All for Entrepreneurs

Theoretical or Practical Marketing?

2011-09-08T08:26:00.004-03:00

Hello friends!

Yesterday I was talking with a coworker, who is studying Industrial Engineering, and he is taking a Marketing course. The interesting thing is that he asked me if I could help him to answer a question that his teacher had done:

For an entrepreneur or little business, is necessary to make a complete Marketing plan/strategy?

My immediate response was ... DEPENDS. To which my friend asked me the obvious question ... Depends on what? And my next response was: It depends if you want a theoretical answer (or book answer) or a practical one.

The theoretical answer is: Yes, anyway you should make a complete Marketing plan/strategy. Otherwise how could you get the most out of every dollar you invest in marketing. You should follow roughly the following:

1 .- What is the product / service will be offered.

2 .- What is the target market of the product / service.

3 .- What is the Marketing Mix "available" to the target market about my product.

4 .- Define the strategy according to the amount you will invest.

In my perception, the practical answer would be: Not necessarily, before you invest a single minute of your time in planning your Marketing plan/strategy you have to keep in mind how much you'll invest. And depending on that, you should spend the necessary time developing the plan, and obviously how perfect it is going to be (again depends on how much do you want to spend). So the practical procedure should be:

1 .- How are you going to invest.

2 .- What is the product / service will be offered.

3 .- What is the target market of the product / service.

4 .- What is the Marketing Mix available for my budget, my product and my target market.

But in addition I would add one point, often not mentioned in the books of Marketing, which is that any plan / strategy it is just a guide. Many times our product / service with which we believe is our target market has very weak relationship, and strangely other uses and markets appear that we had not thought of. And all the time invested in our plan we can not be recovered again.

Long Reflecting - Felipe Cubillos

2011-09-06T14:17:00.003-03:00

Long Reflecting - Felipe Cubillos.

I want to share with you these reflections of Felipe Cubillos, I believe that words are enough.

“What I learned in the race around the world” (regatta)

Hello everyone,

We are now less than 24 hours to finish the Race Round the World and when you open your computers we might have an advantage close to 150 miles and many of you will think that we already won this stage, end to end. We´d love to be that way, but experience teaches us to wait! Races are won and lost at the goal.

And here is a short summary of what I learned or reaffirmed throughout this time. I do it in first person because I don´t want to involve my friend in everything you´ll read below.

1.- About kids. Definitely not yours, just love them and try to educate by example and if you can transfer them to seek their own dreams, not yours. And do not expect thank you for everything you do; the appreciation will come many years later, maybe when you´ve become a grandfather / mother (then they will know just what it is to be a father / mother). But if in the meantime, they even say to you that they are proud to be your son / daughter, richly feel rewarded for that. And if one of them should leave before you, at least you´ll have the consolation that you said to them many times that you really love them.

2.- About parents, always thank them to brought you into this wonderful word and that they gave you the only chance to live, just that, Live!

3.- About the sea, wind and nature. Admire and protect it, is unique and we have no other. To the sea and wind, never try to beat no less challenge. They have everything to win. If you want to be a sailor, get used to living in permanent crisis.

4.- About limits. They do not exist or are far beyond what you think. How much further? That´s the question, you have to take yourself to the limits and there you´ll find it out.

5.- About talent. It is useless if not accompanied by determination, planning, discipline and perseverance. Talent is ephemeral, determination… Eternal!

6.- About love. Be thankful to Universe if you always wake up every single morning with a kiss and a smile. And do as bees and butterflies, they do not look for the prettiest flower in the garden, but one that has the highest content.

7.- About society. Helps those who are equally or more capable than you, but have not had your same opportunities. They are the most forgotten by the society, because it always helps those who ask and shout, but the ones that I mean, do not seek help, they just need a change. I still dream with a more just and more human society.

8.- About leadership. I miss in today´s world to those leaders that did what they should do and what should be said, without waiting immediate results in the polls. I refer to those that mark a path, not those who follow the masses.

9.- About wealth. Once you have funded your cash flow, try to buy more time than money, more freedom than slavery.

10.- About the anguish and bitterness. When you think something is not possible and the problems overwhelm you, that you cannot go further, take the time to expected to see the stars and waking dawn, there will always discover the sun rises, ALWAYS!

11.- About triumph. If you want to succeed you must be willing to fail a thousand times and willing to lose everything you´ve got. And do not be afraid to lose everything, because if you´ve earned rightly, you´ll recover it abundantly.

12.- About present. Live intensely, is the only moment that really matters. Those who cling to the past died, and those who live dreaming the future, yet unborn.

13.- About success and failure. Acknowledge them as two impostors, but especially learn from failure, own and those of others, there´s too much knowledge not generally used.

14.- About friends. Choose those who are with you when you´re in ground, because when you get the glory, you´ll be overrun.

15.- About team. Encourage them through the tough time and never allow one for failing to leave you, that´s the most important.

16.- About your Country. Love the land that gave you birth, work to make your country a better place for everyone, show and be proud of your flag, whenever it is (doesn´t matter if we are good or bad for soccer).

17.- About effort. Never surrender, don´t believe the story that when something is costing a lot is because it should not work, is simply that the Universe is testing you on whether or not you are worthy of success.

18.- About fear. Not fear, it´s a great teammate, but you don´t immobilize and not fear to play the fool or ridiculous; history teaches us that great discoveries are tremendous lessons and product of those moments.

19.- About God and Heaven. I think if we act in doing good, can be on the waiting list if heaven exists and if not, we will have our own Heaven on this Earth. And I did not found him only in the South Sea, in the clouds, storms, the waves, at the end or the beginning of the race. Was always with us, inside, deeply inside us.

20.- And when in doubt of what to do, ask yourself what is your Cape Horn, arm yourself with a small backpack to carry only enough to survive and begin to walk. And be sure to look at the sky, there discover the albatross that will teach you to fly off with effort and released. And you´ll realize you don´t need to fly in a flock.

21.- Never, never give up to your dreams! Pursue them passionately and if not succeed, no matter, that road that you made have been worth living and I hope your pursue the dream is the impossible dream.

22.- If you´re fortunate to one day compete with rivals the size we had to face in this regatta, honor them, admire them, but deliver all you have to beat them fair and square, they deserve it.

23.- If on the day of my death are given the choice to be reborn, I choose to be an Albatross to fly the South Sea and look at the intrepid sailors risking their lives and leave everything in search of their dreams, seeking their impossible dream.

24.- And never take too seriously a sailor who is finishing a race around the world. Only he will know to sail a little more, nothing more!

Felipe Cubillos

Re-Starting

2011-09-06T14:07:00.002-03:00

Hi guys, too long without writing here...
I was too bussy doing "daily stuff" that cape me out of this. So basically I´ll write the same kind of stuff and more "focused" on current things that I´m doing.
Actually I´m from Chile, we speak spanish, so I´ll duplicate the posts in spanish at http://thrust-management.blogspot.com/

See you later!

Team Communication Plan

2010-10-06T10:21:00.003-04:00

4 Steps to a Team Communication Plan.

The biggest complaints virtual teams have revolve around communication: how much, when and how do we talk amongst ourselves? So you’d think more team leaders would put together communication plans and stick to them. It’s amazing that so few teams have explicit, well-thought-out communication plans, and even fewer actually stick to them … wait, you mean you don’t have one? Well, it’s time to develop one. Here are four tips for creating a plan — and then working that plan until it’s second nature:

1.- Create the plan as a team. The team needs to tell you (and each other) how they want to keep information flowing. Don’t just impose order on the chaos — let them work it out with each other. It’s important that they create rules about issues like response time to emails, who needs to be CCed on communication and the like, so they (and you) can hold each other responsible. If a team member misses a conference call, for example, they need to know they’re responsible for reading the notes or listening to the recording, or at the very least find out what happened — no excuses. If there is explicit commitment, it’s easier to hold people accountable — after all, it was their idea. And be explicit about your assumptions. Concepts like “stay in touch daily” or “return emails as soon as possible” are too vague and open to individual interpretation.

2.- Decide together which tools to use, and for what. The team should decide which technology tools they’ll use for which purposes. During these discussions, you’ll hear whether there are concerns about effectiveness, whether anyone needs training on the tools and who is likely to be an early adopter — all critical information for you as a leader and coach.

3.- Recognize those who follow the plan, gently nudge those who don’t. A plan is only going to be effective if everyone sticks to it. Once the plan is in place, don’t be afraid to coach people who stray. if the goal is one all-hands teleconference a week, find out why people are scheduling other activities for that time and then make sure they know they’re needed on that call. If they’re posting questions and answers to the forums on your intranet, thank them and encourage others to participate. If they’re not, ask them why not. This is the surest way for people to learn that their teammates can be depended on — or not. Be especially clear about catching up on anything a teammate might have missed by checking meeting minutes, recordings of conference calls and other ways to stay current so that you’re not constantly going over old ground.

4.- Model, reinforce and constantly refer to the plan. An effective communication plan can’t be put in place once and never referred to again. If team members are constantly reminded about expectations and are coached to meet them, and you as the leader model them, they’re out of excuses for not stepping up themselves. If, on the other hand, you are constantly rescheduling one-on-one conversations, spending the first half of your meetings filling in those who missed previous calls, and privately answering questions from individuals that should be shared with the team, your team will do the same.

With remote team communication, you have to plan your communication and communicate your plan.

Value Innovation:: The Kano Model

2010-03-17T08:07:00.003-03:00

Innovation is consistently delivering exceptional value to the most important customer in the value chain.

The Kano Model is a survey process that allows you to categorize customer solutions and needs according to the level of excitement created in the customer. The Kano model asks customers to rate their level of excitement when a feature of the solution is present and when the feature is not present. The gap in excitement allows the feature to be classified as a “must have”, “delighter” or something in between. This process can also be used on customer needs statements, but the Outcome Driven Innovation is more robust and yields more comprehensive results, therefore, the Innovation EFA recommends using Kano only for concept testing.

Steps to applying the Kano Model:

–Inputs to the Kano model
–Constructing a Kano Survey
–Analyzing Survey Data
–Kano Classification
Part 1 – Using the Kano Matrix
Part 2 – Determining Overall Classification
–Opportunities for Segmentation
–Four Block Analysis

In other words, the Kano Model is a helpful tool for the Idea Generation/Evaluation.

New Air Conditioning Revolution?

2009-05-28T22:16:00.003-04:00

It´s interesting to follow the recent post that I wrote, and to know that there are new interesting ways to "up date" or renovate our air conditioning and cooling systems. As the previous post we were talking about new materials for "Creating" Cooling, at this link we can take a look to other way to do this. It is similar to how photovoltaic cells work,

Just Take a Look.

http://www.tetech.com/FAQ-Technical-Information.html#1

New cooling idea

2009-05-14T23:09:00.004-04:00

As we wrote in a 2008 post, we can innovate over a new technology to deliver comfort and cooling capacity using "new ideas" for this. Please read the next article.

Your refrigerator’s humming, electricity-guzzling cooling system could soon be a lot smaller, quieter and more economical thanks to an exotic metal alloy discovered by an international collaboration working at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)’s Center for Neutron Research (NCNR).

The alloy may prove to be a long-sought material that will permit magnetic cooling instead of the gas-compression systems used for home refrigeration and air conditioning. The magnetic cooling technique, though used for decades in science and industry, has yet to find application in the home because of technical and environmental hurdles—but the NIST collaboration may have overcome them.

Magnetic cooling relies on materials called magnetocalorics, which heat up when exposed to a powerful magnetic field. After they cool off by radiating this heat away, the magnetic field is removed, and their temperature drops again, this time dramatically. The effect can be used in a classic refrigeration cycle, and scientists have attained temperatures of nearly absolute zero this way. Two factors have kept magnetic cooling out of the consumer market: most magnetocalorics that function at close to room temperature require both the prohibitively expensive rare metal gadolinium and arsenic, a deadly toxin.

