Mind Over Matter

Celestial Dollars

2008-06-06T20:24:00.004-04:00

An ironic title to this post given the number the oil prices, job numbers did today bringing the dollar and the stock market down with them. Morgan Stanley and others say $150 per barrel is not far away and in fact $200 isn't either. It is funny how there are still suckers for the increased demand story - that India and China have added to the global demand and so the oil prices are rising and that millions of poor people are now eating a second meal and so the food prices are rising. When the commodities do a belly up soon, I want to hear what these pundits will have to say. So far middle class people bore the brunt while hedge funds find a way to make the rich people richer. I am so eagerly waiting for the day when there is no place to hide for these fund managers. In that sense, I welcome the $200 per barrel day with open arms so that it can then do a nose dive right after.

And yeah what about the celestial dollar? Well I bought a cup of coffee at this cute little coffee shop today where they had a sign that read "Expect better service than Purple Dinosaur and Celestial Dollars." Funny, given Starbucks is not showing any signs of revival even after their revamped strategy that includes a stolen line (Life happens over coffee? Sounds a lot like "A lot can happen over coffee" tag line of Cafe Coffee Day in India) and a line of gourmet chocolates.

Beer Tax Holiday

2008-05-16T13:43:00.003-04:00

How about that huh? Honestly speaking - beer is indeed a very important part of American life - almost as important as gasoline. So why not a beer tax holiday? I heard this funny piece on NPR last evening, enjoy:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=90483748

Jokes aside, I saw this documentary of the truly evil and inhuman side of the ethanol story on Bloomberg yesterday. I couldn't find the video link but here is a link to the story -
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/marketsmag/mm_1107_story3.html

So if alternate energy sources are a threat to the oil companies, I guess the way to thwart it is to promote another liquid that can be added to gas so that you can sell more gas by falsely making consumers feel more environmentally responsible - never mind the human toll it takes in Brazil and the inflationary pressures it causes at home!

If you really want to promote alcohol (ethanol), add it to beer and just make it cheaper!

Rice Price Rise

2008-05-10T12:23:00.009-04:00

Rice prices have almost doubled in the last three or four months and are expected to go further up. Between gas, rice, wheat and some of the other essentials, the inflation for those at the lower end of of the economic sprectrum is much higher than for those at the higher end. Since inflation is just another form of tax, when the "Bushies" say they are for lower taxes, it just makes no sense. In fact, as much as some people dismiss the role of corn-ethanol in the current inflation, the policy to subsidize corn growers in the US is the most visible culprit in the whole affair. Here is a link that explains the rice shortage in a very easy to understand Q and A format.
http://www.businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/apr2008/gb20080428_894449.htm
Hedgefund Speculation >> Oil Prices Soar>> Corn Ethanol Subsidies >> Less Wheat >> Wheat Prices Rise >> Rice Substitution >> Rice Export Restrictions >> Rice Prices Rise!

Any doubts on what the next bubble to burst will be? I am vengefully waiting for that day. And I also hope one of these days the governments will learn to keep out.

Of Gyan and Faff

2008-05-03T07:25:00.005-04:00

During my nine months in India last year, I was reintroduced to the "Inglish" words like funda (and its variations like hi-funda, fundae, fundu) and faff (arguably UK slang) and a host of other words from the many vernaculars that are inserted into conversational English as if they always belonged like "acha," "chalo," "gyan" etc. If Greek and Latin provided much of the input to modern English, the influence of many other languages from around the world over the last few hundred years made English to be called the "borrowing language." As India continues to grow its influence in the world in every field, so also it will on the language that has been in India longer than it has been in the Unites States. The purists may cringe and lament but English will not stop evolving and you only have to look at any decent account of history of the English language to realize that it is a completely different language compared to just five hundred years ago. Follow these links for some interesting reading.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/4be29966-17db-11dd-b98a-0000779fd2ac.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_English_language

Rebate Checks - They Will Vanish Into Thin Gas!

2008-04-29T19:24:00.011-04:00

The one wonderful aspect of learning the basics of economics is that there is so much humor that the politicians continually provide us when they try to describe why economy is doing so badly and what should be done to fix the problem. Today senators McCain and Clinton reiterated why the gas tax holiday should be provided during the peak summer season while President Bush lambasted congress for stalling on the drilling in the ANWR and the proposed increases in refining capacity. It is amazing how the greedy hedge fund managers have brought on both the credit (due to sub-prime) and gas price crises and our illustrious politicians ignore the root cause and try to solve multi trillion dollar problems with band aids of political pandering. Here are two links from the public radio that give you the real economics of the gas price problem.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/news/2008/04/economists_gas_tax_holiday_no.html http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/04/29/bush_moon_q/

The bottom line - both the rebate checks that we will all receive, and the gas tax holiday - will most likely benefit the gas companies and the speculators of petroleum prices.

