Musings of an Iconoclast

Where will TATA go from here?

2008-03-30T05:11:00.000-07:00

Kiran at Indian Economy Blog makes a good case of what acquisition of Jaguar and Land Rover (JLR) can mean for Tata.

To summarize, the argument is that:

having both Nano and JLR creates global visibility and brand for TATA
it gives TATA a world-wide marketing network
TATA now have access to R & D facilities of JLR

My take is that its all nice and dandy to list the benefits but the reality is that creating a world-wide brand takes time. (specially in auto industry - Toyota took 30 years to get to Lexus).

Personally, I am more excited by Nano. If, come September, Tata delivers on what it promised (a safe, trustable car for $3000) then JLR's marketing muscle or not, TATA will not just have created a new high-growth market segment but it will have a lead of 3 years over other auto manufactures in that segment.

What does the death of Bear Stearns mean?

2008-03-19T02:08:00.000-07:00

Finally, there is a good post on why Bear Stearns collapsed and why its a good model for the rest of us.

Lessons from Buffet and Gates

2008-03-02T02:13:00.000-08:00

Brian Haligan talks about some nice things to learn from Warren Buffet and Bill Gates.

I specially liked how important Gates think reading is.

When asked if Gates could be a superhero, what power he'd want to have, he said he'd like to be able to be the fastest reader in the world.

Buffet also thinks that the most important skill he has is the ability to focus. Its important to stress that in our society where every geek thinks that having an attention-deficit disorder is not a bad thing.

On life and career, Buffet thinks that we should do what we love sooner than later and in business that is the biggest predictor of success.

6 traits to get rich

2008-03-01T02:26:00.000-08:00

Russ Alan Prince, author of The Middle-Class Millionaire, has been trying to understand the “working rich”. Prince defines them as those with net worths between $1 million and $10 million, but who still work for a living. After talking to 586 such families, he thinks 9 most important factors are:

Rich people work longer. Rich people work an average of 70 hours a week and they are "always" available via email or phone
Rich people network more. They tend to know 60% more people then average.
Rich people take significantly more risks. Almost 90% admitted of making a big business or career decision with bad outcome. On average they made 3 such mistakes.
Rich people dont work for salary. Over 80% own a good percentage of the businesses they work for.
Rich people follow the money. 74% think that following money is more important for the career.
Rich people can be ruthless. More than half say taking advantage of others' weakness is an important ingredient for success.

Some anti-valentine poetry

2008-02-14T10:51:00.000-08:00

I mentioned Kala Ghoda SMS contest earlier in my blog. The goal is to write a poem that fits into one SMS message (160 letters).

Here is the one I liked most:

In my phone contact list:
Parents
Grandparents
2 best friends
43 other friends
71 business contacts
4 ex-lovers
3 potential dates
1 wrong number -
you.

Another good one:
Roses are passe,

violets expensive;
sugar is fattening
and v-day offensive.

And a shot at fast food:

2 burgers 2 cokes plus fries

in a heart shaped box, surprise!
@Rs. 99 for 2 the lovin’ is easy
Why then do I feel so queasy?

Its not easy being a Muslim in India (or anywhere)..

2008-01-28T12:26:00.000-08:00

She said, you're Pakistani, aren't you?

I said, no. Of course not.

She said, no, I know that you people are Pakistani.

Even then, I knew that I was not Pakistani. I was such an overt patriot that I cringe to think of it now (had saare jahaan se achha by heart - the whole six verses). But in that instant, looking at her face, her smugness, the authority with which that child of eight (I think) spoke, I also knew that there was nothing I could say or do to win this particular argument.

Almost two decades later, I cannot forget. She was a child and I have forgiven. But I have not forgotten.

From Annie Zaidi's history.

Best cash back credit card in india

2007-10-29T02:00:00.000-07:00

I am currently doing some research to find out the best cash-back credit card in India.

So far, I have discovered that ABN AMRO's ONE credit card fits my needs best.

It does charge an annual fee of INR 600 but it gives an average return of >1.5% in solid cash for about first INR 29000/month you will spend on anything (a total of INR 6000 every year). Plus, there is no surcharge at any petrol punps !!

