not for the masses just yet, a privileged few could soon have their meds custom made to match their genes - well, just as soon as the fitting trials are done & the master says aye!</div>
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For those who didn't quite get my pun, I am indeed talking about personalized medicine going mainstream in 2015 - From Novartis making the first move to bring protocol to patient through its series of #<a href="http://www.cancercommons.org/2014/02/24/novartis-revolutionizes-clinical-trials-for-targeted-cancer-drugs/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">SIGNATURE trials</a> & JnJ opening up its clinical data vaults to <a href="http://vishrasayan.blogspot.in/2014/01/is-yoda-enabled-clinical-data.html" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Yale for open research</a> to #Google #<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20140911130929-16107339-forget-ageing-let-google-manage-you?trk=mp-reader-card" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Calico aiming to tackle</a>ageing through big data & bigger collaborations, it's clear there's this huge trend of big pharma going all guns blazing after the alluring promise of personalized medicine.</div>
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This alliance with big data is in some way an existential manoeuvre by big pharma poised precariously on the patent-cliff & thus most initial approvals of designer drugs would be those that have been pulled up from the gorges of failed/failing PII/ PIII trials. Either which way, there is no doubt that the best use of cutting-edge drug design capability is only when it is coupled with the invaluable human genomic & proteomic data decoded in the past decade and using the #bigdata analytics to throw up the statistically best therapeutic match for an individual patient.</div>
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If one goes by the regularity with which FDA has been approving companion diagnostics and genetic tests over past few years; the apparent merit they see in the label of an approved <a href="http://www.fda.gov/Drugs/ScienceResearch/ResearchAreas/Pharmacogenetics/ucm083378.htm" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">drug referencing the genomic biomarker(s)</a> & the pragmatic use of conditional approvals such as the recent one for <a href="http://www.marketwatch.com/story/ptc-therapeutics-announces-launch-of-translarnatm-ataluren-in-germany-2014-12-03" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Translarna</a> by the EMA, it appears the regulators too are in sync with this new reality & have been <a href="http://www.fda.gov/scienceresearch/specialtopics/personalizedmedicine/default.htm" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">gearing up</a>to deal with the potential multitudes of personalized therapeutic applications & evolve an approval mechanism that's applicable despite the indication not being orphan enough.</div>
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Even as connoisseurs may not quite like it, high fashion attains scale only when it goes mainstream & by analogy the designer drugs too would find their way to the masses eventually, I only hope sooner & safer.</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">#BigIdeas2015 #Google #Calico #Bigdata</em></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-61414580886969447492014-12-12T15:40:00.001+05:302014-12-12T15:42:20.294+05:30Overwhelmed by an underwhelming existence<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinqo5NvjwwTBxJxphVw81CHsdgamu3K_unf5VdZ0c_TsIv01v6gljeIpY60Gdue1sKjlVKSQZk72rnGHzy37DVZz0yVA1yT9Ce6LF0aLC7D6jbBuHPvDW-tgM5Rc0z0JMXqLnfKi1i35Fu/s1600/blues.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinqo5NvjwwTBxJxphVw81CHsdgamu3K_unf5VdZ0c_TsIv01v6gljeIpY60Gdue1sKjlVKSQZk72rnGHzy37DVZz0yVA1yT9Ce6LF0aLC7D6jbBuHPvDW-tgM5Rc0z0JMXqLnfKi1i35Fu/s1600/blues.jpg" height="364" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px;">This piece is negative, dark, demotivating and has been scripted in a loathsome moment of existential angst.</span></div>
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Well, you've been warned.</div>
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Whenever I read articles that appeal to the conscience of an average citizen on various issues such as terrorism, jingoism, war-on-terror, environment, livelihoods, ethics etc. & exhort them to find their voice, I do feel like picking up the baton & jump in headlong yelling 'yes absolutely'. But alas, my motivation to do so takes a nose-dive when I try and count on my fingers where at all my voice matters, forget macro, within my microcosm representing my country, my province, my city, my company, my neighborhood - the fist remains closed & limp.</div>
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Most average Joes' (& Jennis') as me are so overwhelmed by their underwhelming existence that they don't really care or bother about changing the world & merely survive by taking things as they are served.</div>
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I really hope this changes for good for me & all else, but as of now my utopia is all make believe & I shudder at the prospect of a damning expose’</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-76708795623593000772014-12-11T12:07:00.000+05:302014-12-11T12:08:15.769+05:30Uberration<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="http://www.tnooz.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/throwing-money.jpg" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5KuHtCVEkrwwtPQAe0by2J6eQH0YDAHZ2tsxVfA8HR31-RSR890vTNNVxqSYScBmBHYCxXOyRd1RX3wC0e6PG1o7HtnE0pivSRZWonhQZliY8SQU_3BmE_UtercXzycxkWIDmTJrsvDwD/s1600/throwing-money.jpg" height="320" width="640" /></a></div>
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Don't worry folks, this isn't yet another Uber bashing or defending article. Since so many are already on that job, I'd rather pass the blame up & rile the investor universe a little instead :-)</div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">First a disclaimer:</strong></div>
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Conceptually I admire Uber - I dig the fact that something as mundane as local commute can have such disruptive business potential. As a user I loved the sheer convenience & practicality of an app based cab service that eliminates the fuss of 'booking' a chauffeured cab & thrilled that I'd always know how far my ride is & jus' how many more are creeping around near where I am. I liked it that this company made it possible for quite a few folks in the recession hit USA to make a decent living without looking too bad doing that.</div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Okay the real poser now</strong></div>
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Among all the financial greats such as Fidelity Investments, Wellington Management, Black Rock Inc, Summit Partners, Kleiner Perkins, Google Ventures, Menlo Ventures et al who poured in a whopping $1.2 billion into Uber merely a few months ago, is there one that had raised/ browsed over the possibility that Uber with it's now famous <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">thumbing-its-nose-at-rules</em> approach is potentially waltzing each day into a new & huge regulatory risk?</div>
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Is it possible at all that there were absolutely no indicators of this looming risk in July 2014 considering that by December 2014 Uber managed to get into trouble in 15 different countries ranging from USA (California, Nevada, Portland); Canada, UK, France, Germany, Spain, Belgium, Netherlands, Japan, Thailand, South Korea, Philippines, Taiwan and India?</div>
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Are the PE, VC organizations in their quest to go after high potential start-ups not sufficiently factoring in any ethical, livelihood & regulatory aspects, that could turn into risks, before unloading truck loads of money? If indeed these aspects were overlooked by them, is it that in their over-enthusiastic support of Uber & it's disruptive enterprise model, the investing universe did a major disservice to them by not letting them get aware of a potential risk they're <strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">aggregating</strong> (<a href="http://www.rediff.com/business/report/pix-ban-on-taxi-aggregators-rs-2000-crore-pe-money-at-stake/20141210.htm" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">pun intended</a>) with each city they are expanding into?</div>
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I really hope Uber cleans-up & pursues its definitive potential so I could hail my fav' cab again soon within my city and elsewhere too - I could be dead-wrong but I feel though that the investor organizations need to do some soul-searching into what exactly their due-diligence is all about or not & if their multibillion valuations are indeed less market regulatory risk.</div>
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<span class="underline" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;"><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Post Thought - 11th December</em></span></div>
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<em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The banning of Uber in India is akin to a parent banishing the teenager from home just because she/ he is caught smoking for the very first-time. The normal approach would be to tell em' 'you are grounded' & proceed to put some sense in the kid which in case of Uber would be asking them to suspend their operations till all aspects are cleared out - I hope Mr. PM will raise above petty politicking and be the stern nurturer of progress people expect him to be.</em></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-49861378982295186612014-11-15T11:21:00.000+05:302014-11-15T11:21:45.535+05:30The eleventh commandment: Share thy health data<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiX4pxzE66SvENhL29KBXWrQ6pOLldlNLv_bBJUP1jT48-x-HidNZZd3CvkwDpgI-TgoHBMNFXGaKXdQn65cwiBjdVnTQ4QTqzRfDzra4gxrS1hZtaKZt_x1NN4l_RWcgT_Rg-TvJfMKIDp/s1600/The+eleventh+commandment+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiX4pxzE66SvENhL29KBXWrQ6pOLldlNLv_bBJUP1jT48-x-HidNZZd3CvkwDpgI-TgoHBMNFXGaKXdQn65cwiBjdVnTQ4QTqzRfDzra4gxrS1hZtaKZt_x1NN4l_RWcgT_Rg-TvJfMKIDp/s1600/The+eleventh+commandment+2.jpg" height="366" width="640" /></a></div>
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You know you've got one compelling business plan when your investor starts promoting your wares even before you hit production. Like I've said <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/article/20140911130929-16107339-forget-ageing-let-google-manage-you?trk=mp-reader-card" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">here</a> earlier, at the base of Google's healthcare ambitions is the health data of its users & now one of their earliest believers is bearing the torch to its data quest & how!</div>