A New Beginning

2008-04-05T10:49:00.007-04:00

For the 420 odd students of the Class of 2008 at the Indian School of Business, today marks the end of a fruitful journey to get to a new and exciting beginning. I am not there in Hyderabad physically (I graduate a month or so later because of my exchange to Darden) but my thoughts are with the classmates for who an eventful and successful year came to an end officially as they donned their graduation gowns and received their diplomas. As I write this most of them are packing their stuff to leave the campus - some right away after the graduation ceremony and some others who will have one more bash before they head out. Most of them are getting terribly emotional and leaving with a heavy heart; I sure am missing all the action and the chance to say Good Bye. All the very best Class of '08 - hopefully our paths will cross more than once in the years to come!

For those that might chance on my blog and do not know much about the Indian School of Business (ISB), I encourage you to look up the website and Google to get to know more about this institution that is fast becoming the gold standard for business management education in India. Ranked 20th by Financial Times globally ahead of such renowned US business schools such as Kellogg of NWU, Ross of Michigan, Darden of UVa, and Fuqua of Duke, not to mention a host of other well known global schools, ISB has achieved in six years what most business schools can only dream of. Whether this ranking was deserved and whether ISB will be able to maintain this ranking and whether it can get on the top 20 lists of the other publications like US News and Business Week are debates that will rage on. But what cannot be denied is that this school is a force to reckon with and it is for ISB to lose from this position of strength. As a soon to be alumnus and someone who has made many friends at ISB, I sincerely hope that the people who make decisions at ISB don't give into pressures to grow fast and instead focus on sustaining the excellence.

This will be my last post on ISB itself but I intend to write a couple of pieces on business school education in general that could be useful for those considering an MBA or those that just got into a program. Go ISB!

Tax Time Blues (and Reds)

2008-04-03T11:22:00.011-04:00

Well I did it. I e-filed my tax returns through Turbotax. I didn't have a job for most of last year since I was in school and yet the amount of tax I paid was almost as much as what I paid the previous year! Someone once famously said that the only two things that are certain are death and taxes. And against the backdrop of the election year in the US and the bitter fight for nomination between Obama and Clinton, I started to think of how the positions and actions of the Democrats and Republicans on taxes and economy in general are so antithetic to what they claim to be their respective core values.

Benny (our Fed chief) and his friends who brokered the JPM-Bear deal were facing some music from the senate banking committee this afternoon and while the democrats were asking why greedy banks shouldn't learn the lesson the hard way, the republicans were congratulating Ben for orchestrating a great rescue through socialism for the rich (this is quickly getting the nick name Bear-Stearns Socialism). Clinton presided over the smallest government in the recent times while Reagan and the two bushes expanded the government against everything their party's fiscal conservatism stands for.

By the way, I got a political survey phone call yesterday. You could only answer in Yes or No. This is how it went -

Q. Are you planning to vote this November?
A. No (*I cannot yet vote*)
Q. Assuming it is McCain vs. Clinton, would you vote for McCain?
A. No
Q. For Clinton?
A. No
Q. Okay, if the scenario were McCain vs. Obama, would you vote for McCain?
A. No
Q. For Obama?
A. Yes (*well I still cannot vote but I just wanted to see where this will take me*)
Q. Are you pro-life?
A. No (*I was hoping the next question would be Are you pro-choice?*)
Thanks for participating in the survey...

So though I cannot vote, I have unwittingly added to the statistic - percentage of "anti-life" voters who support Obama!

Btw, I was able to claim an extra child credit for my one year old who was born in 2007 but I began to think why couldn't I claim an extra exemption last year when my wife was pregnant... all this debate over when life starts and no exemption for a foetus?

Does Green Mean Environmentally Friendly?

2008-04-02T11:15:00.002-04:00

The weather in Tampa at this time of the year is awesome. Low 70's during the day and hardly needing air conditioning in the nights and with spring bringing out the palette of greens in the parks and in the yards, this is easily the best time to visit Florida. My front yard was an exception to the all pervading greenery with dead grass infested with weeds - but not anymore. A couple of days of back-breaking resodding later, my yard looks fine. Not fantastic, just fine. Fine enough to distract the HOA in our deed-restricted community away from my lawn and to some other infractions elsewhere. When I was toiling away resodding, I was reminded of an article I read somewhere that the grass in people's yards is the largest crop in the United States. Not corn, not wheat and certainly not potatoes - it is grass! Imagine the billions of gallons of water, fertilizer, pesticide, and most importantly millions of acres of land that is consumed by this crop that at best serves an aesthetic need and at worst gives backaches to homeowners like me for no reason while being one of the worst crimes against environment.

