Recently in Newshour with Jim Leherer in PBS, there was a segment about poverty and they showed two contrasting books that talks about poverty...
One was "White Man's Burden" by NYU professor William Easterly and the other was "The End of Poverty" by Columbia professor Jeffrey Sachs. The former book argues that the so called aid by "the West" is of not much use. The latter books basically says more aid is needed...
Here is an article "Can aid bring an end to poverty?" in BBC which talks more about this...
Sunday, October 15, 2006
Venture money flowing to India
Here is a Financial Times article about "Venture capitalists descend on India"...
A group of venture capital funds from the UK and continental Europe have completed a fact-finding visit to India in their first big show of interest in a market that has been dominated by US and domestic companies.
More than 50 delegates from European companies such as Logitech, 3i, SAP Ventures, Nokia Ventures, Advent Venture Partners and Sofinnova made the trip, said Nish Kotecha of The Indus Entrepreneurs, a business association and one of the organisers of the visit.
They had about €7bn-€10bn ($8.8bn-$12.5bn) to invest in the global technology sector, including in India, Mr Kotecha said.
"I'd expect a good number of investments to come out of this over the course of the next couple of years," he said.
"It could become 10 per cent [of the €10bn] quite quickly."
Unlike private equity investment, the venture capital industry remains in its infancy in India.
Read on...
A group of venture capital funds from the UK and continental Europe have completed a fact-finding visit to India in their first big show of interest in a market that has been dominated by US and domestic companies.
More than 50 delegates from European companies such as Logitech, 3i, SAP Ventures, Nokia Ventures, Advent Venture Partners and Sofinnova made the trip, said Nish Kotecha of The Indus Entrepreneurs, a business association and one of the organisers of the visit.
They had about €7bn-€10bn ($8.8bn-$12.5bn) to invest in the global technology sector, including in India, Mr Kotecha said.
"I'd expect a good number of investments to come out of this over the course of the next couple of years," he said.
"It could become 10 per cent [of the €10bn] quite quickly."
Unlike private equity investment, the venture capital industry remains in its infancy in India.
Read on...
Here is one important piece of information
Here is an article in Moneycentral about how important it is to leave the key information (passwords, bank and other investment accounts etc) about yourself to a trust or a will.
Here are some excerpts...
"There's no question that online banking, electronic bill payment and personal-finance software make our lives easier.
Read on...
Here are some excerpts...
"There's no question that online banking, electronic bill payment and personal-finance software make our lives easier.
But could we be creating a digital mess for our heirs when we die?
One poster on the Your Money message board shared her family's trauma when her father died without divulging the passwords to his computer or online accounts.
"I am the co-executor of the trust and the most financially savvy of my siblings, so it was up to me to help mom. But what do you do without passwords?" poster Tuppermom asked. "And most companies don't just give you access -- it is a process that can take weeks and months (if they don't just say 'Oh -- he's deceased? OK, we'll close the account' and then NO ONE has access!!)."
Tuppermom's family got lucky when it stumbled upon a folder that contained passwords for some of her father's work-related accounts and one of his online banks. That provided enough clues to find and gain entry to most of his other accounts. The family's lawyers helped them get access to the rest, although the process took time.
The experience was so traumatic that Tuppermom and her family revised their own estate plans to include complete lists of online IDs and passwords for each of their accounts. Concern about identity theft and security, she wrote, shouldn't go so far that family members are left in the dark."
Read on...
Welch's advice to MIT students
GE icon dishes out blunt, politically incorrect advice to MBA students...
"Don't fall in love with your workers," a business instructor tells a student who's launching a small startup company. "If you've got 16 employees, at least two are turkeys."
It's hardly the only piece of blunt, politically incorrect advice the charismatic teacher dishes out in a windowless basement classroom filled with 30 MBA candidates, many of them hoping to eventually become CEOs. Wearing a blue blazer and checked shirt, the baldheaded instructor stands in front of a lecture table, rather than behind, through most of the 90-minute session, sharing his management ideas with a preacher's fervor.
If it sounds like the instructor is copping an I've-seen-it-all attitude, it's because he has reason to. He's Jack Welch."
Read on...