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Beth Seidenberg, a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (@KPCB) that famously invested 25mio USD (along with Sequoia) for a 20% stake in Google way back in 1999, in a recent blog piece of her's exhorts the users saying "<a href="http://www.wired.com/2014/11/on-sharing-your-medical-info/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">You Should Share Your Health Data: Its Value Outweighs the Privacy Risk</a>". Beth of course invests in digital health start-ups and hence could be speaking for those too, but it's anybody's guess which of KPCB's investments this would help the most.</div>
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Not that people need to be pressurized much these days to voluntarily part with their data, health or otherwise, but this dictat by the good doctor will surely makes 'em feel good about the 'why' part of it.</div>
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Sweet.</div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Update: 15th Nov 2014</strong></div>
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allrighty...... now Accel's Rich <a href="http://venturebeat.com/2014/11/14/accels-wong-may-pick-android-over-apple-in-health-platforms/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Wong is going bullish</a> on Android platform over IOS for investments in mobile health technologies. From making appeals of voluntary data disclosure to enabling automated data recovery through internet of things, the (investing) universe is truly conspiring to give it all to Larry & Sergei :-))</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-40762917166478110472014-10-31T23:03:00.000+05:302014-11-03T10:11:26.321+05:30Why did Scott Adams give up on Venture Capital?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiy2SFB8mMc2Ybmic89xGc1WBLuPm1QS3Dr5yWUqDmwPluedAIfjD4mRzLSDzBVpOOk9RdQslQCPXWPBcWt6ZIMVkI29Pl_8Qwzzgrz0kVBCNdySOTGC17RiOXmLrR_om_-5y4ktTCpp7d9/s1600/IMG_20141031_074747874.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiy2SFB8mMc2Ybmic89xGc1WBLuPm1QS3Dr5yWUqDmwPluedAIfjD4mRzLSDzBVpOOk9RdQslQCPXWPBcWt6ZIMVkI29Pl_8Qwzzgrz0kVBCNdySOTGC17RiOXmLrR_om_-5y4ktTCpp7d9/s1600/IMG_20141031_074747874.jpg" height="225" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #4d4f51; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">More than the brilliant humor & the tough to ignore desi-connect called Vijay, what caught my attention in today's DILBERT section of Times-of-India was the date of strip itself viz., 1.20.09 - Now that's pretty dated even for an average Indian newspaper that's stuck in a time-warp when it comes to being current on syndicated comic content.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #4d4f51; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">My subsequent query on the <a href="http://search.dilbert.com/search?w=venture+capitalist&asug=venture&view=list&filter=type%3Acomic" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">website</a> revealed that there're no strips on either 'venture capital' or 'venture capitalist' after the above strip of 2009 – Whoa! If that isn't disillusionment what is? particularly considering how the age-old crib of 'VC model being broken' got a lot more traction post the recession-wreaked 2009 and that would've meant a lot more meat for Scott to chew on!</span></div>
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<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">I wonder why Scott gave up on this wonderful pun-amenable character called VC so very unceremoniously.</span></div>
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<strong style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 20px;">VC = Vijay = No good?</strong></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #4d4f51; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Of course I did search for more strips of my compatriot <a href="http://search.dilbert.com/search?w=vijay&view=list&filter=type%3Acomic" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Vijay</a> too. It was rather interesting to note how this chap’s tagline/ descriptor changed from "Vijay, the world's most desperate venture capitalist" in 2005 to "Vijay the venture capitalist" in 2008 to "Vijay, the world's worst venture capitalist" in 2009 ---- </span><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Despite my respect & awe for Scott Adams, I can't help but wonder if there's a botched-up fundraising behind this obvious gripe.</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-30491120941746817562014-10-15T15:21:00.000+05:302014-10-16T16:51:21.901+05:30Satya Nadella - A defense that is not one<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYdvUKw6yNnlIzUoUa-AXsskOsLu_y7uN0_IjDvQF9UX-AAPlOeCv4ssDbZj5ihKmp9EhWO6ZAdzHJyH5_cSgkuu9jkBGTxmwFQyWJfDkVbxzf_4Ae9Yhyn9eEko_5upJxuShiiCXpsMl2/s1600/satya+nadella.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYdvUKw6yNnlIzUoUa-AXsskOsLu_y7uN0_IjDvQF9UX-AAPlOeCv4ssDbZj5ihKmp9EhWO6ZAdzHJyH5_cSgkuu9jkBGTxmwFQyWJfDkVbxzf_4Ae9Yhyn9eEko_5upJxuShiiCXpsMl2/s1600/satya+nadella.jpg" height="379" width="640" /></a></div>
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<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">One more treatise on the Karma guy’s woes - couldn't resist the temptation to jump on to the bandwagon, my bad!</span></div>
<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">One cannot discount for the fact that as a male he could potentially have some level of bias and foggy view of gender-equality which may have influenced his initial response which in hindsight does sound a tad too casual for the kind of platform it was – I’m not still going to pursue that angle here since enough debate is already happening out there.</span></div>
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My focus here is on some obvious racial backlash against Nadella using this incident as a ruse/ excuse & what's said here is relevant only to the section of netizens whose foremost view of Nadella seems to be that of an Asian-Indian & not as a successful, self-made American corporate/tech executive.</div>
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This current racial slur is evident in the following refrains;</div>
<ul style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 30px 40px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Calling into question his competence (Indian) to handle the top-job of an American corporation vis-à-vis other more 'deserving' (European?) contenders</li>
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">His ethno-cultural, rustic! (India, Hindu?) roots perpetuating his patriarchal, rigid approach to gender</li>
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">His (in)ability to articulate his position well during the initial comment & in his subsequent explanation (non-native English speaker?)</li>
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<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Ironically, many pursuing this angle seem more cock-sure about the meaning of 'Karma' than Nadella himself who, whether or not a practicing Hindu, will still understand better the context & consequence of Karma at a subconscious level given the all pervasiveness of it in an Indian context – this is not to say he’s a saint who knows his pearls of wisdom, but to underscore that misinterpretation of karma is a distinct possibility if the meaning has been merely googled up.</span></div>
<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Given his upbringing in an multicultural urban set-up, in a socially sensitized & progressive familial environment; my own understanding of the shared cultural ethos & social metric he'd have been exposed to & going by the fact that he made it to top on his own steam in a foreign country, I'd believe Satya Nadella understands the implications of discrimination at work of different types, is perhaps more gender sensitive than many mono-cultural tech-executives in the US of A and as articulate in English, if not more, than most native speakers of that language. Ponder this, if the Indian, Hindu angle were absent from his profile, he'd surely have been interpreted far more reasonably by the currently raving minority out there & here.</span></div>
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By all means, rip him apart on what he said or didn't for weeks & months to come, but only while treating him an ‘American male tech-CEO’ & NOT as a ‘Indian-Hindu male & a compromise CEO of an American corporation’</div>
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Like any, this too shall pass. But let this not leave a bitter aftertaste of racial prejudice for the hard-working aliens in the land of opportunity.</div>
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<span class="underline" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;"><strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">POST THOUGHT: </strong></span><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">16 October 2014</span></div>
<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">In <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telugu_language" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Telugu</a>, which is Satya Nadella's native tongue (also mine), the term 'Karma/ Kharma' is typically used in the context of acknowledging consequences of one’s action. The most commonly used phrase is <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Naa kharma, anubhavinchaka tappadu</span></em>, which can be translated as 'I have to bear the consequences that come my way' – It should be noted here that the individual doesn't clarify if the consequences are of his/her actions or someone else’s. Another common usage is <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Evari karma ki vaarey baadhyulu </span></em>which translates as 'an individual owns complete responsibility of dealing with consequences of his karma'.</span></div>
<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Effectively, in Telugu, the term Karma is used as a philosophical refrain/ reproach (to self or others) that conveys the sense that "<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">an individual has to own up & deal with the consequences of his karma, be it good or bad"</strong>. So after all, If not his initial botched-up response, Nadella's subsequent patch-up message to his employees does seem to have some influence of his linguistic roots :-)</span></div>
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<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Image Courtesy: <a href="http://seattletimes.com/ABPub/zoom/html/2024637551.html" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Seattle Times</a></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-74701262775170524372014-10-01T13:46:00.001+05:302014-10-01T13:50:34.443+05:30May the satellites watch over you!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #4d4f51; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">I don't text-drive!</span></div>