But conventional gas-compression refrigerators have their own drawbacks. They commonly use hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), greenhouse gases that can contribute to climate change if they escape into the atmosphere. In addition, it is becoming increasingly difficult to improve traditional refrigeration. “The efficiency of the gas cycle has pretty much maxed out,” said Jeff Lynn of NCNR. “The idea is to replace that cycle with something else.”

The alloy the team has found—a mixture of manganese, iron, phosphorus and germanium—is not merely the first near-room-temperature magnetocaloric to contain neither gadolinium nor arsenic—rendering it both safer and cheaper—but also it has such strong magnetocaloric properties that a system based on it could rival gas compression in efficiency.

Working alongside (and inspired by) visiting scientists from the Beijing University of Technology, the team used NIST’s neutron diffraction equipment to analyze the novel alloy. They found that when exposed to a magnetic field, the newfound material’s crystal structure completely changes, which explains its exceptional performance.“Understanding how to fine-tune this change in crystal structure may allow us to get our alloy’s efficiency even higher,” says NIST crystallographer Qing Huang. “We are still playing with the composition, and if we can get it to magnetize uniformly, we may be able to further improve the efficiency.”

Members of the collaboration include scientists from NIST, Beijing University of Technology, Princeton University and McGill University. Funding for the project was provided by NIST.

Creativity in crisis time

2009-05-11T21:43:00.001-04:00

A German Campaign for the Sparkasse Bank, using the actual crisis time, it shows a strong insight message: Throwing your pennies to a fountain to ask for a wish. Do you copy? :” Wishes? Rather invest your money safely.

Now a days when we spoke about worldwide crisis, the opinions are very wide: invest, wait, to low expenses, discounts, strategies, etc. The point where every opinion converge is that 2009 woun´t be easy. Creativity will be helpful to pass this, using innovative ways to publish your “adds” or to communicate to your costumers, using furniture and media at lower money costs but at high “mind” costs. Take a look at what´s new, here I present these two brilliant ideas.

Got the big picture???

GE: Crisis opportunities

2009-04-28T13:27:00.003-04:00

As Einstein said, a crisis time is an opportunity time. Now is when you must look out to make the right choices and take action, invest today when everybody is running out is when the BIG GUYS are getting in: Warren Buffet, George Soros, etc. Get the big picture?

A hint for you, have you saw the GE (General Electric) shares price? If your answer is no, just take a look now:

What do you see? GE shares prices are as low as 13 years! Is know that GE moves cyclic, so… get it?

Just take a look to this kind of companies, take a look to everything surrounding you. There are a lot of possibilities, and please do not run away like everybody does. Good luck and keep on watching what´s happening!

Invisibility it´s a real reality?

2009-03-07T15:58:00.001-03:00

Numerous Sci-Fi movies we can watch people turning invisible like a magik trick.By now, cientists have discovered some materials which molecular structure make them possible to "turn" the light to pass bording an spheric object and it will not can be seen.These fibers are called "MetaMaterials", and they are capable to virtually make objects invisible to someone looking infront of them
This video is from a latin TV program (the video is in spanish), just take a look folks!

For Innovators, There Is Brainpower in Numbers

2009-02-25T21:01:00.001-03:00

Despitethe enduring myth of the lone genius, innovation does not take place in isolation. Truly productive invention requires the meeting of minds from myriad perspectives, even if the innovators themselves don’t always realize it.

Keith Sawyer, a researcher at Washington University in St. Louis, calls this “group genius,” and in his book of the same name he introduces a scientific method called interaction analysis to the study of creativity. Through studying verbal cues, body language and incremental adjustments during team innovation efforts, Mr. Sawyer shows that what we experience as a flash of insight has actually percolated in social interaction for quite some time.
“Innovation today isn’t a sudden break with the past, a brilliant insight that one lone outsider pushes through to save the company,” he says. “Just the opposite: innovation today is a continuous process of small and constant change, and it’s built into the culture of successful companies.”
It’s a perspective shared broadly in corporate America. Ed Catmull, president of Pixar Animation Studios and Disney Animation Studios, describes what he calls “collective creativity” in a cover article in the September issue of Harvard Business Review. “Creativity involves a large number of people from different disciplines working together to solve a great many problems,” he writes. “Creativity must be present at every level of every artistic and technical part of the organization.”
So, we all should brainstorm our way through the day, right? Wrong. That classic tool introduced by Alex Osborn in 1948 has been proved in a number of studies over the last 20 years to be far less effective than generally believed. “He had it right in terms of group process,” says Drew Boyd, a businessman based in Cincinnati who blogs and speaks often about innovation. “But he had it wrong in terms of the method.”
Brainstorming, Mr. Boyd says, is the most overused and underperforming tool in business today. Traditionally, brainstorming revolves around the false premise that to get good ideas, a group must generate a large list from which to cherry-pick. But researchers have shown repeatedly that individuals working alone generate more ideas than groups acting in concert. Among the problems are these: Throwing in an idea for public consideration generates fear of failure, and workers looking to advance their own interests often keep their best ideas to themselves until a more opportune time.
Instead of identifying a problem and then seeking solutions, Mr. Boyd suggests turning the process around: break down successful products and processes into separate components, then study those parts to find other potential uses. This process of “systematic inventive thinking,” which evolved from the work of the Russian engineer and scientist Genrich Altschuller, creates “pre-inventive” ideas that then can be expanded into innovations.
Kapro Tools, working with an Israeli company called Systematic Inventive Thinking, used the method to create a new type of bubble level calibrated to help build gentle slopes to improve drainage. Previously, construction workers approximated the slope they wanted by placing a nail or other object under the edge of a standard level.
“Innovation is a team sport,” Mr. Boyd says. “There’s a dynamic that happens between people that produces results I just don’t see with an individual.”
Even Albert Einstein, society’s most common mental picture of genius, needed group input to hone his insights. According to “Einstein’s Mistakes” by Hans Ohanian, the great physicist’s derivation of the famous equation E=mc2 contained several errors; it wasn’t until 1911 that another scientist, Max von Laue, developed a full and correct proof.
“The best innovations occur when you have networks of people with diverse backgrounds gathering around a problem,” says Robert Fishkin, president and chief executive of Reframeit Inc., a Web 2.0 company that creates virtual space in a Web browser where users can share comments and highlights on any site. “We need to get better at collaborating in noncompetitive ways across company and organizational lines.”
THAT’S exactly what innovators at a dozen health care systems throughout the country had in mind nearly four years ago when they formed the Innovation Learning Network, says its director, Chris McCarthy. The problem, he says, is that there are so few health care innovators within each organization that introducing technologies and processes can be painstakingly slow. “We thought if we could get all these experienced folks together to push each other’s thinking continually, we’d all be better off,” he says.
What started as a grant-financed, one-year trial is now a member-financed permanent network, he says. The members bring in new technologies and experiment with them in a faux clinical setting in San Leandro, Calif.,. One of the first large-scale initiatives to arise from the network is KP MedRite, an effort at Kaiser Permanente’s 32 hospitals to ensure that nurses are not interrupted while dispensing medications. Other member health care systems have already begun to introduce the program at their sites.
By using the group’s knowledge and experience, Kaiser Permanente accomplished in less than a year what would have required roughly two years to do without the network, Mr. McCarthy says. “It was a huge jump-start for us,” he says. “The group effort allows us to move much more quickly and become successful much faster.”

This article was extracted form the NY Times.

Marketing Evolution

2009-02-18T11:16:00.002-03:00

This video show a little an a simple resume, how marketing were changing in the last 60 years.

Google Adwords 3: Making money with google

2009-02-15T13:14:00.001-03:00

I have spent a lot of money developing products, services and ideas that nobody wanted to buy.

A huge waste of resources, specially if we consider in how many other “bad” ideas the people continue and will continue developing and spending their money.

If you understand how to use google AdWords, never ever you will need to invest a huge amount of money, just a few dollars… in the worst cases just a couple of hundreds if you still insist in an idea that does not work.

If you have a product idea and the product developing costs around U$2.500 and you are sure that these product is a good idea and it solve a complex problem.

So now write a little electronic manual (it does not have to be extended) about whom to solve that problem. Create an opt-in web page (this is optative register) where people can get your manual free, just they have to share their contact information. Then just buy a few key words, write some ads, send people to that information webpage and look how many people register to get that report.

Now, if nobody registers in that page… sincerely it is a great sign to abandon the project or reformulate it completely, before to spent more money. But when people register, you can communicate with them and ask for what they are looking for. This can give you a great feedback!

This process will help you to validate if the problem that you are trying to solve is relevant to the consumers, or in the worst case it will allow you to see which problems are most important to them.

Another application for AdWords. Market Investigation.

Just buy a few key words, write two ads (one for every key word). After one week or a month you will have 5.000 clicks that they would have cost you no more than U$750.

Now you will have information about your consumers: what they really made in relation of your proposals.

Just better and cheaper than a market investigation made by a company “specialized” in that area.

Invention & Innovation in Crisis Time

2009-02-07T23:14:00.003-03:00

We do not try that the thingsthey change if always we dothe same”. The crisis is the best oneblessing that can happen to him to peopleand countries because the crisis brings progresses.The creativity is born from the anguishas the day is born at night dark.It is in the crisis that is born the inventiveness,discoveries and high strategy.Who surpasses the crisis is surpassed to ifsame without being “surpassed”. Who it attributes to the crisis their failures and shortages do violence to their own talent and respect more to the problems than to the solutions. The true crisis is the crisis of incompetence. The problem of the people and the countries are the laziness to find the exits and solutions.Without crisis there are no challenges, without challenges the life is a routine, a slow agony. Without crisis there are no merits. It is in the crisis where the best thing of each arises, because without crisis all wind is caress.To speak of crisis is to promote it, and to be silent in the crisis is to raise the conformism. Instead of this we work hard.We in one go end the unique threatening crisis that is the tragedy of not wanting to fight to surpass it.

Albert Einstein

THE NARCISSUSES PRINCIPLE

2009-02-05T16:40:00.003-03:00

My daughter me had telephoned several times, to say to me: “Mother, you must come to see the narcissuses before they finish.” I wished to go, but it was a way of two hours from Lagoon to Lake Arrowhead. “I will go east Tuesday”, I promised to him with certain renuencia, when it called by third time.Tuesday dawned cold and rainy. Nevertheless, I was fiance', and I handled until there grudgingly. When finally I entered the house of Carolina, the joyful sounds of happy children gave the welcome me. Enchanted, I embraced and I greeted my grandsons.“It forgets the narcissuses, Carolina! The way is invisible with these clouds and this fog, and there is nothing in this world, except you and these small ones, who I wish to see so much as to handle one inch more”My daughter smiled calmadamente and said: “We handled all along in these conditions, Mother.” “Good”, I assured to him, “you will not make me return to the way but until he clarifies, and then he will be for directing house to me”“But, first, we are going to see the narcissuses. They are only a few pictures,” said Carolina. “I will handle, I am customary to this.”
“Carolina”, I said firmly, “please.” “You do not worry, Mother, everything is well, I assure it to you. You would never be forgiven haberte lost this experience.”After about twenty minutes, we doubled to a narrow gravel road and saw a small temple. The other side of the temple, I saw a signboard handmade, with shoots with an arrow, that said: “Garden of Narcissuses.” We leave the car, each took to a small one from the hand, and I followed Carolina by the footpath. Then, when doubling a curve, I watched and I was agape. In front of me it was the most glorious view. (PHOTO)