Between Al Gore style alarmist views on what is happening to the climate and those of people that still dispute climate change (apparently a subtler way of saying global warming) as pure fiction, most people including educated people with good intentions are confused as to what they can do to protect the environment and save it for the future generations. Who is more environmentally friendly - one who drives a Prius to the park everyday so she could jog for a few miles, or one that rides an SUV but recycles, or one that rides a bicycle and drinks the water from the tap? One who installs CFL's in all light fixtures in the sprawling home with jumbo appliances but turns on every light in the home for 4 hours each evening or one who lives in a 600 sft home and has all small dorm sized appliances? I don't have any words of wisdom on this topic because I feel terribly confused but I can tell you that if doing anything that is environmentally unfriendly costs someone more money then one would choose the path that would save money. Sure driving an SUV costs more money and so does drinking bottled water. But it is nearly not expensive enough for many people to quit either.

Driving Rules

2007-08-16T14:09:00.000-04:00

Over the last 4 months, my chief mode of transportation has been the auto-rickshaw. The topic of driving a car comes up from time to time and I tell people that I don't have the confidence that I will be able to drive a car in India (well make that Hyderabad) without getting into an accident. Over time I have had people give me all kinds of tips as to how to drive in India. Some of these rules of thumb are as follows:

1. Develop the skill to see all three mirrors all the time. If you think you cannot do this, do not look at any mirrors. The results will mostly be the same.
2. Dings and minor dents are okay. Scooters and bikes will give your car occasional kisses on all sides - don't get upset, take a deep breath and let it be.
3. Always overtake from left side. If you have to overtake from the right side, honk.
4. If you see people crossing the road, do not slow down - they have already paced themselves according to your car speed.
5. If you see animals crossing the road, slow down and stop as necessary! They expect you to pace yourself according to their speed.
6. When the traffic is light, the traffic lights are largely suggestive only.
7. If there is a car in the left lane, assume that the car will make a left turn. Left turn signals are optional.
8. If you ever get into an accident, remember that the guilt is directly proportional to the size of the vehicles in most cases but in some cases it is proportional to the price of the vehicles as well.
9. Always honk. When you ask? Didn't I say always?

Check out this link as well - http://www.boloji.com/humor/025.htm

The Two E's That Will Determine India's Future

2007-07-11T08:15:00.000-04:00

As the coursework has picked up speed at ISB, so also has the frequency with which we have some big names on the campus giving "gyan" filled speeches. Within ten days we had ISB's founding dean Vijay Mahajan, Kellogg's current dean Dipak Jain and NIIT's Chairman Rajendra Pawar visiting us. Prof. Mahajan spoke of the 86% market - basically his spin on the bottom of the pyramid (86% of the people whose per capita GDP is less than $1000), Dipak Jain about how the opportunities present themselves to Indian entrepreneurs not just in India but everywhere around the globe as India gets younger while the rest of the world ages and finally Rajendra Pawar spoke of group entrepreneurship - where a group of four complementary individuals could be more entrepreneurial than they are individually. ISB's entrepreneurship practicum called the PaEV (Planning an Entrepreneurial Venture) is also about to kick off and there is a buzz of ideas and rapid group forming to rally around a business idea by all interested in starting their own business.

As people look for business ideas, my strong belief that you cannot go wrong in India is getting stronger. India lacks almost everything and people here want everything. The products and services are just not keeping up with the consumerism and the business ideas are not keeping up with the willing venture funding. What else can a wannabe entrepreneur ask for? Given a greater than usual probability of new businesses succeeding in the present day Indian setting, there are two E's - in fact let me call them the Big E and the little e that present great opportunities to not only start something new but also contribute to India's future success. The two E's are Education and energy.

NIIT's Pawar spoke of how India's "ordinary graduates" were NIIT's fuel to deliver in the area of IT. The hundreds of thousands of three-year degree (BA, BSc, BCom) holders are the ones left in the dust as the IT revolution carried the engineering graduates to higher ground with it. Most other countries would kill to have so many people reasonably grounded in high school Math, Science and English. These people actually bring a lot more to the table than that. As they find themselves becoming the bottom feeders among the educated, the two E's should help fuel growth opportunities for this neither here nor there educated Indians.

Let us talk about the Big E first. Taking the left behind ordinary graduates as ingredients, just like NIIT did, we can get them trained in many areas other than the IT, call center etc jobs. Lots of small companies need help in all areas of business from marketing, sales, accounting, and specialized functions such as machine maintenance, lab technicians, nurses and on and on. Institutions serving these professions do exist but they don't match the need in terms of quantity or quality. I will publish more posts on these professions and ideas around education in the future. But for now it will suffice to say that this is an area of great potential. As a teaser, here is a small tid-bit - as the US population ages, it is estimated that the acute shortage of registered nurses in the United States will reach 340,000 by the year 2020.