Is there anything better out there? Am I missing something in its fine print? Please feel free to comment.

Why i moved back from iPhone to Blackberry

2007-10-16T00:51:00.000-07:00

After trying iPhone for about 2 months, I am finally going back to my Blackberry Pearl.
I gave iPhone a shot but even though its awesome, it is still not ready for corporate users.

Here are the issues that were deal breaker for me:

No Support for syncing notes: I was used to taking my notes on my blackberry. I had a lot of lists and misc notes on my Pearl that I synced with Yojimbo on my laptop. If a friend recommended a good movie - it went on my list. My boss suggested something new in the hallway - it was on my list. With iPhone the whole concept does not exist !!
International Coverage is clumsy (and expensive): I travel a lot to other countries and I was used to just having my blackberry work everywhere !! There was nothing to configure. No APN settings to messs around with. No extra charges. I land in a new country and my email just arrives as it always does. It just worked. Not so with iPhone.

There are a few other issues with iPhone that were not exactly deal breaker but irked me a lot anyways.

Mail client is clumsy on iPhone: On Blackberry, it takes one click to read email or to compose one. On iPhone you click on email icon, then you click on your account's name and then you choose your inbox (3 clicks). It takes 1 more click (a total of 4) to compose a mail. This is frustrating as many corporate people live and die by their emails. Adding 2 extra clicks to my email check is like adding an extra 500 clicks to my work week if I am traveling. Totally not cool.
There is no way to search your contacts on iPhone: This is pretty lame on Apple's part. First of all it takes 2 clicks to reach your contact list from the main screen (every phone I have used in my life does this job in 1 click - and blackberry takes zero clicks). Once you are on your contact list, there is no way to search for contacts !! I did not believe it when I first noticed it. Do they really expect me to BROWSE thru my 600 contacts to find the one I want to dial?
No support for task syncing: Just like notes there is no way to sync tasks from my iPhone back to my laptop. If there was a good note syncing application - I probably wont miss it so much. But without it - this annoyed me a lot.
No blinking light for new mails: My Blackberry blinks an LED when it has a new email. Nothing too disturbing - just a subtle way of letting me know that there is new email waiting for me and if I want I can get to it (just like my email client does). I searched very hard but could not find a way for my iPhone to do the same.
Exchange issue has been beaten to death so I wont harp too much about it. Basically, you get Exchange over IMAP. With iPhone, you do not get over-the-air syncing of calendar, tasks or contacts that you get with BES.
Blackberry is smart with email: There are other ways in which Blackberry does a better job with email. If I get a big PDF from my sales guy on blackberry which I need to forward to my boss - I do not need to wait for the entire 1 MB thing to download before I can forward it. I can just look at the header (or the body of the email) and forward it. Blackberry does all the heavy lifting server side. There are other similar smart things that Blackberry does with email which will take Apple quite some time to catch up with.
Other misc issues: I also did not like a few other things. iPhone is a tad heavier than my Pearl. There is a distinct lack of choice for carriers for iPhone (its not even legally available in most of our international office locations). There is no support to view PPT files attached with mails.

I must say, iPhone does have many impressive features:

The quality of the video on this thing is amazing and even though my Pearl can play music there is a huge difference in the quality of the two
The way Apple has integrated with iTunes and YouTube is also very apt. I found myself watching a lot more YouTube because of my iPhone.
The browser is a lot more useful with its finger-gestures and better support for javascript and portrait mode.
And, yes, overall, iPhone is a very finished and good-looking product.

However, I do not think its ready for the business market just yet.

Don't get me wrong. I do think iPhone is a game-changing product. It has redefined not just the bar but the rules by which mobile phone industry measures itself. The list of innovations that have gone into this small product is astonishing.

In the next 2 years, I will not be surprised if we see many more phones (some from Apple and some from other vendors) raising the bar even further and adding even more features. Perhaps, some of them will take good care of business users as well.

Throttling bandwidth usage for Miro (formerly Democray Player)

2007-10-04T16:10:00.000-07:00

Miro is a great software. Unfortunately, there are still some bugs to be ironed out and it can quickly become a bandwidth hog.

Sometimes, it hogs so much bandwidth on my macbook that I cannot browse the net or download my email.