It seemed as if somebody had taken an enormous bathtub from gold and it would have spilled it on the summit of the mount and its slopes. The flowers were planted in majestic crowded around designs, great strips and strips of orange intense, white creamy, yellow a sallow one, salmon pink, added saffron to and yellow butter. Each variety of different color was planted in great groups, in such a way that they were crowded around and they undulated like a single river, with his own and unique shade. There were five acres of flowers, two hectares and average.“Who did this? ”, I asked to him Carolina. “A woman nothing else”, responded Carolina to me. “She lives in this land. That one is its house.” Carolina indicated a well-taken care of good house with a structure in A, small and modestly seated in the middle of all that glory. We walk until the house.In the patio, we saw a signboard. “Answers to Preguntas that I Know that You are doing”, said the headed one. The first answer was a simple one: “50, 000 bulbs.” The second answer was: “One simultaneously, by a woman. Two hands, two feet and a brain.” The third answer was: “It began in 1958.”
For me, that moment was a experience-that-change-the-life. I thought about this woman to whom never was well-known, that, more ago than forty years had begun to bring, a bulb every time, its vision of beauty and joy to a dark top of a mount. Planting a bulb every time, year after year, this unknown woman had changed for always the world in which she lived. A day every time, she had created something of extraordinary magnificencia, beauty and inspiration. The principle that its Garden of Narcissuses taught is one of the great principles to celebrate. (PHOTO)

That is to say, to learn to every time move towards our goals and desires to us a step - to slight it only spent of baby every time and to learn to love doing, to learn to use the accumulation of time. When we multiplied very small spaces of time with small increases of daily effort, we will find that we can realize magnificent things. We can change the world…“To Me it puts sad, in certain way”, I admitted to Carolina. “What would be obtained I if I had thought about a wonderful goal do about thirty and five or forty years, and would be I worked that goal `a bulb every time' through all those years? Nothing else it thinks about which I had realized”My daughter summarized the message of the day in her usual direct way: “She begins tomorrow”, said.It was in the certain thing. She is so without sense to think about the lost hours of yesterday. The way to make the learning a lesson of celebration instead of a cause of weighing is to ask nothing else: “How I can use this today”

Use the Principle Narcissus. You do not hope…

Until your car or your house is paid.
Until you obtain to a new car or house.
Until you finish the school.
Until you return to the school.
Until you clean your house.
Until you organize your garage.
Until you clean your writing-desk.
Until you lower five kilos.
Until you raise five kilos.
Until you marry.
Until you divorce.
Until you have children.
Until the children go to the school.
Until your children go away of the house.
Until you retire.
Until the spring.
Until the summer.
Until the autumn.
Until the winter.
Until you die…

There is no better time than now to be happy. The happiness is a trip, not a destiny.Thus, it works as if you did not need money. Mistress as if you had been hurt never. Dance as if nobody was watching to you. If you want to illuminate and to cheer the day to him somebody, pass this to somebody special one. I finish doing it! I wish a precious day you, a day narcissus. You are not scared of which your life finishes, ten fear of which does not begin.

--Anonymous--

More With Google AdWords

2009-02-04T20:30:00.000-03:00

The business mission of Google Inc. was to construct a mechanism or search algorithm which present information to who is seeking for it, but exactly what you are looking for as fast as possible.

They develop an algorithm capable to calculate who visit web sites and why, with that information they refine their own search engine.

So… when google start to sell ads over the pay per click mode, they where so interested that the ads where relevant for the advertisers and they run over the same idea that the search engine.

It works this way: Google award you if you are relevant y allow people looking for information vote in you. If your ad is “clicked”, so you are relevant. If not, you aren´t. That simple it is.

When higher is you Click Through Rate (CTR), these mean when more people look at your ad and they click it you will pay less for the clicks. But if your ads are with low relevance, google will make you pay a lot for that click. This creates a “Darwinian” effect, award to the professionals and let amateurs out of business.

So, what is good for google clients is good for google and also for you.

A Trivial change can diminish your cost by key Word in 90%.
Why the auction price is not the real price that you pay and the huge difference that this makes for you?

What to do when your key words appear as inactive?
The price that you establish for the key word auction (bid price) almost never is the price that you really pay. Always you pay less than it.

You really are paying one cent more compared to the immediately position (down of yours), not the maximum price that you are allow to pay.

But there are another “secret” more important that is a key to get lower and lower prices, doesn´t matter how many “players” are in the game.

Your Click Through Rate is much more important than the price that you allow to pay for every click.

If 100 people search, your ad will be shown 100 times and if only 1 person click in your ad, your CTR is 1%. Simple.

Suppose you have 1% CTR and you will pay just U$1,00 for the second position. Now suppose that your CTR is 2% now. If you make the right things, you must only pay U$0,51 for every click in the second position, living you a free 3rd position.

In other words, you is twice more relevant and for that, you will pay only the half. Contrary, if I would like to have your position I will have to pay one cent more than your double, that is U$1,01 for every click!

The rules of the game are simple, and their impact is enormous.
When you get high CTR rates, your costs will go down, down, your ad will stabilize in the same position in the page and the amount of visits in your site will grow.

The difference could be amazing.

CD DVD Recycling

2009-01-26T09:52:00.003-03:00

Each year, billions of compact discs (CDs, CDr’s and DVDs) are produced, while millions of them are reaching our landfills and incinerators. Why are they not getting recycled? Because most people don’t know what to do with them! Please play your part in helping to save our environment by starting to recycle your old and unwanted discs today. It’s simple to set up your own compact disc recycling program in your home or office.

A Compact Disc is made from a 1.2 mm thick disc of almost pure polycarbonate plastic and weighs approximately 16 grams. The physical components are defined as--moving from the centre outwards--centre hole, first transition area, clamping area, second transition area, information area, rim. These are also identified as spindle hole, clamping ring, stacking ring, mirror band, data area, rim.

A thin layer of aluminium or, more rarely, gold is applied to the surface to make it reflective, and is protected by a film of lacquer. The lacquer is normally spin coated directly on top of the reflective layer. On top of that surface, the label print is applied. Common printing methods for CDs are screen-printing and offset printing.

The Policarbonate of the CD/DVD discs are an optical degree Policarbonate (arround 2.000 U$/Ton), so recycling this kind of polymer could be a great business. Also the recuperation of the aluminium, gold and silver could be interesting for this recycling industry.

The YouTube video show a simple process which can be made at home (taking the cautions of using strong acids). The video do not share the "magic liquid" but I made at home several tests and that liquid is Nitric Acid concentrated (HNO3).

Diagram of CD layers.

A. A polycarbonate disc layer has the data encoded by using bumps.

B. A reflective layer reflects the laser back.

C. A lacquer layer is used to prevent oxidation.

D. Artwork is screen printed on the top of the disc.

E. A laser beam reads the polycarbonate disc, is reflected back, and read by the player.

e-volve !

2009-01-21T17:04:00.004-03:00

I thought people would simply use the service to buy and sell things, but what they really enjoyed was meeting other people. (Pierre Omidyar, Founder, eBay).

Searching … Searching… reads the message at the bottom of my screen. It seems emblematic of the state of the world. Everywhere I turn, I find people who want to know what the internet really means for their future and what they must do to succeed.

Internet is a revolutionary technology that cannot be ignored or avoided. New economic and organizational forces stemming from the rise of the Internet affect more than just those people and companies whose work centers around the World Wide Web. These forces have an impact on workplaces of all kinds, reaching non-computer users as well as avid techies. The Internet has the potential to transform every economic and social institution, from business to education to health care to government.

“ A must-read for all who care about the future”

People and organizations at every stage of internet sophistication face the same burning question: How should they change in order to succeed in a digital world?

Renowned thinker and business trailblazer Rosabeth Moss Kanter says answers will be found not in cyberspace but on the ground, where real people connect, collaborate, and form thriving human communities. In this eye-opening book, Kanter explores what she calls “e-culture” – a new wat of living and working that will transform every aspect of today´s organizations.

Kanter argues that networks of relationships, not just new technologies, permit speed and seamlessness, encourage creativity and collaboration, and release energy and brainpower – the “soul” of e-business. And every organization – from dotcoms to dotcom-enablers (technology and service providers) to wannadots (traditional companies struggling to embrace the Web) – must lead to build and foster them.

Based on a landmark project with a rare on-site access, over 300 interviews, and 785 company global survey, Evolve! Provides a hands on blueprint for adopting the core principles of e-cultrue: treat strategy as improvisational theater; nurture networks of partners; reconstruct organizations as online and offline “communities”; and attract and retain top talent.

With colorful and memorable stories, Kanter illuminates vast differences between older, more conservative companies and aggressive, born-digital dotcoms. She takes us deep inside evolving organizations – including IBM, eBay, Reuters, Sun Microsystems, Razorfish, Abuzz, barnesandnoble.com, Williams-Sonoma, and pioneering public schools – to provide best practices from e-culture pacesetters and cautionary lessons from internet laggards. Defining the skills leaders need to master change, she reveals how dotcoms and dotcomenablers can grow fast while crafting a great culture, and how wannadots can benefit by becoming Web-enabled.

For anyone who wants to realize the potential and avoid the pitfalls od the Internet Age, this pathbreaking book identifies and analyzes the emergence of e-culture – and provide a lively, rool-up-your-sleeves guide to profiting from tomorrow.

More Words for Motivation

2009-01-21T11:43:00.005-03:00

"The truth is, whether you know it or not, your thoughts are responsible for whatever place or situation you are in right now."

"Any self-improvement program or journey of personal development starts with your thoughts. Master your thoughts first. Then you can master your environment and circumstances."

"Dreamers chart their own course and destiny. Dreamers are always striving to be the person they were meant to be and are not afraid to be different."

"I am here to tell you that there is another way. It’s not for everyone. It’s not the only way. It’s not the easier way. Actually, it is more likely to be the harder way. But I guarantee you it is the best way. It is simply this – follow your dreams."

"We cannot exhaust the creative power of our minds."

"If your mind can accept that something is achievable, it will find a way to attain that thing."

"Your potential as a human being…is unlimited. You have within you the ability to become and to achieve anything you want."

"Your vision is limited only by you. The problem is that you don’t know what you should be. It’s not your fault, really: your education has messed you up. It has taken your boundless potential and shrunk it and shaped it into a narrow title."

"If something is widely accepted and everyone is doing it, it is probably better for you as a dreamer not to do it."

"It is your responsibility to get the correct knowledge so you can have the correct road map of life. Ignorance is no defense. Ignorance will kill you."

"The truth is that while you are not totally responsible for what does and doesn’t happen to you, you are responsible for how you respond to what happens to you."

"There is a big difference between wishing and being a dreamer. Dreamers design their ideal life and work to achieve it everyday. They don’t believe in chance or luck. Wishers wait on a genii to grant their three wishes all their lives. The problem is, if the genii were to ever show up they still wouldn’t know what to wish for!"

"It may seem hard to take full responsibility for your life, but ultimately you will find it is the single most empowering decision you will ever make."

"There is a reason why a lot of people don’t believe in positive thinking and that kind of thing. It is simply that they do not want to face the fact that their lives are totally in their own hands and they are afraid of the immense potential and results if they do so."

"The amount of effort it takes to fail is the same amount of effort it takes to succeed as far as the mind is concerned. It is your responsibility to provide it with the right seeds of thought."

I-Nvention 1 Month of life.

2009-01-18T18:28:00.005-03:00

Dear friends, followers and visitors. Today (19^th of January) we have 1 month of life, and in this occasion we want to be thankful to you.

We have 371 page views, 247 visitors and more than 35 countries readers.

Here we present you our statistics, and very proud of that.

Thanks for all of you to make this site, an special and interesting place to share our thoughts and ideas to help entrepreneurs and business people (also to present our I-Nventions and other stuff).

The Power and the Glory

2009-01-18T14:04:00.003-03:00

The article was published on The Economist on June 19th 2008

The next technology boom may well be based on alternative energy, says Geoffrey Carr . But which sort to back?