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But text-walk I do an awful lot & I realize this could be equally dangerous when done outdoors (read: roads). It so figures that big brother G too is pretty worried over the gory implications of text-walking and <a href="http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/23/latest_google_patent_in_15_feet_you_will_be_hit_by_a_train/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">s</a><a href="http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/23/latest_google_patent_in_15_feet_you_will_be_hit_by_a_train/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">tarted to ideate-on</a> (& patent...) some potential solutions that'll likely result in a new app which could make stuff like <strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">alertness</strong><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">, </span><strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">caution</strong> & <strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">looking-up</strong> pretty much passe'</div>
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An app that can save me from walking into trouble? - I'm sold!</div>
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<a href="http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.htm&r=10&f=G&l=50&d=PTXT&p=1&p=1&S1=(%22Google+Inc%22+AND+ALERT)&OS=%22Google+Inc%22+AND+ALERT&RS=(%22Google+Inc%22+AND+ALERT)" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank"><img alt="" class="center" data-loading-tracked="true" src="https://media.licdn.com/mpr/mpr/p/7/005/08c/2a5/2937097.jpg" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; display: block; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; height: auto; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px auto 15px; max-width: 100%; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;" /></a></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-39835612301012118632014-09-11T22:44:00.000+05:302014-09-16T02:16:48.704+05:30Forget ageing, let Google manage you!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4oLE8ZG5xtIMh_WpWfXLY8pNTzdrPyQzSjAZulFhK22tIbHoKzUh6k-FQsB_0K_tAM0Mi65hp0GImDq4_yL7ckzgYR9V3K0k7GVxDMhB0kdKrks_Nd9JBya3pefMwWfcaXOhHSqpJgHuL/s1600/calicoeyes.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4oLE8ZG5xtIMh_WpWfXLY8pNTzdrPyQzSjAZulFhK22tIbHoKzUh6k-FQsB_0K_tAM0Mi65hp0GImDq4_yL7ckzgYR9V3K0k7GVxDMhB0kdKrks_Nd9JBya3pefMwWfcaXOhHSqpJgHuL/s1600/calicoeyes.jpg" height="384" width="640" /></a></div>
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I can visualize the oodles of intellectual optimism and excitement generated when Bill Maris & Ray Kurzweil sat down for the very first time to envision Calico to ‘Tackle Ageing’ & prolong lives. But despite an equally bold mission statement saying Calico will ‘Devise interventions that enable people to lead longer and healthier lives’, I find it difficult to believe that Larry would’ve agreed to sink millions in this seemingly altruistic goal of creating a clutch of wonder pills that increase human lifespan, in about a decade plus, without fully addressing some key questions, most importantly why Google, why ageing.</div>
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Even if in their new-covert enthusiasm (to healthcare), Bill, Larry et al would’ve down-played the primary question of why Google, it’s unlikely a battle-worn pharma baron like Richard Gonzalez would ignore the same. But the fact that <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/03/us-health-abbvie-google-idUSKBN0GY24H20140903" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Gonzalez is firmly sold on to this idea now</a> indicates that Calico’s actual potential is not definitely limited to mere (& slow) fruition of their stated long-term vision.</div>
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Secondly, while it may look like a really compelling cause given the promise of long-life, scientifically I’m still unsure what makes ageing research an attractive business proposition considering Alzheimer’s drug development is struggling with a depressingly high failure rate of 99.6%? Perhaps Google saw some merit is in this very realization that ‘Alzheimer’s Cure’ is pretty much an oxymoron and prevention is where the hope lies. Of course ageing is much more than Alzheimer’s and hopefully the rest of the pathways that arrest degeneration don’t have as many pitfalls and mines as Alzheimer’s does, b<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">ut how is this untested promise of tackling ageing alluring enough for a healthcare upstart like Google to jump-in with a big-ticket investment?</span></div>
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Through my freestyle inquisitive ramblings below, I have tried to better understand this stealth start-up & see if my above hypothesis makes some sense. Also, despite knowing CALICO is set-up as an independent company, I have dealt with this like Google’s still the boss.</div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">What’s in a name? – Quite a bit actually</strong></h4>
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Other than the obvious fact that it’s short for ‘California Life Company’, the name surely reminds one of a Calico cat. Art Levinson was apparently okay with the cat connotation in connection with a cat’s nine lives (read: longevity). But looking at all the illustrious names on the team, one'd surely suspect the connotation is far deeper than it looks & there's more to Calico than the cat itself.</div>
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After some serious searching, I could make some connection. <span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The biological background to the curious phenomenon called calico cats lies in a spontaneous genetic mechanism called X-inactivation & the effects associated with relative Degree of Skewing (DS) of paternal & maternal X chromosomes among female of the species.</span><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The most interesting find in this connection is a </span><a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3283187/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">study published on NCBI</a><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> that establishes a link between higher DS & longer lifespan – one of the authors of this paper incidentally is Prof. Kaare Christensen of Danish Ageing Research Centre, University of Southern Denmark.</span></div>
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Great conjectures all, but I’m wondering where does this leave male-longevity? :-)</div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Let me get this off my list</strong></h4>
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Is Calico Google Health 2.0? <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Health" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Google Health (GH)</a> was merely a medical data management initiative, a natural offshoot of Google’s cloud aspirations but also Google’s first tentative entry into healthcare. As a “personal health information centralization” service, GH depended on people adapting the same and needed other support organizations to achieve scale. While Google never claimed they did, GH’s monetization was perhaps through positioning healthcare products, solutions to individual users based on the information available against their profiles. Given this background, it doesn't look likely Calico is just rehashed Google Health.</div>
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Now the primary <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/06/update-on-google-health-and-google.html" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">reason for closing GH</a> is stated to be ‘the low adoption’ of the platform by users - Really? Did Google really expect to cover the world within one year after it released the finalized version of GH in 2010 before announcing its retirement in 2011? This super-short life-cycle makes me suspect if Google Health was a recce for Calico if not its previous version. If indeed GH was planned as a recce or even if it was coincidental, I guess there would have been some key takeaways; learning from this escapade that went into design of Calico – a few that come to mind are;</div>
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<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">What healthcare data an average individual is comfortable putting up on cloud & what she/ he isn’t</li>
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">How easy or tough it is to ensure consistent updating of good quality, verifiable data?</li>
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The minimal data points required to estimate an undisclosed indication(s) (user needs) and have a firm basis for monetizing the venture.-------- <span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">E.g.</span><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">when someone uploads Vitamin-D levels on a quarterly basis, other than the fact that the subject is Vit-D deficient if), estimating the manifesting condition is not still possible unless some other kind of data is uploaded which when read together with the first throws up a tangible story. Now if the same user uploads data on bone-density and say a Vertebral CT Scan, it may be safe to assume the user’s actual condition is that of spondylosis pain & thus attempt reaching out to the user and propose solutions.</em></li>
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<ul style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 30px 40px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Did the solutions advised/ advertised, push-notification made to the users translate to any tangible change in their choices (of where/ what to spend) & what percentage of users were inclined to take endorsements as ‘real’ health solutions?</li>
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It’d be reasonable to assume that Google Health conceived in 2008 was piggy backing on the quantified-self trends that incidentally are still strong and was essentially designed to accept, process data fed manually either by user or by supporting stakeholder organizations. <span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">However given the proliferation of the wearable digital health feedback systems in past 2 years & given the inherent limitations of the GH platform to integrate internet of things may have prompted Google to discontinue GH and think of a completely new to way pursue its Health ambitions.</span></div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Why is Google thinking health?</strong></h4>
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Calico in its stated vision is unabashedly a healthcare company & nowhere hints at anything even remotely Googlish (sic). So what prompted Google to enter a domain that’s clearly & completely unconnected to its core-competencies. <span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">If I let alone the self-actualization needs of Larry & Sergei and Google’s avowed itch for innovation & paradigm-setting, what unstated and unassailable advantages Google already has/ will have over other Pharma biggies who've been there and done but yet can’t confidently talk of prolonging lifespan?</span></div>
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Of course <a href="http://www.letsbebrief.co.uk/google-vs-death/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Sky Nash on LBB</a> earlier did say ‘Utilizing the world’s leading minds and Google’s raw computational power, Calico promises to lift, correct and protect humans from aging’. Computational power is fine, but Google neither owns nor has even an indirect stake in any of the invaluable clinical data generated by pharmaceutical innovator organizations over thousands of clinical failures and some successes. So what other kind of data can potentially help them do a better job of putting out drugs and those that tackle ageing at that? – could it be;</div>
