Stuck in reverse, Detroit?

Last month I watched with delight as General Motors launched their Corvette Stingray, the C7. I find the design really really eye catching and the interior was posh. Ford launched their Atlas concept for their F50 pick up truck to remind America who is the King of Pick-up. It is Ford, GM and Chrysler who gave Detroit their identity as the Motor City.

But the city is slowly dying.

http://biz.thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2013/1/29/business/20130129090149&sec=business#1359500745865331&if_height=493

Detroit's population is shrinking, their tax revenue is shrinking due to business dying. Nothing seems to be going right for them and they are contemplating a bankruptcy case. A city; going bankrupt. Can you imagine that?! Now when i read that there are streets without lamps, I am saddened to think that this city is part of America. Reading the news would help my mind to link these images to a place in Uganda, not America!

Now Mr. Rick Snyder, if you are reading this, let me help you out a bit.

Did you know Michigan is the 14th state in the USA to lead in clean energy? Did you know that the future of cars are in clean tech; be it hydrogen fuels and battery? Did you know that Detroit is Motor City? Can you not link those three questions together?

Can you not have the people of Detroit to install solar panels on their homes to provide free energy to their homes? Any extra electricity generated can be sold to the city to power the street lights!

Ok, you might argue, the people of Detroit may not have the money to buy and install solar panels, so this is not going to work. Mr. Snyder, provide a loan for the people to buy up the solar panels. This way you earn via interest charged on them as well.

You cannot jack up the interest rate, this would exaberate the flee out of the city.
You should selectively reduce them for clean energy technology companies. that would theoratically improve the business for Detroit, which will lead to higher tax revenue.

If you really must, in the short term, you can go for a bankruptcy war to make yourself leaner. But without a proper strategic planning, 10 years down the road you would face the same problem. Why not bear the pain of bankruptcy, make youself leaner, and then set a proper path to improve business conditions there?

Start churning out clean tech engineers so that we can have a talent pool to support green energy in Detroit.
Start laying the groundwork for car manufacturers to flourish with clean tech.
Start ensuring that clean tech companies can set up shop there and support the industry.

New world, new challenges and new opportunities

This was posted in one of the blogs i was reading. I posted it here because i find it very refreshing and relevant in today's world.

HBR Blog Network

The Future of You

by Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic  |   9:00 AM January 1, 2013

• Comments (30)
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Economic and technological changes are reshaping the nature of work. Having a great job does not guarantee your career success; your competence no longer depends on what you know; and being an affluent consumer matters less than becoming a sought-after product. Welcome to a new era of work, where your future depends on being a signal in the noisy universe of human capital. In order to achieve this, you will need to master three things: self-branding, entrepreneurship, and hyperconnectivity.

Self-branding is about being a signal in the noise of human capital. The stronger your brand, the stronger that signal. In today's world, self-branding matters more than any other form of talent, not least because the mass market is unable (or unwilling) to distinguish between branding and talent.

We are all individuals, but unless we are also a brand, our individuality will be invisible. Being a brand means showcasing that which makes you special, in a way that is distinctive (recognizable), predictable (consistent), and meaningful (it allows others to understand what you do and why). This is why David Beckham and Lady Gaga are much more successful than their more talented competitors — they understood that being a marketing phenomenon is more important than displaying outstanding soccer skills or musical talent, and focused more on self-branding than their counterparts did.

Successful brands are polarizing (they generate strong reactions) and simple. Strong self-branding means removing all non-essentials from your public reputation or, as Antoine Saint-Exupery put it, "perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away."

Entrepreneurship is about adding value to society by disrupting it and improving the order of things: it is turning the present into the past by creating a better future.

We are all busy, but the only activity that really matters is enterprising activity or entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship is the difference between being busy and being a business, and the reason why some are able to stay in business.

Everything that isn't already optimized or automatized depends on people, and every transaction between people is a business transaction. The most important commodity in human capital today is people who can grow a business, that is, work on the business rather than in a business.

Today's war for talent is the war for identifying, developing, and retaining true change-agents. Change-agents are hard to find, hard to manage, and hard to retain. Entrepreneurship is about being a change-agent; change-agents are signals, everyone else is noise. If you are not bringing growth, you are replaceable and recyclable.

Whether you are self-employed or employed by others, whether you work in a big business or own a small business, your career success depends on your ability to offer something new: new solutions for existing problems; new services and products; new ideas; etc. Everything that isn't new is old, and if you are doing old you are stuck in the past. In the age entrepreneurship, the future of you is new, and your value depends on your ability to do things differently. As the great Alan Kay pointed out, "a change in perspective is worth 80 IQ points."