EVERYONE loves a booming market, and most booms happen on the back of technological change. The world's venture capitalists, having fed on the computing boom of the 1980s, the internet boom of the 1990s and the biotech and nanotech boomlets of the early 2000s, are now looking around for the next one. They think they have found it: energy.

Many past booms have been energy-fed: coal-fired steam power, oil-fired internal-combustion engines, the rise of electricity, even the mass tourism of the jet era. But the past few decades have been quiet on that front. Coal has been cheap. Natural gas has been cheap. The 1970s aside, oil has been cheap. The one real novelty, nuclear power, went spectacularly off the rails. The pressure to innovate has been minimal.

In the space of a couple of years, all that has changed. Oil is no longer cheap; indeed, it has never been more expensive. Moreover, there is growing concern that the supply of oil may soon peak as consumption continues to grow, known supplies run out and new reserves become harder to find.

The idea of growing what you put in the tank of your car, rather than sucking it out of a hole in the ground, no longer looks like economic madness. Nor does the idea of throwing away the tank and plugging your car into an electric socket instead. Much of the world's oil is in the hands of governments who have little sympathy with the rich West. When a former head of America's Central Intelligence Agency allies himself with tree-hugging greens that his outfit would once have suspected of subversion, you know something is up. Yet that is one tack James Woolsey is trying in order to reduce his country's dependence on imported oil.

The price of natural gas, too, has risen in sympathy with oil. That is putting up the cost of electricity. Wind- and solar-powered alternatives no longer look so costly by comparison. It is true that coal remains cheap, and is the favoured fuel for power stations in industrialising Asia. But the rich world sees things differently. In theory, there is a long queue of coal-fired power stations waiting to be built in America. But few have been completed in the past 15 years and many in that queue have been put on hold or withdrawn, for two reasons. First, Americans have become intolerant of large, polluting industrial plants on their doorsteps. Second, American power companies are fearful that they will soon have to pay for one particular pollutant, carbon dioxide, as is starting to happen in other parts of the rich world. Having invested heavily in gas-fired stations, only to find themselves locked into an increasingly expensive fuel, they do not want to make another mistake.

That has opened up a capacity gap and an opportunity for wind and sunlight. The future price of these resources--zero--is known. That certainty has economic value as a hedge, even if the capital cost of wind and solar power stations is, at the moment, higher than that of coal-fired ones.

The reasons for the boom, then, are tangled, and the way they are perceived may change. Global warming, a long-range phenomenon, may not be uppermost in people's minds during an economic downturn. High fuel prices may fall as new sources of supply are exploited to fill rising
demand from Asia. Security of supply may improve if hostile governments are replaced by friendly ones and sources become more diversified. But none of the reasons is likely to go away entirely.

Global warming certainly will not. "Peak oil", if oil means the traditional sort that comes cheaply out of holes in the ground, probably will arrive soon. There is oil aplenty of other sorts (tar sands, liquefied coal and so on), so the stuff is unlikely to run out for a long time yet. But it will get more expensive to produce, putting a floor on the price that is way above today's. And political risk will
always be there--particularly for oil, which is so often associated with bad government for the simple reason that its very presence causes bad government in states that do not have strong institutions to curb their politicians.

A PRIZE BEYOND THE DREAMS OF AVARICE

The market for energy is huge. At present, the world's population consumes about 15 terawatts of power. (A terawatt is 1,000 gigawatts, and a gigawatt is the capacity of the largest sort of coal-fired power station.) That translates into a business worth $6 trillion a year--about a tenth of the world's economic output--according to John Doerr, a venture capitalist who is heavily involved in the industry.

And by 2050, power consumption is likely to have risen to 30 terawatts. Scale is one of the important differences between the coming energy boom, if it materialises, and its recent predecessors--particularly those that relied on information technology, a market measured in mere hundreds of billions. Another difference is that new information technologies tend to be disruptive, forcing the replacement of existing equipment, whereas, say, building wind farms does not force the closure of coal-fired power stations.

For both of these reasons, any transition from an economy based on fossil fuels to one based on renewable, alternative, green energy--call it what you will--is likely to be slow, as similar changes have been in the past. On the other hand, the scale of the market provides opportunities for alternatives to prove themselves at the margin and then move into the mainstream, as is happening with wind power at the moment. And some energy technologies do have the potential
to be disruptive. Plug-in cars, for example, could be fuelled with electricity at a price equivalent to 25 cents a litre of petrol. That could shake up the oil, carmaking and electricity industries all in one go.

The innovation lull of the past few decades also provides opportunities for technological leapfrogging. Indeed, it may be that the field of energy gives the not-quite-booms in biotechnology and nanotechnology the industrial applications they need to grow really big, and that the three aspiring booms will thus merge into one.

The possibility of thus recapturing the good times of their youth has brought many well-known members of the "technorati" out of their homes in places like Woodside, California. Energy has become supercool. Elon Musk, who co-founded PayPal, has developed a battery-powered sports
car. Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the founders of Google, have started an outfit called Google.org that is searching for a way to make renewable energy truly cheaper than coal (or RE<C, as they describe it to their fellow geeks).

Vinod Khosla, one of the founders of Sun Microsystems, is turning his considerable skills as a venture capitalist towards renewable energy, as are Robert Metcalfe, who invented the ethernet system used to connect computers together in local networks, and Mr Doerr, who works at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, one of Silicon Valley's best-known venture-capital firms. Sir Richard Branson, too, is getting in on the act with his Virgin Green Fund.

This renewed interest in energy is bringing forth a raft of ideas, some bright, some batty, that is indeed reminiscent of the dotcom boom. As happened in that boom, most of these ideas will come to naught. But there could just be a PayPal or a Google or a Sun among them. More traditional companies are also taking an interest. General Electric (GE), a large American engineering firm, already has a thriving wind-turbine business and is gearing up its solar-energy business. The energy researchers at its laboratories in Schenectady, New York, enjoy much of the intellectual freedom associated with start-up firms, combined with a secure supply of money. Meanwhile, BP and Shell, two of the world's biggest oil companies, are sponsoring both academic researchers and new, small firms with bright ideas, as is DuPont, one of the biggest chemical companies. Not
everyone has joined in. Exxon Mobil, the world's largest oil company not in government hands, is conspicuously absent. But in many boardrooms renewables are no longer seen as just a way of keeping environmentalists off companies' backs.

Some people complain that many existing forms of renewable energy rely on subsidies or other forms of special treatment for their viability. On the surface, that is true. Look beneath, though, and the whole energy sector is riddled with subsidies, both explicit and hidden, and costs that are not properly accounted for. Drawing on the work of people like Boyden Gray, a former White House counsel, Mr Woolsey estimates that American oil companies receive preferential treatment from their government worth more than $250 billion a year. And the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a United Nations-appointed group of scientific experts, reckons that fossil fuels should carry a tax of $20-50 for every tonne of carbon dioxide they generate in order to pay for the environmental effects of burning them (hence the fears of the power-generators).

So the subsidies and mandates offered to renewable sources of power such as wind turbines often just level the playing field. It is true that some subsidies amount to unwarranted market-rigging: examples include those handed by cloudy Germany to its solar-power industry and by America to its maize-based ethanol farmers when Brazilian sugar-based ethanol is far cheaper. Others, though, such as a requirement that a certain proportion of electricity be derived from
non-fossil-fuel sources, make no attempt to pick particular technological winners. They merely act to stimulate innovation by guaranteeing a market to things that actually work.

If the world were rational, all of these measures would be swept away and replaced by a proper tax on carbon--as is starting to happen in Europe, where the price arrived at by the cap-and-trade system being introduced is close to the IPCC's recommendation. If that occurred,
wind-based electricity would already be competitive with fossil fuels and others would be coming close. Failing that, special treatment for alternatives is probably the least bad option--though such measures need to be crafted in ways that favour neither incumbents nor particular ways of doing things, and need to be withdrawn when they are no longer necessary.

THE POOR WORLD TURNS GREENER TOO

That, at least, is the view from the rich world. But poorer, rapidly developing countries are also taking more of an interest in renewable energy sources, despite assertions to the contrary by some Western politicians and businessmen. It is true that China is building coal-fired power stations at a blazing rate. But it also has a large wind-generation capacity, which is expected to grow by two-thirds this year, and is the world's second-largest manufacturer of solar panels--not to mention having the largest number of solar-heated rooftop hot-water systems in its buildings.

Brazil, meanwhile, has the world's second-largest (just behind America) and most economically honest biofuel industry, which already provides 40% of the fuel consumed by its cars and should soon supply 15% of its electricity, too (through the burning of sugarcane waste). South Africa
is leading the effort to develop a new class of safe and simple nuclear reactor--not renewable energy in the strict sense, but carbon-free and thus increasingly welcome. These countries, and others like them, are prepared to look beyond fossil fuels. They will get their energy where
they can. So if renewables and other alternatives can compete on cost, the poor and the rich world alike will adopt them.

That, however, requires innovation. Such innovation is most likely to come out of the laboratories of rich countries. At a recent debate at Columbia University, which THE ECONOMIST helped to organise, Mr Khosla defended the proposition, "The United States will solve the climate-change problem". The Californian venture capitalist argued that if cheaper alternatives to fossil fuels are developed, simple economics will ensure their adoption throughout the world. He also insisted that the innovation which will create those alternatives will come almost entirely out of America.

As it happens, he lost. But that does not mean he is wrong. There are lots of terawatts to play for and lots of money to be made. And if the planet happens to be saved on the way, that is all to the good.

The 18.5 Master Principles for Success

2009-01-14T09:54:00.007-03:00

THE RISK IS THE BASIS FOR SUCCESS!

The status of failure is up to you.

The workday starts the night before.

1.- Belive you can: mental posture for success.

2.- Create the Environment.

3.- Have the right associations: Stay away from poison people.

4.- Explore yourself to what´s new: Learn Every day.

5.- Be ready for the day: Be ready every day.

6.- Become valuable.

7.- Have the answers your prospects and constumers needs.

8.- Recognize opportunity: Opportunities are elusive.

9.- Take advance of opportunity: Opportunities are elusive.

10.- Take responsabilities: of actions and decisions.

11.- Take Action: JUST DO IT!

12.- Make Mistakes: The best teacher is FAILURE.

13.- Willing to risk: THIS IS THE MOST CRUCIAL FACTOR.

14.- Keep your eyes on the prize.

15.- Balance yourself: Physical, Emotional, Spiritual and Health.

16.- Invest: DO NOT SPEND.

17.- Stick at it until you win.

18.- Develop and mantain positive attitude.

18.5.- IGNORE IDIOTS.

Most difficult for the companies it is to last in the time

2009-01-13T12:45:00.000-03:00

Two dangers watch to the company:

1. - To lack identity and Enchantment

2. - To stagnate.

First danger:

The identity corresponds to associate a business, products and services to certain codes or enterprise values. This identity defines the philosophy of the business, the logic of the business, the style, the codes and their coherence. This means to distinguish who purchase my product. Beyond any thing this means to commit itself to make feel emotions to certain group of people. We do not forget that we are human beings! We are mammals that when we are born we often took chest until the year from life! Our nature is animal: We own feelings. Against this: What feelings cause their business? Want that the people feel accepted, who the people feel unique, whom the people feel included? This does not mean that you must study psychology or something thus, only thinks about same you, what pleases to them, how it likes they treat that it, etc. Thinks that its business gives something and that has to do with which somebody values, if it valued it to nobody, its business would not exist?

The identity of a business corresponds to how it is perceived. All the human beings we own perception; the perception is an impression of the things that surround to us. According to our experiences, motivations and tastes all we felt and we appreciated of certain way. In order to achieve the success of his company you must aim to give in the taste the group of people who buy their products and/or services.