<ul style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 30px 40px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Not to the same level of detail as FB has and not as structured, but Google has user information that could be put to use in wellness business.</li>
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Google’s probable access to the data of online sequencing companies like 23andMe & DNANexus (GV invested into these companies).</li>
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If user data is at the base of this opportunity, how is Google data better than FB's which is far better differentiated & spread across billions of users? - I guess the crux lies in the data semantics. The semantics of a structured data query peppered with specifics generated from mapping user preferences through “Likes” (as for FB) V/s of an unstructured, spontaneous search history based data (as for Google) can be greatly different.</div>
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However given that Google search is more personal & private than activity on FB account (<em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">contestable, as the lines are blurring ever since smart phones with ‘location-on’ took over</em>) people are likely less inhibited in what they search for & this inherently makes their profiling based on search history a lot more accurate and actionable at a one-one level. Whereas on FB, the likes by the individual’s at best indicate a broad interest rather than an individual trait and importantly don’t necessarily indicate what the user is looking for – Let me just say that the data Google has access to & generates every second is more valuable than what FB would have when it comes to identifying a heath consumer's need!</div>
<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Example: consider & compare the following Google search keyword composition, as recorded from a single advanced search or from a search history over a period of time…</em></div>
<ul style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 30px 40px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">40ys+heart disease+arrhythmia+female+supplements?+self-diagnosis+vitamins+non-surgical treatment+jogging+yoga+meditation+fenofibrate+non-surgical+hereditary?+childhood eosinophilia+zinc+PCOS+India+traction safety+physiotherapy</em></li>
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<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">With the following FB profile+activity</em></div>
<ul style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 30px 40px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">40yrs+female+1500 friends across 20 countries+Likes “Yoga”; “Herbalife”; “working women” “Titanic the Movie”; “Savage Garden” “feel” worried, bored, depressed variably across a month & with status-updates that dealt with topics & images that demonstrate ‘feeling generally great”; “euphoria”; “health problems”; “heartbreak’; “depression” et al</em></li>
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When it comes to how much one can profile the user based on the above input, I feel Google search history wins hand down on the degree of specificity of data & for the sheer number of conjectures and probabilities possible. FB data on the other hand is specific on non-health aspects & even if an effort is made to interpret the semantics, it’s likely to end up with ‘probably-true-observations’ but not much actionable observations on aspects related to health. <span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">So as long as health info is considered ‘stealth info’ by users, Google is where people are going to end-up.</span></div>
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Also, with the big pharma companies increasingly open about sharing their clinical data (Ref: <a href="http://vishrasayan.blogspot.in/search/label/Data%20Transparency" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">JnJ tying up with Yale university</a>) with an intention to maximizing the data’s monetization potential, Google may find willing partners in them and thus access to clinical data may not remain a weakness anymore for Calico.</div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Does Google Ventures hold a clue to Google’s health ambitions?</strong></h4>
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Yes, it appears. Google Ventures (GV) portfolio does look representative of the arguments put forth earlier on why Google is into Health? The life science portfolio is populated with companies that have a definite personalized medicine/ health focus --à 23andMe (personal genetics); one medical group (personal medicine); foundation medicine (cancer diagnostics, genomics analysis); DNANexus (cloud based DNA sequencing); Flatiron health (Onco data platform); Predilytics (advanced healthcare analytics); Transcriptic (next generation lab automation); SynapDX (blood diagnostics); Rani Therapeutics (oral large molecule biotherapeutics); Doctors on Demand; AdiMAb (Yeast based antibody discovery platform). Other than life Sciences, GVs investment into upstart companies leveraging Hadoop for healthcare data management also is relevant to the personalized medicine, E.g. Cloudera; Clearstorydata etc.</div>
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As the trends indicate, it is imminent Google Ventures will start investing into companies working on wearable/ injectable health devices, such as the one by Proteus and obtain a stake in the high value vital body data domain? But once cannot ignore the fact that GV is absent from most of the big wearable start-up funding deals in 2014 namely, NanoHealth ($135 million), Alignment Healthcare ($125 million), Proteus ($120 million), MedHOK ($78 million), Lumeris ($71 million), Zenefits ($67 million), and Doximity ($54 million)) – This reluctance is surprising considering Google otherwise appears bullish on health.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; line-height: 23.9999980926514px; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span class="underline" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><b>Update 15 Sep 2014</b></span>: <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Though it isn't linked to Google Ventures, I did miss out including Google's smart contact project for which they have tied-up with Novartis - While at this stage it isn't clear the lens can send up the date to the mobile phone, assuming its on the cards, this could be a cutting edge usage of internet of things in medical devices. Similarly the recent Google acquisition of Lift technologies: while Lift spoon is indeed a amazingly simplistic and utilitarian device that improves basic quality of living for those effected by Parkinson's, I guess the Lift Pulse & Lift Stride technologies are what are going to help Google integrate this company into its digi-health future.</em></div>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Data + User engagement + Alliances + Tailored drugs = Longevity</strong></h4>
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From the above hypothesis & conjectures, <span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">it's safe to infer that Calico would pursue its vision of tackling ageing through its mission to engineer a large-scale, data driven personalized medicine revolution.</span></div>
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The various nuts and bolts that’ll naturally be part of this greater mission could include aspects like; <span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Enabling users to get into the quantified-self mode & leverage this conversion to create a data-set that could be utilized for genetic profiling & drug discovery. </span><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Using the personal charisma of its start-studded team to cobble together alliances with other major pharmaceutical innovator organizations like Abbvie, </span><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">get access to their idle clinical data & maximize the utility of the same by enabling open sourced research & thus create an ecosystem of mutually dependent pharmaceutical innovation clusters.</span></div>
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The leadership at Calico looks well suited for the purpose and their individual strengths in sync with the above vision & mission – Below is a quick peep into what individual value-add they’ll potentially get to the table.</div>
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<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Art Levinson: Innovator, administrator par excellence with a jaw dropping professional pedigree – Unquestionably most useful in getting alliance partners from pharma & technology domains.</span></li>
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Hal V Barron: Knows how stuff works or not in clinic, what pitfalls exist in clinical trial & just how much of it can be predicted genetically – Deep domain knowledge of another lifespan linked disease domain of Cardio Vascular therapeutics.</span></li>
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Botstein: The one who’ll know what to do with big data on genetic ancestries from the likes of 23andMe - Can help put out diagnostic tools (mobility driven; home-use; Molecular diagnostics? Companion diagnostics for personalized medicine)</span></li>
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Cynthia Kenyon: Ageing expert, figuratively speaking the one who can map out a calico cat - The quintessential tea-taster, the screener of potential drugs that act on individual ageing triggers.</span></li>
<li style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.5555562973022px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Robert Cohen: The one who understands the opposite of longevity, programmed cell death nee apoptosis, the devil’s advocate to Cynthia - Understands cancer triggers, and blocks & individual variances in each genetic make-up</span></li>
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<strong style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Is Calico’s “challenge to ageing” the new drug-discovery paradigm?</strong></h4>
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Or is it just a play of words & a smart pitch to the healthcare consumer who hitherto had to make do with rather promise-less solicitations & six-month increases in survival after a year-long therapy?</div>
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Whatever may be intention & the outcome, Calico is sure to change the way healthcare is viewed, pursued henceforth and the health consumers are in for an entirely new & enticing solicitation.</div>
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Exciting times indeed!</div>