Hence, I wrote this small script thats uses ipfw and dummynet features of BSD (and OS X Tiger) to throttle bandwidth to ports used by Miro:

#sudo ipfw pipe 1 config bw 24Kbit/s
#sudo ipfw queue 1 config pipe 1 weight 1
#sudo ipfw queue 2 config pipe 1 weight 3
#sudo ipfw add 10 queue 1 ip from `hostname` to any src-port 8500-8600
#sudo ipfw add 20 queue 2 ip from any 1024-65535 to `hostname`

Now, verify that your Miro bandwidth usage goes down in the real-time !!

If something is wrong, then type "sudo ipfw flush" and start over.

This will not survive a reboot. This will only work for OS X 10.4

best bank and cash-back credit card in US

2007-09-25T02:19:00.000-07:00

After much research and varied experiences I will recommened Fidelity Smart Cash as my choice for the checking account and Fidelity FIA Visa Signature for the credit card.

Fideliy SmartCash has following benefits
* free bill pay, ACH and no minimum balance
* free ATM access from ANY ATM in the world (with a VISA, STAR or PLUS logo). All ATM charges are reimbursed same day
* free checks and deposit slips for life.
* very good interest rates on the cash in this account (currently about 3.5% APY)
* you can also maintain your brokerage, 401k, IRA, 529 etc with fidelity at very good rates so they are a one stop shop for all your US money
* very good phone customer support when you need it

Fidelity FIA Visa Signature card is useful as
* they give 1.5% cash back (deposited to your retirement or brokerage account automatically) on ALL your transactions.
* all benefits of Visa Signature and free cards for additional members

Please remember:
* visa will charge you 1% for any inter-currency transaction (e.g. when you are in India and are withdrawing dollars from your US account). this is true everytime you do an inter-currency transaction (even if its a wire transaction or anything else) - most banks just hide this information in their exchange rates. Fidelity just makes that information public.

keeping your life in sync with blackberry, GTD, os x and exchange

2007-09-16T13:22:00.000-07:00

I see lots of posts on the net around how to manage your life using blackberry and OS x - specially if you have Microsoft Exchange in your office. I thought I should pitch in with my "perfect" setup.

My requirements were:

Should work natively with OS X (no parallels etc for me)
Should work with Microsoft Exchange. In particular, calendar syncing and free/busy status should work both ways (I should be able to see the free/busy status of other people and they should be able to see mine)
Should sync seamlessly with my blackberry (calendar, contacts and notes)
I want it all to be reliable and trust-able. I dont want to deal with beta software or solutions that "almost" work.

After spending about 6 months of trying out various tools, I now think that I have a solution that does all of this and does them very reliably. Its not a cheap setup but, hey, its one-time investment !! Here, it goes:

First, the list of tools that I bought

Microsoft Entourage 2004 (for mail, work calendar and exchange connectivity)
Kinkless GTD (GTD-based task management) - requires Omnioutliner Pro
Missing Sync for Blackberry (for blackberry syncing and a note taking application that syncs)

Now, here is how I set them up:

Calendar : I use Entourage to work with my calendar. (I could just as easily work with iCal) and my sync flow is: Exchange <--> Entourage <--> Missing Sync <--> Blackberry
Tasks : I use Kinkless GTD to work with my tasks. I also take notes on my blackberry so I need to have any new tasks that pop up in my head when I am working on my blackberry show up in my kGTD inbox. My sync flow is: Kinkless <--> iCal <-- Missing Sync <-- Blackberry. I do not currently sync my tasks with Exchange.
Contacts : My sync flow is: Exchange <--> Entourage <--> AddressBook <--> Missing Sync <--> Blackberry
Plaxo Contacts :I also use Plaxo for keeping current with some of my contacts so I have an additional branch to my sync flow above Plaxo <--> AddressBook which then sync with the rest of the contacts as above. I use Plaxo's Addressbook add-in for this purpose.
Notes : Missing Sync ships with a great notebook that you can use on the OS X and that syncs with BB. I use Yojimbo which is much more versatile and sync with BB notes as well. My sync flow is pretty simple: Yojimbo or Missing Sync Notebook <---> Missing Sync <--> Blackberry
Photos : I end up taking lots of photos from my blackberry. These are synced one way to iPhoto and then I manually update to Google Picasa that acts as my Photo backup. Picasa <-- iPhoto <-- Missing Sync <-- Blackberry .
Music : I realize that with the music support on my blackberry I do not need to carry an iPod. I just use Missing Sync to keep my music in sync on my blackberry. iTunes Store / CDs etc --> iTunes --> Missing Sync --> Blackberry
Mail : I have a personal IMAP account along with work Exchange account. Both just download to Entourage and Blackberry.