Hyperconnectivity is about being a signal in the sea of data and making and shaping the waves of social knowledge.

We are all online, but what matters is being a relevant connector. Hyperconnectivity is not about being online 24/7; it's about optimizing the online experience for others.

Unless you are a hyperconnector, only Netflix cares about what movies you watch, and only your friends care about where you went for brunch. But when you are a hyperconnector, thousands of people will watch the movies you like and your brunch recommendations will shape reviewers' comments on TripAdvisor. In the era of information overload, being a trustworthy source of information is a rare commodity — it is the digital equivalent of being an intellectual and the latest state in the evolution of marketing.

The world's knowledge is too large to be stored anywhere; Wikipedia and Google aren't enough; the Library of Congress isn't enough. Hyperconnectors point us in the right direction. Anybody can upload a video on YouTube or tweet, but only a few can direct us to the videos or tweets we want to see.

The most important form of knowledge today is knowing where to find stuff. In fact, the ability to find stuff is now almost as important as the ability to create stuff. Hyperconnectors are the creative of the digital era because in the age of information overload, where everybody creates online content, effectively curating content is what really matters.

In short, the future of you depends on your ability to be a brand, a change agent, and a link to useful information. Paying attention to your personality and managing your reputation (how others see you) will turn you into a successful brand; paying attention to your ideas and defying the status quo will help you become a change agent; and bridging the gap between social knowledge and collective interests will turn you into a hyperconnector.

More blog posts by Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic

More on: Career planning

TOMAS CHAMORRO-PREMUZIC

Dr Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic is an international authority in personality profiling and psychometric testing. He is a Professor of Business Psychology at University College London (UCL), Visiting Professor at New York University, and has previously taught at the London School of Economics. He is co-founder of metaprofiling.com.

Fund Performance

Dear Readers,

This year has not been a good year for my fund. Share purchases have been dismal and the portfolio damning.

Lets go through the table to view the performance.

Stocks	Average Price bought	Current Price (as of 5 December 2012)	Percentage
Pjdev-wc	0.22	0.17	(22.73)
KSL	1.44	1.45	0.69
Tagb	0.28	0.25	(10.71)
Favco	1.80	1.67	(7.22)

To say that the performance has been dismal would be a compliment. I have never had such bad performance in my entire life! The reason(s) for this dismal performance is the fact that I, as the holder of the fund, did not do enough aggressive expansion.

I made a mistake for allowing a small problem to slip through undetected that caused a huge catastrophe. I spent more than I expected ten bloody percent more, to purchase a property that generates positive cash flow every month. (Thank heaven for that). But it still does not mask the fact that I allowed my funds to be used in an unproductive manner. I made that mistake.

Imagine you have 3 bullets left, and you used one bullet to put down a zombie. Somehow, due to your stupidity, you mistakenly fired another bullet into the dead zombie! You have one bullet left and there are 2 zombies coming to eat your brains out. You could have survived if you have 2 bullets, but with only 1 left, you have this “Oh sh!t im f*cked.” Feeling.

The second reason would be me losing my balls. The simple adage I hold dear to my heart seems to be true.

“When you have everything to lose, you tend to err on the side of caution, hoping to preserve what you have” No more risk taking, no more gung ho approach. No more attack maneuvers. Thus, I missed out on the following:

Padini at RM1

Old town at RM0.80

The two stocks would provide the much required ammunition for me to go hunting again, but alas, it was not to be. I take full responsibility for this.

However next year would be a different year. There are four reasons for that:

Reason number 1:

US fiscal cliff. Regardless of whether America goes off the cliff or not, either way it is good. I am going against the norm here to say that the Fiscal cliff is a good thing. A wonderful thing even! You cant keep an economy afloat without higher tax revenue. Sure, America might be sent to a recession if it goes over the cliff, but in the long run, it is a much better proposition. America, you need to bite the bullet for the short term pain for the betterment of your future generation.

If America does not go over the fiscal cliff, its also a good thing. Somehow or rather, they will find a compromise that improves the economy. Thus, it would still be a good move.

Reason Number 2:

I love Europe. They have been battered so bad that the banks in Europe now seems cheap. No bad news can come out from there that could change the outlook anymore. Greece going to go bankrupt? It already has! Three bloody times ( if my calculations are correct)! Spain is in recession? We knew that last year. Germany is slowing down or maybe contract? What you expect? Germany has been propping up Greece, Ireland, Spain and Italy. Of course they are going to break.