At the moment, to enchant and to seduce the people are, more and more, a channeled business more. Each person has clearer tastes, preferences and yearnings. While its business more is oriented to enchant satisfying a certain taste, more identity and success will have.

Each company is able to encounter again its freedom to maneuver and to accede to the longed for position of leader. Instead of to follow the traditional norms: it analyzes clients, it thinks that they are young and It creates new rules please that them and it makes them happy!

The new norms must directly be proportional to the identity of their clients. When creating or re-inventing the company first that you must think it is in those people who buy their products.

Perhaps you never made east analysis previously, but the people whom they buy what you sell, independently that have planned you it thus, are your market. These people found something attractive or useful in your business and behind that it have, doubtlessly, a concept.

The enchantment the enterprise philosophy, the sensation is come off that is desired to give, which is desired to cause. Clearly what it is desired to make feel defines in the measurement that I meet conform my market. This is transformed in the following phrase: What evaluates the company is what they evaluate its clients and vice versa.

You beyond selling your product, sell a taste, an emotion, a sensation, a projection, a yearning, a fulfilled dream. Its business must enchant to a group of people of equal yearnings and preferences at the time of buying a product or service.

Second danger: To stagnate.

Most sensible it is to assume than a business evolves continuously. An incessant movement in its business exists that entails a permanent evolution and therefore a continuous growth. A company is similar to a son, the son is born and begins to grow immediately, is a natural process and irremediable, it does not have reverse gear. The unique thing that is to do is to let grow it.

The parents must like mission orient it, to guide it, perhaps but one of the most important things that a father learns with the son is that this one learns and grows every day, against this most honest it is to adapt to this idea and to help it in his normal process like being human. Perhaps many parents would want to remain in the stage " more adorable" that it is when they are born, that is where has major control exceeds they, the mother them load takes and them for all sides, but this is only a time: you are not owner of your son, your son is owner of itself. Taken to the enterprise plane: you are not owner of your company, this one belongs to a group of people whom it buys, market which you perhaps chose but you go that is to say if it will continue being the same or no, you only must guide his business, to orient it according to which the consumer requires. The concepts keys are indifference and observation. The word indifference is a little deceptive, means indifference and coldness, nevertheless, How I can cause that something works if I let myself take only by the passions? Indifference is a way to arrive at the objectivity; If you are not objective, can throw to lose any company. One is due to know clearly that its business is to the service of the people, the people command, they decide what they want and you must start your business to the service of the people.

Inventory Stock Control

2009-01-11T21:55:00.001-03:00

The level of basic inventory of your business would have to provide an assortment with products and sufficiently great being to cover the normal sales with the company. If these beginning, you will not have present sales or figures necessary to anticipate the necessary product stock, therefore you must project the annual sales based in your plan of businesses.

When you consider the basic stock, you must have in mind the factor of time of retardation that exists between the order and that the products arrive at your warehouse. For example, if the time of delivery of your supplier is of 4 weeks and the product in particular is sold at the rate of 10 weekly units, then you must realize an order before the inventory level lowers of 40 units. If you do not rearrange and you realize that order at the time of which you need stock products, you will be waiting for 4 weeks without the product.

The levels of insufficient inventory mean losses in sales and increase of costs by the required time to remake the order. Operating without raw materials or parts that are vitally important for your productive process it also means operational costs. Your employees will begin to make money to only be seated, because there is no sufficient work to do; when the inventory returns to raise or arrives the order, they will be making more money to work in extra time by reasons for the loss of production by inventory problems. In some situations, you could even get to pay more by those products in cases of inventory emergency.

A form to protect you of being out of stock is creating a safety margin to emit an order. In order to be certainly safety margin it is the adapted one, it tries to think about all the external factors that they can contribute to the delays, like the suppliers that tend to delay themselves or products that are sent from other countries. Once you already have been working by a time, you will have better feeling in the times of delivery and will be able easily to consider your levels of security inventory.

Avoiding the Excess of Inventory.

To avoid the excess of inventory is especially important for the companies with highly cyclical products, such as the clothes, accessories for the home, vacations or gifts. These products have a small time of life and low rotation at the moment at which they are not in fashion. The entrepreneurs who sell equipment without cyclical or seasonal problems, like equipment of plumbing, articles of office or car parts, have the more freedom because it is not so easy that their products are obsolete.

It does not matter of which type is your business, but always the excess of inventory is something that is to avoid. This hill extra money, due to the loans of money to buy an excess of inventory or not to destine those resources for other effects, additionally can have an increase in the taxes due to the inventory without even selling or an increase in the insurance. In fact, a consultant of merchandize esteem that the cost of maintaining products in inventory increases between 20 to a 30% with respect to the original cost of the investment. Buying an excess of inventory also reduces your liquidity, something that we must avoid.

When you are with an excess of inventory, the natural reaction will be probably to reduce the price and to sell it quickly. Obvious this solves the problem of products stock, but also it reduces your return of the investment. All financial projections assume that you will receive the complete price by all those goods. If you reduce the prices in 15 to 25% not only these reducing your inventory, if that also you are losing money that you had considered in your plan of businesses.

Other beginning entrepreneurs can react to the excess of inventory being cautious in the next order of purchase. Nevertheless this increases your risks of having a lack of inventory and of entering to the circle of costs by errors. In order to avoid accumulation an excess of inventory, it establishes these a realistic margin and it only buys what safe that you can sell.

The business way to innovate.

2009-01-08T22:12:00.001-03:00

At the moment, it is much spoken on the creative factor, innovation in the companies and the necessary participation of creative disciplines as the design and the publicity. Most probable it is that this is no longer news for you.

At the moment, companies aside from producing must review how to produce. We are in the era of the qualities. No longer it is the news nor newness, to produce, to sell, to buy, but, how I produce, how selvage, how I buy. What is the new form, the new way to accede to the things. The quality is associated to a characteristic, to a way. Each person has a particular way to live the life, a different perception, to the way of purchase and sale she is related closely to why I buy certain thing or no.

The important thing is to determine the following thing: That something is of certain way has to do whereupon somebody imagined that it could thus be. This sounds very logical. But the truth is that, at present, often it is ignored this idea. The creativity lays the way to us to solve problems imagining new solutions. With this, I believe that it is very important to emphasize that there is no a stereotype of creative person, that is to say, it does not have anything to do the external appearance. There are people who are very formal in their daily life, but which they are considered very "creative" by the activities that they develop or their particular way to see the things. Although there are certain degrees of creativity in the people this characteristic is as a small internal flame who all we have. This small inner fire is developed and it becomes strong according to the amount of experiences that we have, mixes our feelings, our imagination and ours to think. As our brain has more experiences more capacity we must to redefine certain elements associated to our life and our businesses. In this way, the creativity becomes a style that processes our experiences of certain way. To be creative consists of redefining, adapting and to transform continuous to determine improvements.

In this way our brain is enabled to generate new ideas, to contribute new utilities, to solve problems, to enrich previous ideas and to contribute to the progress.

It would be advisable to begin to clarify what is understood by innovation. Generally it considers "innovation" consists of putting a new idea in march. Basically to innovate is to implement a new idea, to take it to the practitioner. The innovation becomes this when an idea is laid down and it is placed in the daily thing.

Innovation is synonymous of change. The opposite of the innovation is the routine.

The difference between innovating and to be creative is the possibility of turning visions, dreams, ideas, utopias, myths and fantasies in fact. The creative being remains in the plane of the ideas; however, the innovator turns in fact his changes, his new dreams and ideals.

What wishes a company? to be developed, to take the opportunities, to anticipate, to innovate diminishing the risks, of defining itself, in other words, to prevail. The company has a permanent movement. On the other hand, the world of the companies is totally diverse, some are more complex than others following their type of market and a product range; nevertheless, the company in generic form, always has the same yearnings: to have identity, to innovate, to be diversified and to be different themselves.

No longer is to sell products, is to satisfy the demands, to forget the logic the product to dedicate itself to those of the people.

An economy professor once said: " The clients are wining". The client is a gain. A person who buys her products and their services is the best utility than you can hoard.

In fact, to produce is not what causes the boredom of the people who complain the lack of variety in products, the problem is TO REPRODUCE, to exhaust this resource to the maximum: The problem is to imitate, to copy, to insist, for example, in a rectangular refrigerator. The idea to always produce must go accompanied to generate something different.

If the companies want to sell they must surprise the people. Not purchase in the same way that is breathed, is not an automatic function. TO BUY IS TO CHOOSE, TO SELL IS TO CAPTIVATE!

The act to always consume has been watched like a superficial and rational act what corresponds to a real prejudice. When you buy something you look for something identifies that it, therefore the industralist or the one that sells must of knowing how to enchant and to be relaxing, and nothing else it attracts that the different thing. The time of the stereotypes corresponds to the past century? nowadays the different thing is valued to the double.

From this point of view, as you produce? What characterizes their production? If You do not produce, you do not have a factory and only sells products: What thing Has reproduced? It is a good imitator? It has served to him to copy? I invite to look for it new ways to arrive at its client. It remembers that all we can get to innovate in our companies, analyzing from the distribution way to new associated services its products.

The society and the culture, are all the answers there. History says about the existence of good objects conceived by social causes. The teflon, for example created for a coating in the space technology, found application in kitchen articles, like covering for frying pans and pots that it prevented that the food stuck at it. The technology that facilitated the development of Internet, was created like answer to the necessity to design a network of computers able to resist bombings. Other many products must their origins to the needs during the Second War, like the Zippo lighter. The man is to the service of the man and all the answers to satisfy it are in him.

Analyze yourself, what things enjoy, what things value, which are their fun. Many of the replaced ones are in the honesty and the good sense of our self. What things can give to their clients so that these are happier? Think it.

The Beauty of Maths

2009-01-07T12:46:00.003-03:00

There is a lot of people arround the world that doesn´t like or see the beauty of maths. It could be because their are "abstracts" and not easy to feel, but with a little of imagination we can see the beauty of them.

Take a look to this:

1 x 8 + 1 = 9
12 x 8 + 2 = 98
123 x 8 + 3 = 987
1234 x 8 + 4 = 9876
12345 x 8 + 5 = 98765
123456 x 8 + 6 = 987654
1234567 x 8 + 7 = 9876543
12345678 x 8 + 8 = 98765432
123456789 x 8 + 9 = 987654321

1 x 9 + 2 = 11
12 x 9 + 3 = 111
123 x 9 + 4 = 1111
1234 x 9 + 5 = 11111
12345 x 9 + 6 = 111111
123456 x 9 + 7 = 1111111
1234567 x 9 + 8 = 11111111
12345678 x 9 + 9 = 111111111
123456789 x 9 +10= 1111111111

9 x 9 + 7 = 88
98 x 9 + 6 = 888
987 x 9 + 5 = 8888
9876 x 9 + 4 = 88888
98765 x 9 + 3 = 888888
987654 x 9 + 2 = 8888888
9876543 x 9 + 1 = 88888888
98765432 x 9 + 0 = 888888888

Brilliant, do you think?

Take a look to this simetry:

1 x 1 = 1
11 x 11 = 121
111 x 111 = 12321
1111 x 1111 = 1234321
11111 x 11111 = 123454321
111111 x 111111 = 12345654321
1111111 x 1111111 = 1234567654321
11111111 x 11111111 = 123456787654321
111111111 x 111111111=12345678987654321

Turn your PC into a money-making machine

2009-01-06T18:21:00.003-03:00

Just keeping my pc online for almost 1 month I´ve earned U$ 1,85. Is not enugh, but for having my pc turned on and online... is not a bad idea to have some incomes for nothing.

The Gomez software is completely private and secure and has no noticeable impact on how your computer runs or how much bandwidth you consume.

To be eligible, you must meet certain program requirements, then download and install the Gomez PEER. It's as simple as that.