As you can see, this set up not only meets all my needs but I am also able to use my blackberry as my only portable device (for my photos, music, mail, notes, calendar, contacts and task taking). When I am on my computer, my photos, music, mail, notes, calendar, contacts and task list are back in sync with my OS X.

Some tips that are useful when creating a similar setup:
* Entourage works with iSync but always sync with a special calendar called "Entourage". My missing sync calendar settings make sure that all my calendars sync to blackberry including Entourage.
* A simple Task setup would just sync everything from kinkless to blackberry. however, I just want the ability to note down any new tasks that pop up in my head on my blackberry and the ability to have them pop up in kinkless "inbox". hence, I created a special calendar called "blackberry" in ical and have missing sync only sync this calendar for my tasks with blackberry. this way, my tasks in iCal never get transfered to Blackberry but any tasks created in blackberry get back to kinkless

Happy Syncing and let me know if you have questions about this set up !!

Bonobos and Chimpanzees can 'speak' using gestures

2007-05-05T13:45:00.000-07:00

New Scientist is reporting that researchers at Yerkes National Primate Research Center in Atlanta, Georgia, US have noticed a vocabulary of 31 gestures and 18 facial and vocal symbols used by apes - where meanings differ based on what context is used.

It should be noted that a lot of animals communicate using gestures and symbols but only humans are known to have different meanings of the same symbol based on the context.

Oh !! The more closely we look at Great Apes - the closer they seem to us.

Indian Mangoes are finally coming to USA

2007-05-04T09:59:00.000-07:00

For the first time in 18 years Indian Mangoes are going to be allowed into the US.

Since India first applied to ship mangoes to the United States in 1989, the fruit has been barred because it can harbor the mango seed weevil, a pest absent from North America. A solution emerged in January 2006, when the Agriculture Department allowed the importation of produce treated with low doses of irradiation to kill or sterilize insects — a somewhat controversial issue. USDA has certified of an irradiation facility, 125 miles northeast of Mumbai (formerly Bombay), close to the prime coastal orchards growing Alphonsos, India’s most celebrated mango variety.

As of last Friday the NY Times announced they are here and I am looking forward to them expectantly. India has over 1000 varieties of mangoes. They come in varying shapes, colors, and tastes and it should change the impression of Mangoes as a fruit for average american.

Don't expect to see huge amounts or types of the fruit immediately available. Some transportation problems still have to be worked out and the product might cost as much as $5/pound when it arrives. But at least we will have Indian Mangoes in USA finally.

tv downloads over internet comes to india !!

2007-05-03T00:08:00.000-07:00

IndyaOnDemand - a StarTV compnay - is offering many StarTV tv shows like Koffee with Karan, Kahaani Ghar Ghar Kii, The Great Indian Laughter Challenge etc for download at $1.99/episode. They are also offering music videos for $0.99/song.

With those prices, they are definitely targeting NRI market.
Hopefully, we will also see them on iTunes soon.

Yahoo launches maps for India !!

2007-04-28T08:19:00.000-07:00

There are no driving directions yet but you at least look at the map and find out nearest ATMs and Bus Stops !!

Link

Biggest bottleneck in the upliftment of India farmers

2007-04-26T08:25:00.000-07:00

Times of India's editorial asks a great question today:

Why does the hard-working Indian farmer — one of the world’s lowest-cost producers — is unable to compete globally.

For example, India is one of the world’s biggest producers of horticultural products; it grows nearly 11 per cent of all the world’s vegetables and 15 per cent of all fruit. And India’s production costs are less than half of those in other parts of the world.