Reason Number 3:

You know I love China lot right? My partner soon to be wife is from China so I love the country to bits. Im looking at the fact that China seems to be slowing down. Im also forecasting that the property bubble will burst in China, sending its economy spiraling. However, there is a saving grace. There is a new premier. The new premier would use every last Renmenbi to prop up the economy. They will spend as much as they can so that the economy grows. So expect in the next year or the next two years, China will grow, albeit at a slower rate.

Reason Number 4:

You have me back on seat. I will be taking a very active approach next year. I will not hesitate to remove underperforming stocks to be replaced with other stocks. I will go in strong and go in fast. No more holding back. No more shirking my responsibility.

Air asia vs Astro

Today i am writing about two companies in two different industries. One is in the aviation business and the other is in the entertainment industry.

Both companies are power houses and known to every Malaysian. Let us go through each company.

Air asia

The best low cost airline in South east asia currently. They have pioneered the low cost business model in Malaysia. They have actually changed the industrial landscape and made MAS scramble to keep up. Currently, they are penetrating other markets with their long haul flights to China, Korea and potentially other parts of the world. This counter is the darling of many funds; local and international.

I like that they are penetrating the long haul markets. They do have the money to purchase new planes and likely they have the expertise to make it a success. However, this business is not scalable. With every new route, they would require new planes. With new planes being purchased, this would burden them with higher borrowing or reduce their cash pile. Capital expenditure will likely increase in the years to come should they insist on this growth strategy.

They do not have a choice though. They have to grow beyond the Malaysian market.

With the imminent arrival of Malindo Airways into the Malaysian market in 2013, the pie that they are currently enjoying will likely shrink; they have already educated travelers that used buses/ cars as their mode of transport and converted them into using planes as their mode of transport. ( I used to drive from KL to Penang, but with Airasia, I use planes instead.) There is limited growth in terms of potential new travelers.

Current travelers are actually quite price conscious. They will go to the lowest priced airline. If Malindo Airways want to carve a market share, they are likely to reduce the price to either match or be lower than Air Asia. This is another business model that i dislike; price war.

Astro

99% of the household in Malaysia have Astro. They are currently moving towards the HDTV box set and most likely all will convert to HD. ( this is based on the assumption that most TVs sold are HD-ready. With an HD-ready TV, most subscribers will definitely switch to HD channels). Granted, they are spending more for marketing to educate and convert subscribers to HDTV and also spending too change the box-top. However these costs over the long run will be re-coupe.

I also like the fact that they have a monopoly of channels such as EPL or Wah Lai Toi; the channels most people watch. No other broadcaster have that ( caveat: IPTV could stream PPSTV which could cater to Wah Lai Toi, but i will get to that later)

The current capital expenditure that they are likely to incur is to shoot another satellite into space to increase their channel offerings and to improve their quality. However, a satellite cost as much as two planes, and the business is scalable. One satellite cost is likely to be lower over time as more subscribers convert to Astro while Air Asia could not. One plane can only serve a fixed amount of passengers.

There are still 50% of the current household that does not have Astro and likely to be in the rural areas. Astro is working hard to target them with prepaid cards to view content ( smart move as once you use the pre-paid card, you will likely to continue using Astro). Best of all, they are offering more malay content to target the Malay community. Once they secure the Malay content (like how they secured the Chinese market, no way will others be able to compete)

Their competitors are likely to be the following two:

Unifi/ Other broadcaster:
Potential threat? Likely no. They have crap for their content. EPL and Wah Lai Toi is secured and not many customers would want to watch Shanghai Dragons vs Shendong Tilapia as compared to Manchester United vs Liverpool.

IPTV
Yoonic in Malaysia; Mio in Singapore. All you need to do is plug in the decoder into your modem, and voila, you get to stream content onto your TV. Think Apple TV. Can they challenge Astro? Likely no. There are no content worth paying the price for. Of course if you really like China content or Taiwan or Spanish Telenovela yes please go ahead. or else it would be a waste of your time.

Illegal IPTV.
Porn would be the only saving grace. Or else it would be another waste of your time.

Thus, Astro has growth and value potential.

Both stocks are trading at less than RM3. I believe that Astro have the best potential with the same RM3 as compared to Air Asia.