Now coming to the small e. Energy is big business but it just doesn't mean we need to focus only on energy generation - like wind, solar etc. Business ideas about energy generation tend to be grand needing very large investments. However, there are many business opportunities in the supply chain to these energy generation industries as well as in the energy conservation area. Consider this - there is estimated to be $40BB for taking in LED lighting. I recently read an article that an entrepreneur in a small town in Andhra Pradesh has started supplying LED lighting kits to people in Afghanistan. What ingenuity! In the interest of brevity, I will stop here. I will pick up on the two E's in my next post.

UB-Idea Series: The Timeshare Taxi Fleet

2007-06-19T16:15:00.000-04:00

One of the great worries as Indian cities grow and do so in an unplanned way is the access to the automobile increasingly for some and lack thereof for most others. And of course, the pollution and the traffic chaos go hand in hand without saying. Last week I had the misfortune of having to traverse some hundred kilometers in one day from one end of Hyderabad to the other and back and I did this in auto-rickshaw in part and in a car-taxi the rest. Hoping to get some respite from the dust and heat I decided to call the much hyped citi-cab service but somehow I ended up calling a competitor to citi-cab called Call Taxi. The cab arrived almost an hour after I called and to my chagrin, the car, a Maruti Omni, did not have air-conditioning and so for all practical purposes I traveled in an auto-rickshaw.

I know of many people in Hyderabad who own a car but seldom use it. Some of these car owners use the cars to drive their families around during the weekends but some others have the cars but cannot drive them. So they employ either a part-time or a full time driver who himself might live quite a distance from the car-owner's house and therefore will have to use his own transportation to get to the car-owner's house before getting behind the wheel. These drivers are not very reliable and their turnover is very high. Also these not so automobile-savvy car-owners have a hard time taking care of their cars. Between the unreliable drivers, car maintenance and the big monthly payment (EMI), these car-owners sometimes wish there was an easy way. And IMHO, there is one.

I call it the Timeshare Taxi Fleet (kinda sorta like the timeshare resort homes) that will be set up with a two-part tariff. The business idea basically is that many of these people who travel by auto-rickshaw a lot and sometimes use a car-taxi pay a membership fee to own a piece of a taxi fleet. The taxi fleet along with the drivers and all the scheduling etc is managed by the company that will run this business. When the members need to use the taxi they call a number and the taxi will be available for them within half-an-hour. Then the member will pay at a rate similar to what they would pay an auto-rickshaw but for more comfort like nice cars, well maintained interiors, air-conditioning to name a few. An online portal could be used to make any advance reservations including any rentals for multiple days. Between the convenience of having a nice car and a driver in minutes and the lack of all the pains associated with owning a car, this would be a great alternative to buying a car for most people.

Let me illustrate this idea with a few more details. Say a hundred people in Hyderabad are interested in this. Say we wanted to buy ten cars, we would use the membership fee (which is on an amortization schedule and if a member leaves, they will get the remaining value of their membership) and buy ten cars. But when someone actually uses the car, they will have to pay for the car per auto-rickshaw rates. For longer duration uses, there will be discounted half-day, day and weekly rates. These rates, however, will be higher than what you would pay for EMI and driver's services combined to discourage some people hogging the cars too much. There are a lot of logistics that will need to be worked out (including what if everyone wants a car at the same time or if nobody wants a car) but they are beyond the scope of this blog. GPRS, GPS, online portals, route and docking (where the cars will be parked when idle) optimization programs, cell phones etc are some of the few technologies that will be in use in the business model. Over time, many of those that currently have a car will most likely find this much more attractive than owning the car and will switch and there will be many copy-cat services. But the first one to move will have an enormous advantage.

If anyone ends up using this business idea, please let me know as courtesy. There is no obligation whatsoever beyond that. I will be gladly willing to develop the idea further for a business plan.

UB-Idea Series: The Parking Carousel

2007-06-11T16:49:00.000-04:00

Now this is not a new idea. The car parking carousels of all different kinds are common in Japan. Some are more sophisticated than the others but they all operate on the same principle that cars are transported as if by an elevator to a parking space on a spinning carousel to achieve maximum parking density while utilizing vertical space and by eliminating human parking. Given the amount of stress the Indian cities are going through for car parking space among other things, it is again a surprise that some adaptation of the parking carousel concept has not taken off in India. It is likely that this is because of the high capital costs and the potentially very high parking rates that will need to be collected to hasten the return on capital. A good friend of mine who did some preliminary study of these types of systems told me that it would cost around 150 rupees per day in parking charges to cover the cost of the equipment. Given that this is a lot of money in the Indian context, it is imperative that parking carousels are manufactured within India with cheap indigenous designs. Any takers?