But, despite being a large, low-cost producer, India’s share in the global market is insignificant — it accounts for only 1.7 per cent of the global trade in vegetables and 0.5 per cent in fruits.

A recent world bank study cites three reasons:

The biggest reason is the broken and inefficient supply chain we have. The high costs of getting agricultural produce from farm to market erode any advantage the Indian farmer enjoys by virtue of being a cheap producer. For example, it costs three times more to transport grapes from India to the Netherlands than it does from Chile to the Netherlands, although Chile is twice as far from the destination as India is. I am hoping with the new retail chains like Reliance Fresh, we will now start seeing some private investments in the creation of a supply chain.
Quality Control and Quality Assessment Methods are lower in India - a concern costantly raised by foreign consumers. The concerns voiced by foreign consumers today will be the concerns raised by domestic consumers tomorrow and players will have to adopt to this. We are already seeing leading players seize the initiative here. Haldiram already has some of the cleanest and high quality facilities in India now.
The third reason is the protection mechanisms from foreign regimes. There is no easy solution to it but WTO negotiations are a step in the right direction.

Remedying bottlenecks from farm to market is arguably a higher priority than raising farm productivity. Consider this: 20 per cent higher yields will only lower the final price by less than three percentage points.

In contrast, a 20 per cent reduction in transportation costs alone will reduce final prices by as much as 10 percentage points.

In fact, without more efficient logistics, increasing production — through subsidised credit, power and fertilisers — can lead to gluts that hurt rather than help farmers. Radical reform in services is also necessary.

Providing farmers better access to services — from transportation to distribution — will enhance the economic gains from, and strengthen the political case for, agricultural trade liberalisation.

A willingness to reform its own trade regime — which in any case subsidises the inefficient intermediary more than the farmer — will enable India to take a more forceful position in the WTO negotiations.

It can then more effectively secure not just lower levels of foreign protection, but also greater transparency, simplicity, and predictability in foreign trade regimes.

Reliance launches first Reliance Digital store (near our NOIDA office)

2007-04-25T15:56:00.000-07:00

Mukesh Ambani's Group has launched the first Reliance Digital store in Shipra Mall, Ghaziabad (incidentally, very close to our NOIDA office). While I was in NOIDA last week - I saw this store under construction.

Reliance plans to launch 170 stores nation wide which will carry all international brands as well as private labels. They are also trying to launch a consumer finance company to support easy finance to allow people to buy these goods.(they recently hired AmEx India's CEO to head this group)

India's telecom base: 150m wireless and 2m broadband users

2007-04-24T10:00:00.000-07:00

Some quick numbers from TRAI:

At the end of 2006, India had 190 million wireless+wireline subscribers and it was adding 20 million subscribers every quarter. (11.7% growth Q on Q).
In that quarter, wireless subscribers grew from 130 m to 150m. Wireline subscribers declined from 40.5 m to 40.3 m.
ARPU (average revenue per user) per month was down to INR 316 ($7.5) declining 6.2% QonQ.
Internet subscribers grew to 8.5m (5.9% growth Q on Q). Broadband subscribers constituted 2.0m out of that (growth of 11.2% Q on Q)

IBN Video of the first Reliance Fresh store in Hyderabad

2007-04-22T15:59:00.000-07:00

Reliance has launched 90 grocery (perishables) store all over the country and has decided to invest 25,000 crores rupees ($6 Billion) in this business. IBN's vidoe report:

Online Groceries Coming to India via Reliance Retail

2007-04-20T17:47:00.000-07:00

Reliance Retail is planning to launch online groceries in India. They are calling it an e-commerce portal where people can buy groceries which will be then delivered to their homes. Mukesh Ambani announced it yesterday on his 50th birthday. They plan to target both B2B and B2C markets.

Unlike USA - where the biggest challenge is the cost of delivery - India's biggest challenge is penetration of credit cards with the common man. As is well understood, reliance' strategy has always been to target the large middle class base and not just the top 1% that have always had access to cellphone, credit cards and internet.

Perhaps, Reliance will allow a CoD (cash on delivery) service to offset this issue. (just like delivery services from Domino's and McDonalds)

Anil Ambani group has already launched a Reliance Credit Card (in collaboration with Citigroup) to target common man.