15 things NEVER to say to your child

1. Call her "stupid" or "useless"
It's shocking that, in a fit of anger, many parents call their child "stupid" or "useless". Cruel words like these can remain etched in her mind for a lifetime.
2. Decide everything for her
Doing this can make her feel like she's being restricted and that she's not wise or intelligent enough to make her own choices.
3. Overemphasize the importance of obedience
Some parents do everything they can to raise an obedient child, but this can come at the expense of the parent-child relationship.
4. Don't show affection
When parents rarely show affection, the child may begin to question whether she is loved.
5. Discipline her when they are angry
Discipline should be carried out when the parents are calm. Caning or spanking the child shouldn't just be an immediate reaction to something she has done.
6. Show conditional (or seemingly conditional) love
Parents wound a child psychologically when they appear to show love and concern only when she performs well in school or when she's well behaved. Children need to know that their parents' love is unconditional.
7. Compare her with her siblings or with other children her age
Every child is unique, so she shouldn't be made to feel as if she's living in the shadow of someone else.
8. Praise her for her ability, instead of her effort
Praising the child for her commendable effort will encourage her to develop new skills and try out new things, instead of doing only the tasks that she has already proven her aptitude in.
9. Set boundaries but don't enforce them
Parents often set boundaries with regard to behaviour, sleeping time, household chores, etc. When these boundaries are not enforced, it causes the child to become confused and, possibly, defiant.
10. Allow their emotions to get the better of them
Based on my observations, the majority of parenting mistakes occur when parents fail to control their emotions. When parents allow negative emotions to get the better of them, it indirectly gives the child the permission to do the same. This manifests itself in the form of temper tantrums and teenage angst.
11. Attempt to achieve their unfulfilled dreams through her
Many parents live vicariously through their children. This can, however, be unhealthy. Parents who force their child to study certain subjects or pursue certain careers—against her wishes—can cause her to become angry and resentful.
12. Continually bail her out of trouble
For example, if a child forgets to bring her mathematics textbook to school and is threatened with punishment, many parents would bail her out by bringing the textbook to school for her. This kind of parenting, however, doesn't teach her to take full responsibility for her choices and her life.
13. End arguments by saying "I know what's best for you"
Parents use this phrase as a kind of trump card, but it's hardly ever effective. Instead, parents should express how much they love and care for their child, all while stressing the fact that choices come with consequences that she will have to bear.
14. Shield her from challenges and discomfort
It's completely natural for parents to do this, but it usually isn't best for the child's long-term development. Challenges, discomfort and struggle are necessary for her to find enduring success.
15. Allow her to become the center of the family's universe
Many parents allow the child's wants and needs to determine the entire family's schedule, plans, etc. But when this is taken to an extreme, the home environment can become hectic and stressful. Instead, parents should make the child realize that she is an important member of the family, but that the world does not revolve around her.
In closing…
Parenting isn't just about raising children. It's about empowering the next generation to be the best they can be, and to lay the foundation for a better future and a better world.
Such a noble and monumental task requires parents to continually reflect on their parenting style, so that they can improve as parents day by day.
To all of you parents reading this: I know you're up to the task.

Stupid stupid company

Air Fuel Synthesis has created fuel out of water. Their process is harnessing the carbon dioxide in water and turning it into fuel.

http://www.chinapost.com.tw/life/science-&-technology/2012/10/21/358367/Engineers-at.htm

Another startup in Princeton University called Liquid Light also made a similar breakthrough.

http://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S33/95/96G16/index.xml?section=featured

While i applaud their efforts to convert CO2 into fuel, and their quest for sustainable energy, i condemn their business stupidity. They are operating in the notion that this world is fair and the best innovators win and live like Tony Stark. ( i guess that is how every professor thinks of this world, it is either black or white; a or b)

Sorry to burst your bubbles, but this world is NOT fair, when you announce to the world that you are capable of producing fuel out of water, with your business still at its infancy, what do you think major oil companies like Rotal Ducth Shell or Exxon Mobil will do to u? they will likely choke off your funding and destroy u.

within the next two years, when your project delivers fuel at pump price or below pump price, it will adversely affect the major oil companies. Remember that their profit and their investment decision depends on the price of crude oil. You are now trying to kill off their business. Of course they will try to take you out first!

Gosh, you guys should have waited until you are ready for commercial use before announcing it to the world. Have you not learned from Apple? Only launch a product that you are ready to ship in the next 1-2 weeks. Dont be like Microsoft or RIM! Announce a new product that needs 2-3 months to ship.

Facebook Revenue Jumps, this is the power of Analysis

http://www.cnbc.com/id/49522459

Remember when i put up a posting saying that the selling down of Facebook shares are being overly done? Remember my argument saying that they will be able to penetrate the mobile market more effectively? Guess they have done it.

There are still a few more points that they should implement to ensure their growth is sustained but they are now growing at a very respectable rate. And if they implement my strategies, they WILL increase their profit by at least three fold.

As for stocks, with an eye on the US election and the Malaysian election, this month and the next would be at best muted, no stock purchase at the moment.

Yes, i know some people say that it is unwise to hold so much cash, it is painful to hold cash and let inflation eat into that pile, but it is even more painful to make a mistake and dumping your cash into an unprofitable investment venture.