New PEERs Needed Immediately

Gomez is now seeking PEER participants from all over the world to become part of this growing community. No matter whether you're on a dial-up, DSL, Cable, Satellite or ISDN connection, you can take advantage of this opportunity.

Systems required by all the businesses for the optimal efficiency.

2009-01-06T16:57:00.000-03:00

The following section includes a list of the typical systems that the successful businesses must have. In some cases the required system can be defined of way different from the way in which it appears in the list, but anyway is necessary for the operations of the business. For example “development systems of the product” could be “procedure to provide services” in an organization dedicated to the services. Although the specific details can differ, the basic elements are the same. Both require that the business develops the product (or service) that in last instance will be offered to the consumers.

In the case of franchise exemptions or the organizations of market in network, many of those systems are provided of automatic way. By the cost of the franchise or membership of the organization of trade in network, they will provide a manual of operations that describes the systems provided for its business. That causes that the type of “pre-elaborated” businesses is so attractive for much people.

If you wish to create your own business, reviews the list of systems. Although already it is carrying out many of these functions, is possible that it has not defined them as separated systems. While it can more formalize his operations, more efficient it will become his business.

Daily operations in the office system:

To answer the telephone and the system of line of long gratuitous distance.

To receive and open the mail.

To buy and to maintain articles and equipment of office.

To send faxes and electronic mails.

To take care of the needs of shipment and the reception of packages.

To create endorsements and to file the information.

Development of products systems:

Product development and its legal protection.

Development of the packing and additional material (for example catalogs)

Development of the process and method of manufacture.

Development of the process of obtaining of manufacture costs.

Manufacture and inventory system:

To select to the suppliers.

To determine the guarantees offered by the product or service.

To fix the price of the product or service.

To create the process of new orders for inventory production.

Reception and storage of the product like inventory.

I collate of physical inventory and registry of accounting.

Processing orders system:

Rise and registry of the orders by mail, fax, telephone or Internet.

Attention and equipment of the orders.

Shipment of the orders.

Invoicing and accounts to receive system:

Invoicing to the clients by the orders.

Reception of the payments by the orders and accreditation to the clients by the payment (or in cash, check, credit card)

Beginning of the process of collection for the pending accounts to receive.

Clients service system:

Procedure of return for reception in inventory and reimbursement to clients.

Answer to the complaints of the client.

Defective product Replacement or fulfillment of another service of guarantee.

Accounts to pay system:

Procedures of purchase and required approvals.

Process of payment by provisions and inventory.

“Small Box”, or money for smaller payments.

Marketing research system:

Creation of a general plan of marketing research.

Design and production of promotional materials.

Development of prototypes.

Creation of a publicity plan.

Creation of a plan of public relations.

Creation of a plan of direct mail.

Development and maintenance of a data base.

Development and maintenance of a site in Internet.

Analysis and pursuit of statistics of sales.

Human resources system:

Procedures of hiring and agreements with the employees.

Qualification of the employees.

Process of list and plans of benefits.

General accounting system:

Administration of the process of accounting with daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly and annual information.

Administration of cash that assures that the bottoms will be available for the case in that it is necessary to borrow in the future.

Elaboration of the budget and prognosis.

Consignment of taxes on list and retention of payments.

General corporative systems:

Rough draft Negotiation, creation and contract execution.

Development and protection of the intellectual property.

Administration of the needs and cover of insurances.

Consignment and payment of federal, state taxes and of other jurisdictions.

Administration and storage of registries.

Handling of relations with investors and shareholders.

Obtaining of the legal security.

Planning and administration of the growth.

Management systems of physical space:

Conservation and electrical and telephone design of systems.

Planning of permissions.

Granting of licenses.

To guarantee the physical security.

It is possible that it wishes to register his operations in a manual of policies and procedures. This manual can become a invaluable reference for its equipment. When creating the manual, will find forms to cause that their operations are more efficient and to improve its yield. You also will have taken a step to be an owner of a successful business more.

Any Comments?

2009-01-05T15:29:00.002-03:00

I sarted this blog as a place where I can "publish" my ideas, inventions and thoughts, also to share things and stuff that I think it will help to other business people or entrepreneurs (I am one of both).

But one of my initial intentions is to have some feedback or comments to my posts. I know that this blog is new, just 18 days and more than 20 posts/articles.

I would like to have more followers, references, comments or anything to "optimize" the posts and to develop an interesting place for all people who want to start their own business or to keep on going in their inventions or innovations.

Please give me some feedback.

Mind Mapping: Your Thoughts On Paper

2009-01-05T09:43:00.002-03:00

If you’re a “thought leader” or an “idea generator,” you are probably familiar with the problems surrounding the generation and control of ideas.

Ideas generation can’t be effectively organized with Post-it notes or legal pads. Sure, you can write all of your brain sparks on Post-its but it’s hard to share them or get input from others to help you organize and prioritize things. Most flowcharting software requires 6 hours of computer science just to understand the menus. Aside from the learning curve, they also are not cheap.

Fortunately, there are some affordable (even free) tools you can install on your computer that can help you think the way you like to think and still organize and share those ideas. These are called mind mappers. Mind maps let you arrange things intuitively based on your individual classification method, which, with “idea generators,” often is non-linear in nature. Some ideas don’t make sense on their own so here’s a chance to organize things based on the way you think rather than the way some software thinks is best for you. These can usually be either concept-based or structure hierarchically.

Mind mappers to try out:
FreeMind
Pimki
Buzan’s Mind Map
OpenMind (integrates with MS Office)
SmartDraw
WikkaWiki (a wiki with a native mind mapper)

Looking for the perfect Battery !

2009-01-04T09:36:00.005-03:00

This is an exctract of the article published in the economist.

WHEN General Motors (GM) launched the EV1, a sleek electric vehicle, with much fanfare in 1996, it was supposed to herald a revolution: the start of the modern mass-production of electric cars. At the heart of the two-seater sat a massive 533kg lead-acid battery, providing the EV1 with a range of about 110km (70 miles). Many people who leased the car were enthusiastic, but its limited range, and the fact that it took many hours to recharge, among other reasons, convinced GM and other carmakers that had launched all-electric models to abandon their efforts a few years later.

Yet today about a dozen firms are once again developing all-electric or plug-in hybrid vehicles capable of running on batteries for short trips (and, in the case of plug-in hybrids, firing up an internal-combustion engine for longer trips). Toyota's popular Prius hybrid, by contrast, can travel less than a mile on battery power alone. Tesla Motors of San Carlos, California, recently delivered its first Roadster, an all-electric two-seater with a 450kg battery pack and a range of 350km (220 miles) between charges. And both Toyota and GM hope to start selling plug-in hybrids as soon as 2010.

So what has changed? Aside from growing concern about climate change and a surge in the oil price, the big difference is that battery technology is getting a lot better. Rechargeable lithium-ion batteries, which helped to make the mobile-phone revolution possible in the past decade, are now expected to power the increasing electrification of the car. “They are clearly the next step,” says Mary Ann Wright, the boss of Johnson Controls-Saft Advanced Power Solutions, a joint venture that recently opened a factory in France to produce lithium-ion batteries for hybrid vehicles.

According to Menahem Anderman, a consultant based in California who specialises in the automotive-battery market, more money is being spent on research into lithium-ion batteries than all other battery chemistries combined. A big market awaits the firms that manage to adapt lithium-ion batteries for cars. Between now and 2015, Dr Anderman estimates, the worldwide market for hybrid-vehicle batteries will more than triple, to $2.3 billion. Lithium-ion batteries, the first of which should appear in hybrid cars in 2009, could make up as much as half of that, he predicts.

Compared with other types of rechargeable-battery chemistry, the lithium-ion approach has many advantages. Besides being light, it does not suffer from any memory effect, which is the loss in capacity when a battery is recharged without being fully depleted. Once in mass production, large-scale lithium-ion technology is expected to become cheaper than its closest rival, the nickel-metal-hydride battery, which is found in the Prius and most other hybrid cars.

Still, the success of the lithium-ion battery is not assured. Its biggest weakness is probably its tendency to become unstable if it is overheated, overcharged or punctured. In 2006 Sony, a Japanese electronics giant, had to recall several million laptop batteries because of a manufacturing defect that caused some batteries to burst into flames. A faulty car battery which contains many times more stored energy could trigger a huge explosion—something no car company could afford. Performance, durability and tight costs for cars are also much more stringent than for small electronic devices. So the quest is under way for the refinements and improvements that will bring lithium-ion batteries up to scratch—and lead to their presence in millions of cars.

Alessandro Volta, an Italian physicist, invented the first battery in 1800. Since then a lot of new types have been developed, though all are based on the same principle: they exploit chemical reactions between different materials to store and deliver electrical energy.

Back to battery basics

A battery is made up of one or more cells. Each cell consists of a negative electrode and a positive electrode kept apart by a separator soaked in a conductive electrolyte that allows ions, but not electrons, to travel between them. When a battery is connected to a load, a chemical reaction begins. As positively charged ions travel from the negative to the positive electrode through the electrolyte, a proportional number of negatively charged electrons must make the same journey through an external circuit, resulting in an electric current that does useful work.

Some batteries are based on an underlying chemical reaction that can be reversed. Such rechargeable batteries have an advantage, because they can be restored to their charged state by reversing the direction of the current flow that occurred during discharging. They can thus be reused hundreds or thousands of times. According to Joe Iorillo, an analyst at the Freedonia Group, rechargeable batteries make up almost two-thirds of the world's $56 billion battery market. Four different chemical reactions dominate the industry—each of which has pros and cons when it comes to utility, durability, cost, safety and performance.

The first rechargeable battery, the lead-acid battery, was invented in 1859 by Gaston Planté, a French physicist. The electrification of Europe and America in the late 19th century sparked the use of storage batteries for telegraphy, portable electric-lighting systems and back-up power. But the biggest market was probably electric cars. At the turn of the century battery-powered vehicles were a common sight on city streets, because they were quiet and did not emit any noxious fumes. But electric cars could not compete on range. In 1912 the electric self-starter, which replaced cranking by hand, meant that cars with internal-combustion engines left electric cars in the dust.

Nickel-cadmium cells came along around 1900 and were used in situations where more power was needed. As with lead-acid batteries, nickel-cadmium cells had a tendency to produce gases while in use, especially when being overcharged. In the late 1940s Georg Neumann, a German engineer, succeeded in fine-tuning the battery's chemistry to avoid this problem, making a sealed version possible. It started to become more widely available in the 1960s, powering devices such as electric razors and toothbrushes.

For most of the 20th century lead-acid and nickel-cadmium cells dominated the rechargeable-battery market, and both are still in use today. Although they cannot store as much energy for a given weight or volume as newer technologies, they can be extremely cost-effective. Small lead-acid battery packs provide short bursts of power to starter motors in virtually all cars; they are also used in large back-up power systems, and make up about half of the worldwide rechargeable-battery market. Nickel-cadmium batteries are used to provide emergency back-up power on planes and trains.

Time to change the batteries

In the past two decades two new rechargeable-battery types made their commercial debuts. Storing about twice as much energy as a lead-acid battery for a given weight, the nickel-metal-hydride battery appeared on the market in 1989. For much of the 1990s it was the battery of choice for powering portable electronic devices, displacing nickel-cadmium batteries in many applications. Toyota picked nickel-metal-hydride batteries for the new hybrid petrol-electric car it launched in 1997, the Prius.

Nickel-metal-hydride batteries evolved from the nickel-hydrogen batteries used to power satellites. Such batteries are expensive and bulky, since they require high-pressure hydrogen-storage tanks, but they offer high energy-density and last a long time, which makes them well suited for use in space. Nickel-metal-hydride batteries emerged as researchers looked for ways to store hydrogen in a more convenient form: within a hydrogen-absorbing metal alloy. Eventually Stanford Ovshinsky, an American inventor, and his company, now known as ECD Ovonics, succeeded in creating metal-hydride alloys with a disordered structure that improved performance.