UB-Idea Series: The Bloodmobile

2007-06-10T15:01:00.000-04:00

Actually the Bloodmobile idea was a part of an unpublished post from a few weeks ago when I went to a blood donation camp on the ISB campus and was very disheartened with the way it turned out. I then wrote a very acerbic account of what happened that day but decided in the end not to publish it after I realized that most people who had not donated blood outside India actually felt that the blood donation camp was organized very well. But even those that felt everything went well would agree that the blood donation process can be made more efficient and effective with a Bloodmobile.

So this Bloodmobile is basically a bus with a couple of registration desks with the donor databases on the computers, a few very comfortable reclining beds, all the refrigeration required for the blood once drawn and all the food and beverages given after the blood donation. The very first time might take a little longer as they put you in their database but once you are in it, the subsequent times, it is fairly quick. They do some instantaneous blood tests to see if you have a fever and some other simple diagnostics (a quick and dirty HIV test) to make sure you are eligible to donate. Once you are done with the paperwork, you move to the super-comfy reclining beds and you can kick back and let the nurse do her work while you watch TV.

The alternative is a small van carrying rickety triage beds that will need to be unpacked and installed and which are terribly uncomfortable for the donors. Add to that a bunch of paperwork that is repeated every single time, blood packets collected stored in iceboxes and poorly trained medical professionals. With a Bloodmobile and some token but nice incentives like a T-Shirt that proclaims that I am a proud blood donor or something to that effect, more donors can be attracted and donating blood does not have to become an act performed under pressure from unrelenting self-righteous people.

According to the Florida Blood Services website, one of these Bloodmobiles costs around $85,000. But I am sure they can be made a lot cheaper in India. Where is the willing entrepreneur?

Think Vertical

2007-06-10T14:36:00.000-04:00

This is sort of a continuation of the theme from the previous post about planned Indian urbanization. As I look around Hyderabad and the hundreds of apartment complexes being built almost anywhere you look, I wonder why isn't each one of them taller - I mean why don't they have more floors? Given the exorbitant (unaffordable to most including yours truly) prices of houses in Hyderabad and the scarcity of land, one would think the best strategy would be to build more houses per square foot. If not skyscrapers at least some or most of the four or five floor apartment buildings should at least be doubled or tripled in height. I am sure it has something to do with building codes and the speed with which the construction companies would like to move on to the next project. But given the fact that most people cannot afford individual houses (single family homes as opposed to flats or condominiums) the public policy should be such that the land use is optimized and building tall buildings is encouraged.

I once went to a place in Hungary on business called Tiszaújváros. It was a small industrial town that was barely a couple of square miles in area. But it had a large population of nearly ten thousand and one thing that struck me odd - especially going from the US to Hungary - was how thin and slim the people in that town were. But the other interesting thing was how most residential buildings were tall with many floors and since that reduced the overall size of the town while maximizing the number of people in the town, people preferred to either walk or use the bicycle to get around. This made them healthier while keeping automobile traffic to a minimum which of course results in a host of fringe benefits. Mind you this city is in no way special - it may just be one example of the efficient use of space and energy that is a hallmark of Europe. And the worry for India is that we seem to be aping the US in creating the environmentally unfriendly Indian version of the American dream.

Indian Urbanization

2007-06-10T13:35:00.000-04:00

Much has been said and written about the haphazard growth of the Indian cities. Some have argued, and in my opinion with a lot of sense, that brand new cities built from scratch is our only hope for sustainable urbanization. Apparently there are some active projects of brand new city building including the $1.07 Billion Nanocity in Haryana headed by the Hotmail Sabeer Bhatia and another project near Bellary in the state of Karnataka. Whatever the status of these projects and whether or not these actually happen it is inevitable that planned urbanization will happen in some shape or form soon. An interesting viewpoint is expressed in an article in the Mint magazine that basically amounts to saying that urbanization and not rural development is key to India's future.

Scalability and sustainability are important factors that the planners of these urban centers need to keep in mind. At the rate India is growing, what may be a good plan today may be woefully inadequate in a couple of years. It is also important to learn from the mistakes of other countries in the way they developed their cities. One of the major complaints that is heard in the United States is the urban decay that the so-called anti-suburbanists lament about. Bigger houses, urban sprawl, big box stores, and lack of proper mass transit etc are all results of decades of suburbanization that began with construction of highways and the American obsession with the automobile. And judging by the uncontrolled growth in India's cities so far, I can tell you that the same is happening in India - only with even less planning. And that is scary.