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Image courtesy (partly modified) - Wikipedia</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-18990977366524346812014-09-02T18:43:00.000+05:302014-09-02T18:43:01.562+05:30Please forgive me my friend!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<img alt="" class="center" data-loading-tracked="true" src="https://media.licdn.com/mpr/mpr/p/8/005/082/307/008e404.jpg" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; display: block; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; height: auto; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px auto 15px; max-width: 100%; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;" /></div>
<div class="center" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Looking at the omnipresent, persistent conflict all around the world and realizing how mostly banal the typically offered justifications are, I am starting to wonder if we (</span><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">the 'Humanity', if one can still call us that...</em><span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">) are increasingly driven solely by our rights; our entitlements; our privileges; our contributions; our generosity; our (perceived?) sacrifices; our value-addition etc and have all but eliminated through disuse, the need to stop once in a while and mull over our not-so-positive impact on others around us & do a little something about it.</span></div>
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Even as I am ashamed that I haven't ever heard of this till today, I am also happy that I have finally stumbled upon this symbolic yet undeniably noble concept of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micchami_Dukkadam" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #7b539d; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Micchami Dukkadam</a>, the annual ritual of seeking forgiveness followed by the Jain community.</div>
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We perhaps went through a better part of the year mouthing the mandatory go-to-hell's, damn-you's, F/S-you's & an occasional thank you - For a day let's set aside our ego & entitlement and say;</div>
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<div class="center" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin-bottom: 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">MICCHAMI DUKKADAM - If ever I have offended you in thought, word or deed, even if unknowingly, I seek your forgiveness today</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-36826354718699003502014-08-11T15:52:00.001+05:302014-08-11T17:44:33.798+05:30Missiles are the new Mines<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="http://en.ria.ru/images/19107/78/191077812.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://en.ria.ru/images/19107/78/191077812.jpg" height="226" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Even as speculation is ripe on the WWW on whether it is the pro-Russian separatists BUK anti-aircraft missile OR the Ukrainian Air force air-to-air missile that felled it, it can't be denied for a fact that the actual on-the-ground MH17 crash investigation is getting inexplicably slower & rather covert lately.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Either which way, one has to but agree with Dr. Brahma Chellaney when he says in his recent article <a href="http://asia.nikkei.com/magazine/20140724-7-Eleven-s-regional-numbers-game/Politics-Economy/Brahma-Chellaney-To-prevent-another-MH17-examine-root-causes" target="_blank">"To prevent another MH17, examine root causes"</a> that the most critical aspect to be addressed in light of this tragedy is effectively barring/ preventing countries from transferring SAMs to non-state actors.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">While inter-state relations, arms-control isn't generally what I write on, a specific aspect in the above article prompted me to share my opinion. It's about the US administration apparently considering building-in a remote
kill-switch in the sophisticated TOW anti-tank missiles being provided to the 'moderate jihadists' in Syria with a noble intention of ensuring these missiles aren't usable in any other hands &/or for any other sinister purpose (<i>i.e. other than fighting the Assad regime!</i>) - this stuck me as throwing-in yet another deadly uncertainty into the already impossibly volatile cocktail of missile proliferation among non-state groups;</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Below is the comment I posted against the above article;</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Great insight as always Dr. Chellaney! Even if supplier
states indeed wish to NOT let non-state/rogue-states use their SAMs for any
deviant purpose (if there’s any other kind), the plan of ‘building
obsolescence’ into missiles, while sounds sci-fi, comes across as an
ill-conceived strategy since this’d create a supplier base that differentiates
its offering by way of NOT building in obsolescence into its ware – any
incremental risk-mitigation from the innovation would thus be negated by this
newly introduced uncertainty. The trading states probably would be better off
exercising precaution through consensus trade regulation than resorting to
doomsday preparedness features as these.</span></blockquote>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-23391318527544471532014-08-08T14:24:00.000+05:302014-08-11T17:37:44.506+05:30Cloudsciencing [sic]<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="http://media.dods.co.uk/sites/media.dods.co.uk/files/image/Frontline%20NHS%20Hospital%20Laboratory%20Worker.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://media.dods.co.uk/sites/media.dods.co.uk/files/image/Frontline%20NHS%20Hospital%20Laboratory%20Worker.jpg" /></a></div>
<span style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A potential game-changer in contract research services domain & I’m talking about the latest concept that <re code=""> calls “<a href="http://recode.net/2014/06/30/founders-fund-backs-a-robotic-lab-that-puts-science-in-the-cloud/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; color: #7b539d; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Putting Science in the Cloud</a>” in its intro of <a href="http://www.emeraldcloudlab.com/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; color: #7b539d; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Emerald Cloud Laboratory</a>, essentially what looks like an idle infrastructure monetization initiative of the 'stealth start-up', Emerald Therapeutics.</re></span></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; line-height: 20px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Pun apart, if indeed this turns out like it’s promised, a scientist in any part of the world will be able to simultaneously prescribe & iterate-on (with the robotic handlers) the experiments that she/he outsourced. This in turn will make it easy for more drug discovery start-ups to emerge (including some garage innovators too..) & pursue their dreams in a quicker, cheaper & more efficient way (~ <em style="border: 0px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">the likes of <a href="https://dnanexus.com/" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; color: #7b539d; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">DNAnexus</a> claim that as scale emerges, it’s possible that a whole human genome can be sequenced for a mere $1000!)</em></span></span></div>
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<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; line-height: 20px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The above scenario also implies that scale is a possibility & efficiency at scale an absolute need for any player in this emerging domain.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">With only <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_in_time_(business)" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; color: #7b539d; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">JIT</a> availability of both laboratory & equipment consumables as a probable potential 'scale-limiting' bottleneck, I won't be surprised if the domain of cloud contract laboratory services (</span><em style="border: 0px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">I wouldn’t yet call this research..</em><span style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">) is quickly populated & dominated by the likes of <a href="https://www.lifetechnologies.com/in/en/home.html" rel="nofollow" style="border: 0px; color: #7b539d; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Life Technologies</a>, a process likely starting with acquisition of buyer organizations by these technology platform & consumable behemoths.</span></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; line-height: 20px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">An exciting prospect surely for a scientist currently hyperventilating while awaiting the outcome of an outsourced experiment.</span></span></div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-31104080244182130612014-07-03T12:11:00.000+05:302014-07-03T12:27:50.073+05:30Take me in, dammit! - a gripe & a request<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXSmdFAupXhlrn6m7-Q7joUrFiww9jz58CczSSTRC3mZXGIn5bSGA3FmF0ORaV7Q0MFtcZDXA8oIdxLlD1AA5wP1hedzlxcUfRiFKxUuu-UQe0kmpsEbs8jNy2TnJ3Qu6VCGRK3cI0Zhpk/s1600/inafluxer+logo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXSmdFAupXhlrn6m7-Q7joUrFiww9jz58CczSSTRC3mZXGIn5bSGA3FmF0ORaV7Q0MFtcZDXA8oIdxLlD1AA5wP1hedzlxcUfRiFKxUuu-UQe0kmpsEbs8jNy2TnJ3Qu6VCGRK3cI0Zhpk/s1600/inafluxer+logo.jpg" height="51" width="200" /></a></div>
<span style="border: 0px; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">For the lack of any better term, I christen myself an </span><strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">in</strong><strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">afluxer, </strong><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">to mean </span><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">a nouveau Linkedin author who’s dying to be an </span><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">influencer</span><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> but loathe to admit it! (or not..)</span><br />
<span style="border: 0px; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: 15.555556297302246px;">Right from the day I have been given the privilege of publishing on LI (</span><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">no email, just stumbled upon it..</em><span style="font-size: 15.555556297302246px;">) & I grabbed it greedily, I’ve been trying to make sense of what exactly it takes to get the inafluxer articles ‘featured’ on relevant channels.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; line-height: 20px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">While I couldn't identify any rationale yet, I observed a probable trend wherein LI;</span></div>