Adapting the nickel-metal-hydride battery to the automotive environment was no small feat, since the way batteries have to work in hybrid cars is very different from the way they work in portable devices. Batteries in laptops and mobile phones are engineered to be discharged over the course of several hours or days, and they only need to last a couple of years. Hybrid-car batteries, on the other hand, are expected to work for eight to ten years and must endure hundreds of thousands of partial charge and discharge cycles as they absorb energy from regenerative braking or supply short bursts of power to aid in acceleration.

Lithium-ion batteries evolved from non-rechargeable lithium batteries, such as those used in watches and hearing aids. One reason lithium is particularly suitable for batteries is that it is the lightest metal, which means a lithium battery of a given weight can store more energy than one based on another metal (such as lead or nickel). Early rechargeable lithium batteries used pure lithium metal as the negative-electrode material, and an “intercalation” compound—a material with a lattice structure that could absorb lithium ions—as the positive electrode.

The problem with this design was that during recharging, the metallic lithium reformed unevenly at the negative electrode, creating spiky structures called “dendrites” that are unstable and reactive, and can pierce the separator and cause an explosion. So today's rechargeable lithium-ion batteries do not contain lithium in metallic form. Instead they use materials with lattice structures for both positive and negative electrodes. As the battery discharges, the lithium ions swim from the negative-electrode lattice to the positive one; during recharging, they swim back again. This to-and-fro approach is called a “rocking chair” design.

The first commercial lithium-ion battery, launched by Sony in 1991, was a rocking-chair design that used cobalt oxide for the positive electrode, and graphite (carbon) for the negative one. In the early 1990s, such batteries had an energy density of about 100 watt-hours per litre. Since then engineers have worked out ways to squeeze more than twice as much energy into a battery of the same size, in particular by reducing the width of the separator and increasing the amount of active electrode materials.

The high energy-density of lithium-ion batteries makes them the best technology for portable devices. According to Christophe Pillot of Avicenne Développement, a market-research firm based in Paris, they account for 70% of the $7 billion market for portable, rechargeable batteries. But not all lithium-ion batteries are alike. The host structures that accept lithium ions can be made using a variety of materials, explains Venkat Srinivasan, a scientist at America's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. The combination of materials determines the characteristics of the battery, including its energy and power density, safety, longevity and cost. Because of this flexibility, researchers hope to develop new electrode materials that can increase the energy density of lithium-ion batteries by a factor of two or more in the future.

Hooked on lithium

The batteries commonly used in today's mobile phones and laptops still use cobalt oxide as the positive electrode. Such batteries are also starting to appear in cars, such as Tesla's Roadster. But since cobalt oxide is so reactive and costly, most experts deem it unsuitable for widespread use in hybrid or electric vehicles.

So researchers are trying other approaches. Some firms, such as Compact Power, based in Troy, Michigan, are developing batteries in which the cobalt is replaced by manganese, a material that is less expensive and more stable at high temperatures. Unfortunately, batteries with manganese-based electrodes store slightly less energy than cobalt-based ones, and also tend to have a shorter life, as manganese starts to dissolve into the electrolyte. But blending manganese with other elements, such as nickel and cobalt, can reduce these problems, says Michael Thackeray, a senior scientist at America's Argonne National Laboratory who holds several patents in this area.

In 1997 John Goodenough and his colleagues at the University of Texas published a paper in which they suggested using a new material for the positive electrode: iron phosphate. It promised to be cheaper, safer and more environmentally friendly than cobalt oxide. There were just two problems: it had a lower energy-density than cobalt oxide and suffered from low conductivity, limiting the rate at which energy could be delivered and stored by the battery. So when Yet-Ming Chiang of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and his colleagues published a paper in 2002 in which they claimed to have dramatically boosted the material's conductivity by doping it with aluminium, niobium and zirconium, other researchers were impressed—though the exact mechanism that causes the increase in performance has since become the subject of a heated debate.

Dr Chiang's team published another paper in 2004 in which they described a way to increase performance further. Using iron-phosphate particles less than 100 nanometres across—about 100 times smaller than usual—increases the surface area of the electrode and improves the battery's ability to store and deliver energy. But again, the exact mechanism involved is somewhat controversial.

The iron-phosphate technology is being commercialised by several companies, including A123 Systems, co-founded by Dr Chiang, and Phostech Lithium, a Canadian firm that has been granted exclusive rights to manufacture and sell the material based on Dr Goodenough's patents. At the moment the two rivals are competing in the market, but their fate may be decided in court, since they are fighting a patent-infringement battle.

The quest for the perfect battery

Johnson Controls and Saft, which launched a joint venture in 2006, are taking a different approach, in which the positive electrode is made using a nickel-cobalt-aluminium-oxide. John Searle, the company's boss, says batteries made using its approach can last about 15 years. In 2007 Saft announced that Daimler had selected its batteries for use in a hybrid Mercedes saloon, due to go on sale in 2009. Other materials being investigated for use in future lithium-ion batteries include tin alloys and silicon.

At this point, it is hard to say which lithium-ion variation will prevail. Toyota, which is pursuing its own battery development with Matsushita, will not say which chemistry it favours. GM is also hedging its bets. The company is testing battery packs from both A123 Systems and Compact Power for the Chevy Volt (pictured), a forthcoming plug-in hybrid that will have an all-electric range of 40 miles and a small internal-combustion engine to recharge its battery when necessary. To ensure that the Volt's battery can always supply enough power and meet its targeted 10-year life-span, it will be kept between 30% and 80% charged at all times, says Roland Matthe of GM's energy-storage systems group.

GM hopes to start mass-production of the Volt in late 2010. That is ambitious, since the Volt's viability is dependent on the availability of a suitable battery technology. “It's either going to be a tremendous victory, or a terrible defeat,” says James George, a battery expert based in New Hampshire who has followed the industry for 45 years.

“We've still got a long way to go in terms of getting the ultimate battery,” says Dr Thackeray. Compared with computer chips, which have doubled in performance roughly every two years for decades, batteries have improved very slowly over their 200-year history. But high oil prices and concern over climate change mean there is now more of an incentive than ever for researchers to join the quest for better battery technologies. “It's going to be a journey”, says Ms Wright, “where we're going to be using the gas engine less and less.”

Create a Culture !!!

2009-01-02T18:29:00.003-03:00

Some strategies of growth are obvious and have immediate tangible results. Others, like creating a culture, own indirect results, but they are extremely important when you strive in making that your organization is more dynamic, more productive and more lucrative.

To create a culture for your company is to cultivate the passion between your equipment and your clients. Your culture shows your identity, your values and your beliefs, besides the most basic things as they are your products or services and you value as them.

Not sure what culture mean? Think about “Enron” and you would generate a burst of images and adjectives of the culture of that company. In the other hand, “Disney”, “Starbucks” or “Patagonia”, and think that the mental process goes in opposite directions.

When this culture penetrates to everything what beams, you will find to your clients responding of that way. The type of loyalty that can generate this you can take to repeat the business or the sale and is excellent average of transmission a mouth to mouth, both invaluable.

In order to follow ahead we propose some to you tips useful, that we can help you to go ahead:

Define and shows your final goals.

When the people of your team believe in the goals, this takes your business to a new level. It leaves the bases of the goals for you. But we will reinforce the importance of the specific goals for defined times here good. We recommended to you to establish monthly, quarterly and annual goals for intentions of short control of and medium term, and final missions for long term.

It is important to establish goals not only for the company, if not that stops each individual that works in the company. Of this form each person understands how their goals are related and contributed to the global goals of the company.

Also you must maintain consistent registries of what goals are short, medium and long term in the established times. This can be a little intense for the team in a beginning, but these points quickly will be welcomes in the meetings where each person coordinates itself with the rest, and more directed informer and in his labor effort feels.

Let all the members of the equipment “take” part from the property of the company.

So that you are sure that the exposition of the goals get the maximum effort, and that your team takes these goals with vigor, it establishes the sense of “owner” of the company. It introduces to your team to be enterprising of and for the company. Your personnel will understand that he exists “to win” for them, not only for you, to reach its individual or group goals. The rewards can vary by a simple celebration of the equipment until bonds.

Your objective would have to be to eliminate any “keeper of” mentality and to replace it by the tenacity of a proprietary brilliant of a business.

Listen to the aspirations of your team and handle their roles and incentives, you will see therefore them prosper.

In the basic line, your employees feel like contributor pillars and that they can influence the process so that the company obtains its goals. If you maintain that spirit alive, you will be a prosperous company. You lose if it, the cynicism, the lazy and mediocrity are destined to remain for always.

Find and execute the “better practices”

We know, like entrepreneurs who we are, that the nature of the beast of the entrepreneur is to want to always make the things of innovating way. But the point is that some times to be innovating it is not the best strategy. Anyway, we have learned that one of the strategies more intelligent than you can do is simply to be an imitator.

Ask yourself which entrepreneur or company you admire, only in as you would be proud to model aspects of its business. It is always a challenge to find companies in your niche, watches generally beyond the market. Who is making admirable, efficient things and that always inspire to you? Learning that is what it makes “the best one of the best thing” to reach results they helped, you in your business to arrive very high.

When you find companies that exhibit that excellence, it finds that what exactly it makes be “separate” or is differentiated. And ask yourself if you can apply to the same practices or strategies to your own business.

They could be its practices of leasing, their packages of compensations, the demography of its clients, their mix of products, the services that offer or its prices. You will know that areas of your business need more attention and re-engineering before completing point 1 of the 10 ideas to let grow your business.

Besides your competitors or other companies, another good source of good ideas is probably in front of your noses: a mentor or an adviser. We have found mentors who are great contributors when they come to avoid those great problems helping you to avoid them, taking you directly to the best practices.

Create a social agenda.

The major significance that you add to your business, the greater passion than you instill, more prosperous will be your company.

Your “Social agenda” can include initiatives like in particular donating a part of your utilities to a cause, upsetting used to being voluntary for charity works, even promoting the cause that your product selection follows a strict line to protect to other people or the atmosphere.

Here is an excellent example: Vital Choice is a company of Internet that provides salmon from Alaska. The company stress the clients who sell caught salmons of a certain way, and works only with a few fishing industries that are not of open water fishing.

This approach gives to the workers the passion and the delivery, leaving them clients know the benefit of the “godfather” of Vital Choice in its cause by the environment, in this case the industries of the salmon. Further on that a health benefit, gives to its clients another impetus to make businesses with Vital Choice.

To donate a part of your utilities to a charity foundation also presents to you. Tell to your clients the problems of the community that must be boarded. You will find that your workers will begin to also become jumbled. To them he will enchant to them to work in a place that only is not focused to make money. They enjoy the feeling to feel like plenary sessions, and this can reveal in them more attention to the details, to commit itself to the success and the productivity.

9 Criteria to solve the ties of your business.

2009-01-02T18:25:00.001-03:00

1. – Exercise the observation and the curiosity. Manifest intellectual curiosity, about the things that surround to him and what happens in the world. The curiosity or to fix seen to its surroundings allows to discover details and new points of view. From this experience it removes an education: Many things are not discovered always watching the same. The curiosity is exercised: To read books and magazines, to see films, to listen to music and other activities that are not of "ours likes" it can show new solutions and answers to us because exactly they are the solutions and the ideas there that we do not know.