Some economic facts from India

2007-04-15T10:11:00.000-07:00

Indian exports reached $125 billion, doubling from $63.84 three years ago.

Citigroup is investing $400 million in the Indian property estate sector. (time to buy that property is NOW !!)

An UN report forecasts the economy to grow at 9% in 2007.

The gross telecom sector base has touched 190 million. India could become the world’s second largest steel producer by 2016, and an Ahmedabad based company claims to have developed the world’s most advanced IP surveillance camera.

A chart of history of housing prices

2007-04-06T09:39:00.000-07:00

Yale economist Robert Shiller’s chart of historical housing prices is shocking to say the least:

5 most important open source projects for web 2.0

2007-04-06T09:22:00.000-07:00

In this article in IDG.se Niklas Andersson comments on the continued progress of Web 2.0 and, like the O’Reilly Radar, notes how Web 2.0 is essentially a synonym for composite applications built on Open Source components. In light of that context, Niklas points out 5 Open Source companies/projects that people should be looking out for:

OpenID - Identity Management
OpenMPI - Multi-Processor Handling
Hyperic - Systems Administration
Memcached - Memory Caching
Mogile - Distributed File Systems

Delhi is the best city to live in India !!

2007-04-03T12:54:00.000-07:00

Mercer survey for 2007 which rates various cities all over the world find Delhi (worldwide rank of 148) is the most livable city in India. Mumbai came a close second followed by Bangalore and Chennai.
The survey ranked 215 cities all over the world on 39 criteria which included:

Political and social environment (political stability, crime, law enforcement, etc)
Economic environment (currency exchange regulations, banking services, etc)
Socio-cultural environment (censorship, limitations on personal freedom, etc)
Health and sanitation (medical supplies and services, infectious diseases, sewage, waste disposal, air pollution, etc)
Schools and education (standard and availability of international schools, etc)
Public services and transportation (electricity, water, public transport, traffic congestion, etc)
Recreation (restaurants, theatres, cinemas, sports and leisure, etc)
Consumer goods (availability of food/daily consumption items, cars, etc)
Housing (housing, household appliances, furniture, maintenance services, etc)
Natural environment (climate, record of natural disasters)

Indian cities ranked poorly on health and sanitation parameters as most have high air pollution, are densely populated and have poor waste removal and sewage systems.

China, in comparison, did slightly better with Shanghai at 133 and Beijing at 166.

How to buy a car?

2007-04-03T11:08:00.000-07:00

What is the best time and method to buy a used or new car? Edmunds.com sends one of their reporters undercover to work at two different car dealers as salesmen to find out the scoop. My learning from the report is never go into the dealership till you have worked out the deal with a cool, rational mind. This is what I will do for my next car purchase:

Do the research on the internet to find out the make and model you want. Also research what custom options you want pre-installed and research their prices as well. Know what you want BEFORE you got the dealer to the final detail.
Consult Consumer Reports to find out the dealer prices for the car. For a small fee, consumer reports will tell you how much dealer has likely paid for the make and model you want.
Get pre-approval from your bank or credit union for this amount. Shop around looking for the best rates. Have a check ready in your hand for this amount.
Make a list of all dealers that sell this particular make in your area. Get their "internet sales" contacts.
Wait till morning of one day before the last day of the month.
Then send an email to all the internet sales contacts with following details:

full make and model name with all the options you want and if you have a color preference.
that you want to come and pick the car the next day.
that you want to know a committed price (including all fees and taxes) for your selected model and not interested in just "estimates".
that you are contacting other dealers in the area.
that you believe a fair price is what CR has told you.
that you have financing and will pay on the spot with the full amount.

Wait for the offers till late evening that day.
Ignore all offers with no committed price then find the lowest price.
email all dealers once again with this lowest price giving them a last chance to beat it
Wait till late next afternoon to find the lowest/best deal.
Call the selected dealership and ask them to fax over all the paperwork to you so that you can review it and bring it to them later in the evening.
Verify that the papers are in order and have the same terms and price that you expected.
Go to the dealership. Hand over the paperwork and pick the car !!

Read the entire edmunds.com report here.