<ul style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; line-height: 20px; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 1em 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 3em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Identifies profiles that could be potential churners of reasonable quality posts on largely generic/ popular issues & ones that could beget a loyal following</span></li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Invites them to publish on LI with a personalized email; ensure their initial posts get huge viewership, build a quick following & thus compel the new writers to get regular with posts – a clever no-cost approach to develop quality content by utilizing the inherent need of smart, opinionated & communicative individuals to be heard and importantly, to be recognized.</span></li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Essentially, this appears to me as an "Influencer Seeding Program", assuming that a lot of the current stock of Influencers will soon encounter a writer’s block if not a cramp.</span></li>
</ul>
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I could be dead-wrong in my hypothesis, but a chap who writes on pharma venture capital, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">while not even being a VC</em>, doesn't fit the bill perhaps.<br />
<br />
bummer...<br />
<br />
<strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">PS</strong>: yelling apart, I am all willing to be used free & fair - Try me LI, I don't tire easy :-)</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; line-height: 20px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<div style="color: #333333;">
<strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Disclaimer</strong>: <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The inafluxer logo is of course fake & has been put together with a harmless & sole intention of enabling this funny (hopefully) rejoinder grab some eyeballs</em></div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.555556297302246px; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></em></div>
<span style="color: #cc0000;"><i>Read this article (& comments) <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20140702082640-16107339-take-me-in-dammit-a-gripe-a-request?trk=prof-post" target="_blank">also</a> on Linkedin</i></span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-68606929100379439112014-06-21T18:33:00.000+05:302014-06-21T18:38:40.058+05:30The next Facebook may not be found online after all<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfEJoA9wMInG6uJwixKRQduJLC_CUy1wGHUWaBouLQQkQSS-iIWGO6laFHzlzZFg8XbdeAH-0UXzNpwxABE6nKzlxUKI360EXeW49aNwyzwrKBgD-5YxAvrby1Xem_f5e5qIm5bLEIASbs/s1600/Newsweek.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfEJoA9wMInG6uJwixKRQduJLC_CUy1wGHUWaBouLQQkQSS-iIWGO6laFHzlzZFg8XbdeAH-0UXzNpwxABE6nKzlxUKI360EXeW49aNwyzwrKBgD-5YxAvrby1Xem_f5e5qIm5bLEIASbs/s1600/Newsweek.jpg" height="320" width="240" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It’s not very often one comes across an article, a cover
story at that, in <a href="http://www.newsweek.com/2014/06/13/how-greylock-partners-finds-next-facebook-253329.html">Newsweek</a>
on the start-up scene & VCs – So there was no which way I could have let-up
an opportunity to read through, read in between the lines, postulate,
extrapolate and generally make my own merry conclusions on stuff the article
never intended to dwell on - </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Call me extreme, that’s okay – like the partners
at Greylock, I don’t back down easily either :-)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It isn’t perhaps
about trying to find/ fund the next Facebook at Greylock</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">While the title has enough oomph to grab eye-balls, it could
be fundamentally misleading. A quick look at the recent investments (mentioned
within the article) of Greylock partners shows it is bullish on startups that are
waltzing back into the realm of real-life albeit through cyber gateways – i.e. ones
that have built revenue models on O2O commerce platforms; think <a href="https://www.airbnb.com/">Airbnb</a>;
<a href="http://www.coupons.com/">Coupons</a>; <a href="https://www.onekingslane.com/">OneKingsLane</a>; <a href="http://shopkick.com/">Shopkick</a> (all Reid Hoffman investments..); <a href="http://www.sprig.com/">Sprig</a>; (Simon Rothman) – Though
it’s just one subset of investments primarily by one partner, the sheer
millions pumped in indicate there’s a lot of enthusiasm at Greylock on O2O
commerce.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Just may be David Sze should display a real apple (besides
Apple Newton & Apple iPhone) in his timeline collection of technologies – a
sweet reminder that any technology’s ultimate potential lies offline<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Incubate a potential acquisition? –
Sounds like a nice strategy or is it?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It is perhaps a strategy/ wish to utilize the (insider) knowledge
of a current investee companies that are avid deal-hunters themselves by way of
incubating a few custom designed startups & facilitating (evetually) their acquisitions by the aforesaid companies – Consider the investments in <a href="https://nextdoor.com/">Nextdoor</a>,
<a href="https://path.com/">Path</a>, <a href="http://jelly.co/">Jelly</a>, <a href="https://medium.com/">Medium</a>, <a href="http://www.pandora.com/">Pandora</a>
(all David Sze investments..) & the likelihood of these companies getting
acquired by either Facebook or Linkedin at some point of time.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Startup scene in USA
is raining <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asok_(Dilbert)">Asoks</a>* – and
they’ve been raking in some moolah, finally<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The article starts with Gagan Biyani (Sprig), dwells on
Aneel Bhusri (Greylock) and mentions the likes of Nirav Tolia (Nextdoor) – not
an inconsequential acknowledgement of the increasing presence of Indians in the
American entrepreneurial scene. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<i><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: xx-small;">*’<b>Asok’</b> is used in the context of any
techie of Indian origin rather than just the IITians.</span></span></i></div>
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</div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">A final dig I can’t help – The article by Katrina Brooker is
far superior to anything related I’ve come across in HBR magazine till date.</span></div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-5520383692765453092014-05-23T15:27:00.000+05:302014-05-23T15:34:53.844+05:30What if one happens to be possessed of a heart that can't be trusted? - a book review that isn't one<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Just finished reading <span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #2c2c2c;">“</span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0316055433/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0316055433&linkCode=as2&tag=washpost-opinions-20"><span style="background: white; color: #005b88; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">The
Goldfinch</span></a><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #2c2c2c;">”, a</span> book by Donna Tartt that recently won the <span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #2c2c2c;">Pulitzer
prize in fiction for 2014. While I enjoyed my journey through the <i>at-times-agonizingly-long</i> story, what's lingering
on in my mind at the end of it all is a fascination for the painting itself,
that little masterpiece by Fabritius, the theme of & inspiration behind the
book.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #2c2c2c;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The painting’s composition as intended by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carel_Fabritius" target="_blank">Carel Fabritius</a> and/ or as inferred by the viewer seemingly evoked emotions of varied
hues within the author and articulated through the protagonist, emotions
ranging from feeling of angst, identifying with the chained but resolute bird; an
overwhelming urge to free the creature from its misery and thus a symbolic
effort at deliverance of a shackled self and finally a submission to the
status quo, a realization that you cannot choose the being you want to be…. More than anywhere else where there's a more direct reference to the painting, I feel the text quoted below is where the author most eloquently delves into the existential angst as represented by the chained bird;<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #2c2c2c;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<a href="http://www.artcyclopedia.org/art/carel-fabritius-goldfinch.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.artcyclopedia.org/art/carel-fabritius-goldfinch.jpg" height="400" width="270" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #999999;"><i><span style="font-family: georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;">"A great sorrow, and one that I am only beginning to understand: we don't get to choose our own hearts. We can't make ourselves want what's good for us or what's good for other people. We don't get to choose the people we are.</span><br style="font-family: georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;" /><br style="font-family: georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;" /><span style="font-family: georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;">Because--isn't it drilled into us constantly, from childhood on, an unquestioned platitude in the culture--? From William Blake to Lady Gaga, from Rousseau to Rumi to Tosca to Mister Rogers, it's a curiously uniform message, accepted from high to low: when in doubt, what to do? How do we know what's right for us? Every shrink, every career counselor, every Disney princess knows the answer: "Be yourself." "Follow your heart."</span><br style="font-family: georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;" /><br style="font-family: georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;" /><span style="font-family: georgia, serif; line-height: 18px;">Only here's what I really, really want someone to explain to me. What if one happens to be possessed of a heart that can't be trusted--? What if the heart, for its own unfathomable reasons, leads one willfully and in a cloud of unspeakable radiance away from health, domesticity, civic responsibility and strong social connections and all the blandly-held common virtues and instead straight toward a beautiful flare of ruin, self-immolation, disaster?...If your deepest self is singing and coaxing you straight toward the bonfire, is it better to turn away? Stop your ears with wax? Ignore all the perverse glory your heart is screaming at you? Set yourself on the course that will lead you dutifully towards the norm, reasonable hours and regular medical check-ups, stable relationships and steady career advancement the New York Times and brunch on Sunday, all with the promise of being somehow a better person? Or...is it better to throw yourself head first and laughing into the holy rage calling your name?” </span></i></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #2c2c2c;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #2c2c2c; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">When I look at the painting, my first impulse
is to agonize over its chained status, it's limited boundaries & it's still stoical disposition in such a dismal state. The subsequent thought is if