Energy, water, mass transit, recycling, and many other issues related to sustainable and environmentally friendly growth will offer many entrepreneurial opportunities. It is a good time for budding entrepreneurs to start thinking outside the box in anticipation of the needs of the new as well as old urban centers.

UB-Idea Series: Custom Menu Card

2007-06-02T16:21:00.000-04:00

Looks like I am hung up on cards. But this is a favorite idea of mine that I am surprised is not already in existence in a big way. A little context first before I give away the idea. Two of my favorite places to get food or beverage are Subway and Starbucks. While ordering a double shot tall extra hot cappuccino with two raw sugars, slightly wet was an experience in itself (see below for a quote and video link from the movie You've Got Mail), it could get quite annoying saying the same thing day after day or worse, wanting to order something different but the barista assuming you want "your usual." And of course choosing your bread, your cheese, whether you want it toasted or not, and your assortments for the filling for your subway sandwich is an equally fulfilling American experience. But these custom food orders can be expedited beyond belief if the rest of the operational issues like more number of workers to meet the faster ordering process is taken care of.

Enter UB's custom menu card. Along with the many adjectived cappuccino above, I could have the Seven Pump Extra Hot Chai Latte and eight (or more) other favorite combinations on my card each one numbered. These custom orders can be updated on a website by any card holder. Of course, we would make a card reader that interfaces with the computer and also with a label maker that prints your order once you order it. The small label can be peeled and affixed to the coffee cup or the sandwich wrapper so that the person preparing your food can use clear, legible and ordered instructions to make their job easier as well. Of course once this technology takes off, numerous other businesses will want this for their products too. It is possible to combine this with my earlier customer rewards card as well.

If anyone ends up using this business idea, please let me know as courtesy. There is no obligation whatsoever beyond that. I will be gladly willing to develop the idea further for a business plan.

Tom Hanks' character Joe Fox in You've Got Mail: "The whole purpose of places like Starbucks is for people with no decision-making ability whatsoever to make six decisions just to buy one cup of coffee. Short, tall, light, dark, caf, decaf, low-fat, non-fat, etc. So people who don't know what the hell they're doing or who on earth they are, can, for only $2.95, get not just a cup of coffee but an absolutely defining sense of self: Tall! Decaf! Cappuccino!" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58jxg31k5_k

That Dreadful Driver's License Photo

2007-06-01T15:45:00.000-04:00

People often complain that they do not look good in their driver's license photograph. Assuming we use the commonly understood standard of what good means here, I would probably agree so based on the most likely conditions under which the photographs are usually taken. One probably spent a long time in a queue and it was probably a hot afternoon and the waiting room didn't have conditioned air. The gal taking the photo was probably not in a good mood or even if she were, your photo turning out good is not her greatest priority. But it turns out that even the photos that look very much like the person they represent nevertheless leave people unsatisfied. Why is that?

I hypothesize here (not counting the truly and clearly hideous photos) that the person whose likeness is on the driver's license (or the passport or the school ID etc) felt that one looked better than how the photo turned out on the day the picture was taken. And that is very likely for the reasons I mentioned earlier. However, the differences in one's own perception of how different (read worse) the photo looks compared to one's self-image is highly exaggerated because of the possible preparations that went into trying to look good for the crucial photo. And this gets worse with time because one's perception of one's looks many years ago when one was younger and more attractive also becomes greater with time. These two disparities between one's mental image of self and the actual photograph on the license make this feeling of misrepresentation exponentially worse with time.

Of course, if you want to avoid that really hideous photo from being taken, here are some tips from a website I found by googling.

http://www.howtodothings.com/automotive/a4725-how-to-take-a-good-drivers-license-picture.html

UB-Idea Series: Consumer Experience Rewards Card

2007-05-31T18:01:00.000-04:00

When I set out to write this blog, one of my objectives was to come up with one business idea per day, preferably but not necessarily in the Indian context. Here is one to get this kick-started.

At the Indian pizza huts, there is a bell that people ring on their way out if they feel that they received good service. It is kind of cool but annoying at the same time. And of course there is no data collected of this valuable customer feedback. So how about we get major retail and hospitality industry companies to sign up to sponsor a consumer experience card? This card is given to any consumer that is interested - a single card that could be used at all the participating business outlets. A card reader would be developed that simply registers the card ID and simple feedback on a 1-7 scale for a couple of questions (customizable by business and changed as needed) and transmits to a central database. These card readers would be placed at the exits of the restaurants, pubs, grocery stores, hotels etc of the businesses that sign up. Every time the consumer provides the feedback, they get reward points redeemable for some monetary value at these participating businesses (something reasonable like a free pizza for providing feedback 10 times).