Here are some of his Classroom Quotes...
"Don't fall in love with your workers," a business instructor tells a student who's launching a small startup company. "If you've got 16 employees, at least two are turkeys."
It's hardly the only piece of blunt, politically incorrect advice the charismatic teacher dishes out in a windowless basement classroom filled with 30 MBA candidates, many of them hoping to eventually become CEOs. Wearing a blue blazer and checked shirt, the baldheaded instructor stands in front of a lecture table, rather than behind, through most of the 90-minute session, sharing his management ideas with a preacher's fervor.
If it sounds like the instructor is copping an I've-seen-it-all attitude, it's because he has reason to. He's Jack Welch."
Read on...
Here are some of his Classroom Quotes...
iPod revolution
Here is a story about iPod's impact on the culture, commerce and coolness...
"The iPod arrived in October 2001, bringing the promise of pleasure to a world in transformation from its comforting analog roots to a disruptive digital future. But no one expected that the iPod would become the signature artifact of our young century, selling more than 60 million units in its first five years. No one envisioned vast swaths of humanity escaping reality via the White Earbud Express. And no one would ever have believed that a 2005 survey would report that the iPod is more popular on college campuses ... than beer."
Read on ...
"The iPod arrived in October 2001, bringing the promise of pleasure to a world in transformation from its comforting analog roots to a disruptive digital future. But no one expected that the iPod would become the signature artifact of our young century, selling more than 60 million units in its first five years. No one envisioned vast swaths of humanity escaping reality via the White Earbud Express. And no one would ever have believed that a 2005 survey would report that the iPod is more popular on college campuses ... than beer."
Read on ...
Micro Financing: Mohammed Yunus
Newsweek has been covering Grameen Bank extensively for the past decade... Here they are rightfully boasting their coverage about the bank, its founder and its pioneering work to help poor people out of poverty...
"From its humble beginnings more than 20 years ago as a new kind of lending institution that has made loans of as little as one dollar to poor people looking for simple ways-buying a cow, or some small farm equipment—to better their lives, the Grameen Banks of Bangladesh has become a major force in lifting people out of poverty. It’s not charity—the bank has been profitable in all but three years-but a lending revolution that has made a total of $5.72 billion in these “microcredit” loans. NEWSWEEK has been writing for years about Grameen and its founder, economist Mohammed Yunus, winners Friday of the Nobel Peace Prize. Below is some of our coverage:"
Read on ...
Here is a video about MicroFinancing from my professor Dr. Bhagwan Chowdhry... He discusses about how to make micro financing accessible to more down trodden villagers in poor countries like Bangladesh, India etc. He talks about the idea of "Village Money Lenders", with a different role than their notorious predecessors (who used to charge poor with an interest rate of 30-50% per day because of lack of collaterals) had. Money to these lenders (with reasonable collaterals) will be lended by bigger banks and these lenders will in turn lend smaller amounts to the poor people at a lower and reasonable interest rates...
Here is a BBC story about how poor peasants in India commit suicides because of huge debt...
"From its humble beginnings more than 20 years ago as a new kind of lending institution that has made loans of as little as one dollar to poor people looking for simple ways-buying a cow, or some small farm equipment—to better their lives, the Grameen Banks of Bangladesh has become a major force in lifting people out of poverty. It’s not charity—the bank has been profitable in all but three years-but a lending revolution that has made a total of $5.72 billion in these “microcredit” loans. NEWSWEEK has been writing for years about Grameen and its founder, economist Mohammed Yunus, winners Friday of the Nobel Peace Prize. Below is some of our coverage:"
Read on ...
Here is a video about MicroFinancing from my professor Dr. Bhagwan Chowdhry... He discusses about how to make micro financing accessible to more down trodden villagers in poor countries like Bangladesh, India etc. He talks about the idea of "Village Money Lenders", with a different role than their notorious predecessors (who used to charge poor with an interest rate of 30-50% per day because of lack of collaterals) had. Money to these lenders (with reasonable collaterals) will be lended by bigger banks and these lenders will in turn lend smaller amounts to the poor people at a lower and reasonable interest rates...
Here is a BBC story about how poor peasants in India commit suicides because of huge debt...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)