whether the bird even if unchained would challenge its boundaries, having never
ever experienced a free life & but then a sliver of hope emerges that a free-will can never be chained. Do I associate myself with any, all of these… probably
yes, probably no… I guess the given context; the prevailing mental-state determines the
feelings and association with self.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #2c2c2c;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Look long & hard enough; this living bird could enliven your brain.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">And yes, get the book! It’s for keeps.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-24011662733539166222014-05-18T23:28:00.000+05:302014-05-19T18:09:48.310+05:30An open letter to the Indian Prime Minister-designate<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Dear Mr. Modi,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Heartiest congratulations on receiving
a clear and emphatic mandate from the people across India!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I always believed great
leadership is what India needs at the current juncture and in your relatively
successful demonstration of a development based governance model in Gujarat and
in your super-effective execution of the poll blitzkrieg unleashed by BJP, I see
a definite promise of this leadership need getting fulfilled.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCKF9cqzAO6AOFIkRkZ_FAztCsx2qk4YSISMO-DkFITp_GijLE8P-lN9NdqCZOnEhcH5wenEFkyHoSjhQHFfNOxImDk_b-en6kfyvVocYuU1fNknaH2bDWfMmQ0TAZ6JFzBjCHUczrW-2n/s1600/DSC_0840_1~2~2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCKF9cqzAO6AOFIkRkZ_FAztCsx2qk4YSISMO-DkFITp_GijLE8P-lN9NdqCZOnEhcH5wenEFkyHoSjhQHFfNOxImDk_b-en6kfyvVocYuU1fNknaH2bDWfMmQ0TAZ6JFzBjCHUczrW-2n/s1600/DSC_0840_1~2~2.jpg" height="200" width="160" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Cynicism however being the
hallmark of an oft-let-down individual/ population, I am a tad cynical despite
nurturing a predominant hope of seeing a promise materialize. Upon
introspection, I realize that my current bout of cynicism has been triggered by
what I repeatedly hear about this verdict of Indian population being a mandate
against corruption; a mandate for a long overdue Indian-spring, no less &
finally a mandate for development. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Mandate for development? Probably
yes. But is it against corruption & pro-clean governance too? The cynic in
me doesn’t agree….<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I’m cynical largely since a small
but a <a href="http://eciresults.nic.in/">startling fact</a> I’ve stumbled upon
pretty much trashes the claim of this election being a mandate against
corruption; the fact being that AAP that contested on a national scale on an
anti-corruption platform manages a mere 2% vote share and trails behind the
2.5% of an upstart regional party that symbolizes everything corrupt in Indian
polity. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Even if I discount this as owing
to the tell-tale impact of an escapist-legacy that AAP couldn’t shrug-off, this
for sure underscores the fact that corruption wasn’t the top-of-the-mind issue
for the average Indian citizen headed for the polling booth & there was
every sign out there to say that money flowed like water in this general
election and a significant proportion of the voting junta had had a field time letting
one party out-bid the other.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I am cynical also because in the
revamped scheme of things within your party, the past blemished have sauntered
back right-in and have been duly resurrected and reinstated honourably, all in
the larger context of coming to power and providing an alternative to the chronically
fatigued dynasty that grappled with corruption at all levels.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Finally, I am cynical because there
is this improvised practical theory gaining ground among the Indian citizens
that corruption isn’t a big issue as long as development happens & within
the narrower realm of visible development.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I absolutely loved it Narendra bhai,
when during the victory speech at Vadodara, you reiterated the importance of inclusiveness
in development. Unlike many liberals who raised an eyebrow on what you didn’t
state explicitly, I indeed understand you meant to include all segments of
population in the development process without malice towards any one in
particular. I know for sure anyone who has come to power on such a unique
mandate, much less you, would waste such an opportunity by indulging in antics
that result in polarization & marginalization of a specific segment. Only, I’m
worried that all this inferred disengagement between development &
corruption in the Indian psyche shouldn’t end up making inclusion merely a term
to denote equitable sharing of spoils among a corrupt polity and a corruptible
populace, irrespective of region, community or caste.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Notwithstanding the oft-employed reproach
that Indian growth rate over the past few years has been way above the rate of
most advanced countries’, I know you understand well that we aren’t exactly
comparing apples to apples here & in reality India lags behind these nations
in infrastructure and civic amenities by a decade at the least. I trust that
you fully realize that development at this scale isn’t possible merely by launching
or going after symbolic, disjointed developmental initiatives that neither impact
the quality of life nor help improve the perception of an ever-doubting
international community on India’s capability to operate as a transparent &
corruption-free business nation.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Cynicism apart, I am thrilled by
the fact that the clear mandate will help you avoid the oh-so-typical arm-twisting,
blackmailing politics of the coalition/ alliance governments and this in-turn
will allow you to focus on executing your vision that much more smoothly and without
hindrance. Given this and given your own leadership potential this is the
closest, I suspect, India would ever get to an Indian spring.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I’m positive Mr. Prime Minister-Designate
that you’ll seize this moment to redefine the paradigm & give me a reason
or a score to feel more proud of being an Indian wherever I go.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I wish you, your cabinet and all Indian
citizens the very best in the days to come!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Acchey din…, bas ab aane hee
chaahiye!!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Respectfully yours,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A fellow Indian</span></span></div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-10840822596906433192014-04-24T15:58:00.000+05:302014-04-24T16:07:54.255+05:30Being a CVC - A perspective on Novartis Venture Fund's investment (& exit) strategy <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">If anything, the <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/04/23/us-novartis-gsk-assetswaps-idUSBREA3M1KX20140423" target="_blank">recent news of Novartis</a> agreeing to sell
its vaccine & veterinary businesses while simultaneously acquiring oncology
assets from GSK consolidates my earlier view/ observation that the investment
philosophy of a corporate’s venture arm seldom reflects the strategic goals
pursued by the corporation itself - effectively meaning that there’s hardly any
difference between a CVC and a VC as far as the ‘intention behind the
investment’ goes – the intent in this context being a tangible ROI.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">There is albeit a definitive difference between a CVC &
VC as far as the ‘intelligence behind the investment’ goes – the intelligence
in this context being the insider-edge the CVC enjoys when it comes to
identifying, qualifying and investing in a promising enterprise, an edge seemingly
acknowledged by the VC & angel community given the sheer number of
fundraising rounds led by the likes of Google, Intel & Novartis compared to
than those led by non-CVC brave-hearts – This propensity of the investing junta
to look up to the CVCs to take lead is demonstrated once again by the quantum
of followers the likes of Kevin Rose (Google Ventures) & Jerry Yang (Yahoo)
command on AngelList, the new age pit-stop of investors & enterprises
alike.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I realize though that compared to the regular VC, an average
CVC can afford to be lot more adventurous/ less-conservative since the LP,
which is the corporate itself, has a far less looming presence given the non-financial
nature of the corporation. This context
of less-intense LP scrutiny thus affords a CVC greater liberty & hence
their investment strategy may not be that de-risked after all & this isn’t
saying anything.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">With no prejudice whatsoever on the relative merits of a CVC
vis-à-vis a VC & going merely by the data, I think Novartis Venture Funds
(NVF) is what one could refer as the ‘Google Ventures of pharmaceutical
innovation’, a yard-stick, if not a bench-mark other VCs could use within the
pharmaceutical domain. With this premise, I went about analyzing the NVF’s investments
data, of both current & exited portfolio, the key takeaways of which I have
discussed below;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">DUALITY OF VISION<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A quick comparison of NVF
investment focus & Novartis business focus;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<o:p><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQYu0L9-OCYtgDro7dD3uTmMrbgf0s0sUgtWzLw1YKY5wHMudfzJx7LoSzhO_CpRiwiSzrbpLuerJVHtvHzZjMDuhTEuee60AHtS4rH6KXUOwd4VO-0uxgDbqHKlI5_P_7AKhI-agzcAUu/s1600/Picture6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQYu0L9-OCYtgDro7dD3uTmMrbgf0s0sUgtWzLw1YKY5wHMudfzJx7LoSzhO_CpRiwiSzrbpLuerJVHtvHzZjMDuhTEuee60AHtS4rH6KXUOwd4VO-0uxgDbqHKlI5_P_7AKhI-agzcAUu/s1600/Picture6.jpg" height="190" width="320" /></span></a></div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrZ3A2kyvK0y6sr4PNKskI-59NnJSL5JruVsqMZuDRZks1jeK0So4yCHI-xbBIjPWK4gK7HUbllHIZSVDtaSrWO-P6ylCdbToIB7hHovm4k3ISzkqsqN2yV9Zs0bp53kV4CCdADvn7CChB/s1600/Picture7.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrZ3A2kyvK0y6sr4PNKskI-59NnJSL5JruVsqMZuDRZks1jeK0So4yCHI-xbBIjPWK4gK7HUbllHIZSVDtaSrWO-P6ylCdbToIB7hHovm4k3ISzkqsqN2yV9Zs0bp53kV4CCdADvn7CChB/s1600/Picture7.jpg" height="190" width="320" /></span></a></div>
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<o:p><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></o:p><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">INVEST SMALL – EXIST FAST<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">When it comes to making small molecule therapeutics work
both as a business strategy & investment focus, few seem to be able to bend
it like Novartis. Despite Small molecule therapeutics being a mere 20% of the total
invested value, this segment is a star performer at 63% when it comes to exits.