The businesses get valuable feedback on the service they provide and if they are up for it, the data could be made public on a website for consumers who then can make well informed decisions about the merchants and so this serves as some sort of an Angie's List, but only better and free. It could be a win-win as businesses get valuable feedback almost on an instantaneous basis, while consumers gain from improvement in customer service not to mention the freebies they get via reward points.

If anyone ends up using this business idea, please let me know as courtesy. There is no obligation whatsoever beyond that. I will be gladly willing to develop the idea further for a business plan.

Neologisms

2007-05-30T10:55:00.000-04:00

Well, back to back posts on language and the evolution thereof! I am currently listening to Professor Piyush Kumar's interview on the ISB Radio and while the interviewer plays boring (to me, yes) music between questions, I decided to write this inspired by what Prof. Kumar said was one of his interests. Honestly, I didn't know that this is a big area of interest for so many people around the world. I frequently have fun with language with play on words, some go down with people as corny but I rarely do come up with some that people like. I didn't realize until today that these have an elegant name called neologisms. Apparently the word that won some award last year was coffee - the neologism being coffee is one who is coughed upon, coffer being the one who coughed, you get the drift... so let me try a few myself (Of course if someone else stakes a claim to these, I have just one thing to say to them - DILLIGAS?).

Abrupture - Sudden, what else, rupture
Brandismo - A strong pride in a company's own brand
Cafetearia - A place where you have coffee and have incisive discussions at the same time
Dogma - The mother dog
Entertrainment - The act of entering a train

Okay, I am sure these don't measure up to those that Prof. Piyush is working on or any others that serious neologians (?) come up with but given I came up with the above in under ten minutes, I am sure it ain't that bad.

For more on neologims, here are a couple of good sites -
http://www.neologisms.us
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A1051598

If you want to explore more, just Google (LYDKIA!)

The Strange New Language

2007-05-29T14:51:00.000-04:00

Acronyms like LOL are as much a part of the active vocabulary of young people today as any other legitimate words from the English lexicon. NetLingo, as it has come to be called, is familiar to many along with the emoticons and other related "words" of the netizens. The use of SMS, IM's and the online communities is so routine in India among young people that it is hard to imagine how these people communicated with each other prior to their existence and gaining popularity. I am learning some of these terms slowly but it is hard to keep up with this ever expanding new lingo. For those that would like to get initiated, www.netlingo.com is a good resource. So once you get a hang of it, come back and read my little message here:

SMEM TOM n LMK WUF n ur NAZ. B4YKI we'll be BFF. L8R.

Like it?

SOHF?

DILLIGAS?

LOOL :)

Lost and Found

2007-05-28T16:12:00.000-04:00

There have been quite a few e-mail messages of people losing things and someone else finding them. It is as if critical balance was lost for a moment and then it was safely restored. It is as if the loss and the subsequent finding happen just so two people that have not met yet get to know each other and start a friendship that will last a life time. But there have also been things that people have lost that are yet to be found.

Judging by the weather outside, the nights at ISB will probably be great here on. As the hot and torrid summer winds down and Hyderabad gets ready to take a long vacation from the heat, it is great to see people go out and enjoy themselves even as the exam-fever has caught on. But not every cup is filled with joy -

Some people are lucky to know where they want to go
There are others that enjoy life for they do not know what is in store
Still there are others that somehow scrape along
That cannot for the world figure out where they belong

To all those lost souls, a piece of advice - find someone that can hold you by your hand and pull you back into the realms of joy that you somehow wandered away from. In due time, everything will be just fine. Trust me.

Mother

2007-05-27T06:03:00.000-04:00

Brevity, in whatever form of communication, is one of the more undervalued traits in people. My last couple of posts have been antitheses to brevity, so here is an attempt to even it out. This for all the mothers out there... especially two of the greatest mothers ever - my mom and my wife. Today my mother turned 70. Happy Birthday Amma!

With every happy moment and with every sorrowful teardrop
And when the emotional rollercoaster does a ninety-degree-drop
The way I manage to keep my perspective straight
Is the gift of character that you have given me o mother, o saint

The Indian Conundrum

2007-05-24T13:29:00.000-04:00

I was at the ISB Happy Hour today after the classes. This is an attempt at replicating some of the well known weekly get-togethers at the top US business schools to bring the faculty, students and alums together to foster more interaction at a social level. Although I was skeptical as to how much I could really mingle in an hour-and-a-half, "I got my money's worth" as I told someone while exiting the party an hour later. First, I had a nice Kingfisher, the desi beer which is fast replacing the "imports" in the US - Corona, Heineken, and Fosters as my favorite. Then I got a chance to speak with Prof. Waterman of Wharton for a bit and to top it all, Prof. Finn of Kellogg gave an emotional speech that was truly heartfelt. And as if this party was meant to keep giving, when I went to the rec center lawn later in the night, where this was still going on albeit with sparse left over janta, I ran into an alum that had just started working at the Acumen fund and a batch-mate that turned down an admission to the Kennedy School of Government because he would "have kids, grow old, and contribute in India than anywhere else."