This performance is consistent in both the major exit types of IPO (69%) and
Acquisition (59%) – the relatively higher contribution of IPO as an exit also seems
to suggest that the chances of an IPO are higher for an enterprise developing small
molecules & that going public isn’t an easy game for a company developing
biologicals.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgb16HDl_t2iJlCYKQxLh7l4obBgw1VNntuE-VEdcZWBe5R4FR1U7LW-8K2dYUcAnzYID4zZxEShl2cyuMJcsnq7JMUhwBFobPtcSKUnlHnRWcx56uRTBnh0h2LQcoQXIruHoW0MnDKX7I3/s1600/Picture3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgb16HDl_t2iJlCYKQxLh7l4obBgw1VNntuE-VEdcZWBe5R4FR1U7LW-8K2dYUcAnzYID4zZxEShl2cyuMJcsnq7JMUhwBFobPtcSKUnlHnRWcx56uRTBnh0h2LQcoQXIruHoW0MnDKX7I3/s1600/Picture3.jpg" height="238" width="400" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">No wonder then that the current portfolio of NVF once again
is dominated by enterprises pursuing small <i><span style="line-height: 115%;">molecule
therapeutic</span></i> dreams (53%). However the marginally higher percentage share
of biologic therapeutics in the current investments indicates NVF is cautiously
optimistic about these <a href="http://vishrasayan.blogspot.in/2013/11/les-propheties-pharmaceuticale.html" target="_blank">living herbs!</a> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEt_SlTa3EYyA2i1Arfdb7cwq-iEsHvO7rS8fWk3SdhKdftQXvNqkCdkN1XZ0ROLVBAnTYbJKyuMHDZ0ZqoVF5crStGaXzurI2ZSy3Vp5qaCdr3YvfJpAapO6A74uXwnpC1graEsAc-BYB/s1600/Picture10.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEt_SlTa3EYyA2i1Arfdb7cwq-iEsHvO7rS8fWk3SdhKdftQXvNqkCdkN1XZ0ROLVBAnTYbJKyuMHDZ0ZqoVF5crStGaXzurI2ZSy3Vp5qaCdr3YvfJpAapO6A74uXwnpC1graEsAc-BYB/s1600/Picture10.jpg" height="275" width="400" /></span></a></div>
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<o:p><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">ATTITUDE, IT’S THERAPEUTIC<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The NVF investment spread across therapeutics is nothing counter
intuitive & is expectedly skewed towards oncology. What’s interesting is
the sentiment/ attitude driving these investments in different disease segments.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKDx7UL0QeONb3f6CU7pBwqdI_1BCzOw7LCIWJFJt72lbGkHTvwjgrr4l-UBdGi4TVX8hC7LYrS28UHml6u7rL2j7LJ3s8OV7Ucl-w96ADPskAj1XPOuNzm7DSvUbGLkdSBWp8gAaix92x/s1600/Picture1.png.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKDx7UL0QeONb3f6CU7pBwqdI_1BCzOw7LCIWJFJt72lbGkHTvwjgrr4l-UBdGi4TVX8hC7LYrS28UHml6u7rL2j7LJ3s8OV7Ucl-w96ADPskAj1XPOuNzm7DSvUbGLkdSBWp8gAaix92x/s1600/Picture1.png.jpg" height="305" width="400" /></span></a></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Looking at the interplay of number v/s value of investments,
NVF’s investor attitude can be summarised as follows for a few key segments;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Oncology --> Casting the net far & wide<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Hematology --> Betting
high<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Cardiology --> Upping
the stakes<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Allergy --> Risking it big <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Infection --> Seeding a promise<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">EXIT THROUGH ACQUISITION
THAN IPO<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">With companies having FIC assets making up 60% of the total current
investments & since FIC assets are typically more attractive acquisition
targets, it can be surmised that NVF is not counting on IPO as the primary exit
path.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPBJpFb-6ve2cC_aJrAKgxzMOWPDpTYwJ7PaV0bpMz7jQQap43WJWkYaA995xt_p3oaULkFgg0dXJj2upRaXQsgIqOfgvpT4FSYH597hAjaaakrtfBYWKbaHbGUeCpmLjQSN_XSuSunjBm/s1600/Picture4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPBJpFb-6ve2cC_aJrAKgxzMOWPDpTYwJ7PaV0bpMz7jQQap43WJWkYaA995xt_p3oaULkFgg0dXJj2upRaXQsgIqOfgvpT4FSYH597hAjaaakrtfBYWKbaHbGUeCpmLjQSN_XSuSunjBm/s1600/Picture4.jpg" height="238" width="400" /></span></a></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">BULLISH ON EARLY
& BEARISH ABOUT LATE-PHASE ASSETS<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Perhaps this is more of an alert to enterprises seeking
venture funding than other VCs – the date clearly shows NVFs reluctance to risk
its green-backs on the very volatile PIII assets – this once again underscores
the primal premise that for NVF’s vision is limited to supporting viable
clinical assets and NOT in seeing them through to the market.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4VoyDlbJGDNZXWzWemqEx_SHaz1yR8TCdZI557dH7sI9gn0Yonu76BZQv_oaxEbQfkRrrl6NHuz9BW5LrBKrPkBMA9g9Gbccq-H1gQ96J3wYXtiikhd176Iza5yLVxgLBV6EmgaPLWRpz/s1600/Picture5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4VoyDlbJGDNZXWzWemqEx_SHaz1yR8TCdZI557dH7sI9gn0Yonu76BZQv_oaxEbQfkRrrl6NHuz9BW5LrBKrPkBMA9g9Gbccq-H1gQ96J3wYXtiikhd176Iza5yLVxgLBV6EmgaPLWRpz/s1600/Picture5.jpg" height="400" width="397" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The message hence for the biotech is - knock at the doors of
NVF after your IND is filed & count on their support till end of Phase II & showcase the potential of your clinical asset to get acquired even as it
is still in PI or PII. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">SLOWER, LONGER &
BIGGER – NVF’s NEW MOTTO?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">VC is more a patient fund than earlier & NVF seemingly
realizes that – that’s what the numbers say at least<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<o:p><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgf1IDynLG2png31i81hZOxPGdGzMzZ5zawgNRHs2T8ignchuh9njtOAZDl_lmLscvc7jDhwCGbfsNuEiiqpLulZaG4w9JgXsx4ujepp77r7rEjurEaTvMSJy08Bd-n94MtUoQc59QECEPu/s1600/Picture2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgf1IDynLG2png31i81hZOxPGdGzMzZ5zawgNRHs2T8ignchuh9njtOAZDl_lmLscvc7jDhwCGbfsNuEiiqpLulZaG4w9JgXsx4ujepp77r7rEjurEaTvMSJy08Bd-n94MtUoQc59QECEPu/s1600/Picture2.jpg" height="330" width="400" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Despite the now apparent & clear segregation of objectives
of a corporate & of its venture fund, a CVC seemingly still employs the
insider-edge in making its investment & exit decisions.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Meray Chaaraaney.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-43534090984210268472014-02-28T23:07:00.000+05:302014-02-28T23:13:57.434+05:30Not wanting to sell-off is key to being bought!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="http://get.whotrades.com/u2/photo24CF/20574386171-0/original.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://get.whotrades.com/u2/photo24CF/20574386171-0/original.jpeg" height="216" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">19 billion dollars for a company with one app & 20 million
in revenue is of course a frickin’ big deal - No wonder that everyone from entrepreneurs
to VCs to analysts want to have a go at cracking the code called WhatsApp.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Suvir Sujan in his <a href="http://indianvc.blogspot.in/2014/02/capital-doesnt-build-great-companies.html">latest
blog post</a> broached this quintessential topic & attributes the success
achieved by WhatsApp to its founders keeping disciplined focus on superior
product offering with an eye towards building a profitable and sustainable
business – True, but I wished to be more direct and say an enterprise that
starts with the intention of selling-off will probably never get this kind of
supreme pay-off, my comment on Suvir’s post is as follows; <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">WhatsApp indeed pulled-off a
coup and got this eye-popping valuation. While I agree they keeping the product
no-frills helped in making its adoption viral, I'm not sure it'd have helped
the acquisition costs - after all a 19 billion pay-out would cover any quantum
of unreasonable asset stock-pile (bells & whistles..) </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">In my humble opinion where WhatsApp scored is on how it did
not go after the formulaic 'Built to Sell' strategy and instead adhered to it’s
probable original idea of 'Built to Solve/ Differentiate' - Let's not forget
that most of us got attracted to WhatsApp primarily since it offered what FB
mobile chat denied/ couldn’t assure viz., communication & data privacy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Afterthought:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Communication & data privacy, precisely what I’m edgy
about right now as a WhatsApp user - Will this remain intact when FB eventually attempts to integrate the app with its own & monetize the user-base? If I were Zuckerberg, I’d be worried sick thinking how to prevent the edgy half-a-billion junta from waltzing towards
Snapchat & likes - that would be a real bummer, wouldn't it be?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1459058477751555317.post-45936987359035528712014-02-22T12:50:00.000+05:302014-02-22T12:52:37.881+05:30Isn't securing employee personal information equally important (vis-a-vis' company data) in a BYOD scenario?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="http://www.workplaceprivacyreport.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/162/2013/06/BYOD.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.workplaceprivacyreport.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/162/2013/06/BYOD.jpg" height="200" width="197" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The title of a recent article on W.I.R.E.D Innovation Insights asks "<span style="line-height: 115%;"><a href="http://insights.wired.com/profiles/blogs/how-secure-is-company-information-in-the-hands-of-smartphone#ixzz2tq1LZHYn" target="_blank">How Secure Is Your Company's Information With the Mobile-Carrying Social Employee?</a>" - </span>The apparent one-sidedness of this 'concern' got me thinking that somewhere in all this securing data of employers, the employee's is getting compromised.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Just may be, while designing the data-security solutions the product
companies should simultaneously address another question "<b>How secure is
the Mobile-Carrying Social Employee's Personal Information with the
Company?</b>" - Not just for the heck of it, but so as to come-up with a
compliance boosting mutual-data security feature! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Below is the comment I posted against the above article:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">An interesting observation in the second paragraph "The
second thing that worried me was all the data on the phone, the contacts, the
texts and all the account passwords that I had fed into the various
applications and the data within those apps".... this aspect doesn't
however figure in the solution though...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Sure while employers securing their data by way of ‘remote
controlling information even after dissemination’ is probably necessary for
justifiable business reasons, the technologies employed for this purpose must
not breach the fine-line between ‘securing employers corporate data’ &
‘respecting employees social/ personal data' - as safety of personal data is an
equally big concern for the individual in question as suggested by the quoted
text above.</span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">As a social corporate employee I personally
would hate carrying two smartphones if not for anything else, for the sake of
not sacrificing efficiency & convenience. This means my corporate mobile
will have to double up as my personal device too & I suspect I’m with the
majority in this matter. Given this and given the corporate decision makers too
are part of this BYOD environment & since ensuring compliance (by
employees) ideally should be a two-way transaction of trust, I believe
whichever company develops technologies/ products that equally address both the
above aspects will have a sure-shot winner at hand.</span></span></div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05858014104170726901noreply@blogger.com0