The few minutes I spoke to Prof. Waterman were great because he talked about what he did when he was not teaching and among other things how he felt the ISB students held up against those at Wharton. He felt that the best at ISB were better than the best at Wharton. When asked if the same held true on the other end of the distribution, he quietly smiled as if in affirmation. Among the interesting things he works on is being an expert witness in anti-piracy trials of the recording and motion picture industries. He couldn't give us any more details because of confidentiality but he seemed to enjoy his consulting gigs quite a bit.

Then I moved on to listen to Dr. Mark Finn who was given the microphone to talk about his shopping experiences in Hyderabad. Although the premise for getting the mic was decidedly dumb, Dr. Finn took the chance to give back a sliver of gratitude that is no match for how much ISB students adore this guy. As if this was meant to be the night of reaffirmation of the decision I took to go to the ISB, Dr. Finn as well said something that amounted to the students at ISB being a cut above the students he taught at Kellogg. He said and I quote, "ISB students think big and dream big."

Talking of some of the very good professors that comprise the visiting faculty at ISB, it is hard to leave out Prof. Robert Stine that taught us the first half of the statistics class. I listened to Dr. Stine's interview on the ISB radio last night and some of the things he said got me thinking about how far India has come in the last few years and how far it promises to go in the next several years. The new economy versus the old has brought about its share of interesting conundrums but in the end the questions of sustainability and equity invariably come up.

Dr. Stine in his interview cited a couple of examples that illustrate this strange juxtaposition of the old and new economies. A few years ago, when the faculty accomodation was still in construction, Dr. Stine would travel each day to the school and on his way he had the pleasure of witnessing these paradoxes that modern India had thrown up. He saw fiber optic cable being laid along a community where people didn't have running water and another time he was bemused as the advertisement for Java programmers and a loaded cycle rickshaw being hauled by a scrawny guy appeared in the same frame. These pictures abound in India now - ask any visiting foreigner or just look around yourself. These pictures may be quite interesting now but the educated and the smart among us need to start thinking and think fast as to what these rapid changes in our society have in store for us.

I am yet to read Edward Luce's book (In Spite of the Gods: The Strange Rise of Modern India) but I assume that his book is full of such pictures as well. But to keep this change in our economy pointed upward it is absolutely important that this growth be inclusive. The undercurrents of communism and naxalism (the Maoist movement) are still very strong in India and a large scale social unrest led by these leftist entities looms large. There was an article in The Hindu last weekend that puts the possible sentiments behind such a potential unrest in perspective. It is time the like-minded among us start thinking of how to prevent a disaster of that kind and help effect a public policy change before it is too late. Did I mention the guy from the Acumen fund and the guy who gave up admission to the Kennedy School?

Rain, Salsa, and the Games

2007-05-24T01:09:00.000-04:00

Well, officially this is the first post.

Yesterday I picked up my dinner order at the coffee shop - a thali full of bisi bele bath and some dahi to go along with it and sat down to watch the enthusiastic salsa (well we are talking about the dance) learners sweat it out in the atrium, the hub of all social activity here at the Indian School of Business (www.isb.edu). The heavens began to roar and the rain along with the trademark Hyderabad winds came down and the feeling was quite ethereal. The girls tried hard to keep their skirts down in face of the winds while the subtle lilt in their mid-bodies was as unrelenting as the winds themselves. The boys who were dancing with them, of course, couldn't believe their luck.

The buzz around the cafe was uncharacteristically subdued because of the newly opened Cafe Coffee Day in the courtyard - the most direct challenge yet to the monopolistic cafe here at ISB. The students who were praying for some competition to the existing cafe for a while finally took their business elsewhere. I didn't mind that because that meant I got my order delivered at an unprecedented speed and with a hint of ghee in the food as a bonus.

The day felt short, not a usual feeling at ISB, probably because the mid-term exams and the weekend assignments were behind us but also because the classes were great today - the impressive British-accented Prof. Waterman's multiple regressions and Prof. Allen's games (of the Game Theory kind). Two dominant strategies and no Nashes, Battle of the Sexes, Prisoner's Dilemma and so on kept coming back to me. "Good stuff - I should read more of it," I said to myself when my thought train was derailed by some non-South-Indian friends who couldn't comprehend why I was eating this gruel of a sambhar rice for dinner. The misty tease that the wind was playing ended as well. Some other time I will publish my salsa recipe, yes we are talking about the Mexican sauce this time.