2. - Assume risks. The risks always have been watched like possibility of loss or irresponsibility losing or leaving something to secure another thing. The risk, beyond meaning a possibility of losing something corresponds, for good or bad, to a gained experience. There is no another form to grow and to learn that it is not assuming risks. The one that does not dare, does not cross a river. From the enterprise point of view, the risks are extremely necessary to grow and to develop their business. The risks, in this sense, always are associated to invest great amounts of capital, for example, in a new branch, a new product, publicity, etc. The best risks do not have to happen necessarily through "quantities" but by "qualities" of its business. In relation to this, it thinks about the ways, the ways that work bad or not absolutely well. I assure, most probable, is than the risks that assume to benefit of their company, mean a very low monetary cost to him. From this point of view, it reviews his identity his forms of distribution, their ways of promotion, their forms to exhibit his products etc. But… QUALITATIVELY!

3. – Look where nobody watch. This indeed does not mean to be obstinate nor to insist on which is not although we try thousand times. But rather in " to look for the things less seek" or " to look what nobody watch". The common one of the people gives by seated who something is not successful or it does not only serve because it values it to nobody, nevertheless, many things are not valued because nobody is shortage to an honest and useful sense. A clear example of this I set out the following situation: It remembers or it knows pineapples the pines? Those that when one walks by the forest finds foundlings in the ground? Industralist began a national them to collect and he sells at the moment them regularly for Christmas decoration to foreign countries, found here where nobody looked for. This must also see with the observation, the curiosity and have the desire to watch where few or nobody have watched.

4. - Empathy in the day to day. It demonstrates empathy towards people and the divergent ideas. In other words, it be in the place of how the other think, considers all the ideas, all the critics, all the commentaries. Although this it can be negative or until "ridiculous" it can be that behind that commentary exists a “warning" or something fundamental that it is being lost of view to solve certain problem.

5. – Exercise the independent thought. Do not be conformist with your ideas, but either unconformed, is rather, an independent person. Get free of restrictions and inhibitions. This does not mean that it leaves its values morals nor their ethics, but, maintains the "critic spirit" maintains a glance analytical against which he happens around to, and try to watch the situations objectively. These will allow you to see the things him with more clarity and to find solutions more easily.

6. – Exercise the practical thought. To have capacity of analysis and synthesis is fundamental. We do not get anything with thinking and thinking and to get many conclusions about a problem or a conflicting situation in our company, also is important to have a synthesis capacity and to determine the problems, solutions, new proposals and to implement them with clarity.

7. - Exercise the flexibility and the reframing. It develops the capacity of redefinition that is to say to rearrange ideas, concepts, people and things, to transpose the functions of the objects and to use them of new ways. We think for a moment about the use of a daily object. What different uses so initially it was created that object are happened to us? It thinks about 25 different uses.

This it is a very simple example than it can be the creative thought.

It remembers, the practice makes the expression and the creativity easier. Each new creation is originated observing some other thing. The creation consists generally of transferring the attributes from a thing to another one. In other words, we give the thing with that we are working, some new quality or characteristic or applied attribute until then otherwise.

8. - Value your imagination and fluidity. This consists of using all the senses in order to generate new ideas, little conventional images and solutions. In order to obtain this practitioner is an exercise very simple that can be realized easily. Between the people who work in their business realize one "Storm of ideas". This consists of raising a problematic present in our company, for example, "The forms of distribution of our business are very conventional". The exercise consists then of beginning to "shoot" ideas without a greater elaboration. The phrases must be said aloud and somebody must be in charge to write down them quickly. The important thing is to write down everything, from more "ridiculous" until more "logical and true". Soon each one of the premises are evaluated. The idea is to rescue and to consider all the premises using the imagination soon to implement the best ideas. It is not necessary to forget the simple thing and sometimes most ridiculous it can more be "clear" for its equipped business of a good way.

9. – Associate one thing to another. You must have ample mind information that can combine, choose and extrapolate to solve problems. This is an excellent quality to work. To associate a personal ability with lived experiences and knowledge can give creative and innovating answers to us. If to this it takes it situation to his work party, group ideas, experiences and knowledge in favor of different proposals for their company can be combined.

Laser Beam & Cigarrete Smoke

2008-12-31T14:46:00.002-03:00

Few months ago, we were thinking about laser light and smoke. Effectively we can see the laser beam crossing the smoke!

So, what happen if we mix a mirror, smoke and laser?

Simply, we can see a lot of laser beam crossing the smoke, but just with one laser. Then, what happen if we arrange various mirrors, we can create some image or sign which can only be seen at night and in presence of smoke… it´s a great idea to make innovative marketing in a pub, bar or discotheque!

Unfortunately it´s quite complex to get an interesting arrange to show some logo or letters.

Just think guys!!!

Marketing on the Beach... Stamping the Sand??

2008-12-31T09:21:00.005-03:00

Stamping the sand.

It is a marketing art, innovativa, high impact and unique (almost in Chile).
Daily when the sun rise, any beach that you chose, will wake up with ads in the sand. It is impossible avoid to see it! There are more than 2.500 impresions for every 300 meters of sand beach. There will no space in the sand without your ad!

These pictures where taken in La Serena city (Chile), and they are a real test.

The Chilean company who offer this kind of ads is ANEPCO.

Worldwide payments charged to your phone bill

2008-12-31T09:14:00.001-03:00

Imagine that you can pay worldwide without giving your credit card number, 100% fraud free and you don´t have to make anything to get started!

DAOPAY is a company who offer payments charged to your phone bill. You just have to dial a phone number or send an sms to an specific number and your bill is payed. So it is obvious that you don´t have to give personal information or banking account. Just a call.

This is a great idea to be paid for your services or products!

More revenue - no credit card needed.

You might already accept all the major credit cards and even PayPal, chances are you are missing out on a signiﬁcant number of people who’d like to pay you - but can't. Which is like saying "No, thank you" to your customers (just not as polite).

And it's not that they don't like your products, they really do; they just don't feel comfortable sharing their credit card number over the internet because they're concerned about their privacy. Or they don't have a credit card, which is still very common outside the United States.

Charging the phone bill.

With daopay, your customers can charge your product to their phone bill. They just dial a service number and without ever giving away any personal or financial information, they hold the line for a minute or two until the product price has been charged to their bill. Probably the only way to make buying easier is to pay by SMS. Which is why we do that, too.

Reach additional audiences.

No credit cards, no bank accounts or any other contracts

just dial a number or send an SMS and you're all set. And, of course, everyone has a telephone - there are more than 3 billion worldwide, twice as many as there are Visa cards, and even fifty times as many as PayPal accounts. By adding daopay as a complementary payment option, you reach more people and receive more payments than with any other payment method alone.

Accept payments from 200 countries.

There's more to global business than just simple payments. Like, when ever possible, we greet callers in their native language and assist them with any payment-related questions - so you don't have to.

They also take care of the different currencies, sales tax rates, laws and regulations in the 200+ countries they operate in and they keep an eye on the hundreds of ever-changing phone tariff schemes in order to get the best rates for you.

For most countries they guarantee fixed payout rates without any chargebacks or associated fees, so your cash flow is more predictable.

They have been in business since 2001, processing millions of transactions worth millions of Dollars, Euros, Forints, Dinars, Kronas, and other national currencies you've probably never heard before; and don't have to, because at the end of the month, you simply receive all your funds in one single payment, in your preferred currency.

Fabric Protection From Sun!

2008-12-30T10:00:00.005-03:00

Another idea we were thinking in our "labs" was a product to protect our curtain and back yard furniture from sunlight and the weather conditions. Unfortunately SunArmor already has developed it.

Fabrics fade in both direct and indirect sunlight, from sunlight passing through windows and onto interior surfaces. Scientists agree that long term exposure to solar radiation should be limited in order to prevent damaging fabrics, upholstery and other surfaces both inside and outside the home.

After redecorating your home its time to protect your fabric and upholstery investment from harmful sun rays. SunArmor Ultra Violet Protection a unique product sprayed directly onto your fabric can stop the damaging ultra violet rays from fading your fabrics and causing them to lose their original colors.

Current architectural trends and improvements in energy conserving glass have lead to homes with larger windows, high number of windows, clearer glass, and open interior spaces inundated with natural light. While beautiful and relaxing, ordinary clear window glass allows 80-90% of the sun’s UV radiation, the most damaging type of sun radiation, to enter. For many years, collectors of high end artwork have used expensive ‘conservation glass’ to block UV rays from damaging their art.

This is a pricey and in Damage caused to Fabrics Clearly the most evident and visible damaged caused to interior fabrics is the fading of the colors seen over time. The color changes are often dramatic especially when brighter, and more ‘eco friendly’ fabrics are used, as the reduction in color saturation due to bleaching is more harmful to brighter colors and the non-solvent based nature of the dyes used in eco-friendly fabrics. In addition to the quickly fading colors on couches, carpets, pillows, and other upholstery, additional material damage including cracking and tensile strength reduction causing fabric to be brittle and break or tear easily. By using a spray open product such as SunArmor Ultra Violet Protection, both the structural fabric damage and the color fading can be prevented on various types of fabrics.

Direct Sunlight and Ultraviolet Damage– Indoors Extensive research prepared by the US Library of Congress to protect the original copies of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence showed that while blocking all the ultraviolet radiation portion of the solar spectrum does not eliminate damage caused by fading, it does slow down the rate of the fading and other damage by about three.

Current methods of protection include: Methods of protection - Physical blocking of light o Heavy curtains to prevent ultra violet and visible light from entering a room o Sheets or other light colored fabrics draped over furniture - Window glass treatment o Conservation glass o UV films to stop UV rays from entering the room - Fabric treatment o Spray on treatment such as SunArmor Ultra Violet Protection (www.gogonco.com) SunArmor Ultra Violet Protection is a unique coating sprayed directly onto fabrics and uses advanced technology to fight Sun Damage and Fading on fabrics such as upholstery, area rugs, carpet, drapes, covered outdoor furniture, auto upholstery, boat upholstery, and any fabric-like surface receiving harmful sun exposure. Works to dissipate both UVA and UVB rays by absorbing the UV radiation and dissipate the energy as low level heat. A simple application will prevent sun damage for 4-6 months in direct sunlight indoors, 3-4 months in direct sunlight outdoors, and 6-8 weeks for extreme desert conditions.

SunArmor Ultra Violet Protection will not change the color, texture, or feel of your fabrics. The product offers a cost effective method to prevent high quality and delicate fabric from sun damage and fading. To provide additional water and stain damage, SunArmor UV Protection must be sealed with SunArmor™ Water & Stain Protection.

8 ways to make money on eBay

2008-12-30T09:17:00.003-03:00

Can you make money through eBay selling? Absolutely. You can use this auction giant to generate a serious part- or full-time income just by selling products on eBay. But even if you already have a business, eBay can help you make even more money.

Why?

Well, eBay had around 244 million registered users in 2006, generating over $52 BILLION in sales! So all you have to do is sign up for a free eBay account and list your items... and voila! You have instant access to a massive audience that's eager to BUY.

Let's take a look at some of the many ways you can make money on eBay:

1.- Generate qualified leads for an existing business. A well-presented listing may result in only one winning bidder — but it will be seen by many more people than those who actually make a bid.

You can take advantage of this exposure by including a link to your website from your eBay About Me page (NOT from within your auction listing!). Then in your auction listing include a link to your About Me page.

2.- Sell off your retail floor model items and returns for extra money. Keep the stock in your retail location or website fresh and new so you can sell it at full price. Use eBay to clear out items you need to discount.

3.- Sell in-demand items purchased at yard sales and thrift stores. Check out eBay's "Completed Listings" to see what's popular, then scour local second-hand sales. You can also check out wholesalers to see if you can get these items at low cost.

4.- Sell collectibles found at flea markets and estate sales. eBay originally started out as the place to buy collectibles... and these items are still very much in demand.

5.- Resell items for a profit. You can often buy items for less on auction sites that don't get as much traffic (like uBid and Amazon Auctions). Then you can resell the same items on eBay for a profit!

6.- Buy items offered in bulk on eBay and resell them individually. Single items sell at a higher price point than they would as part of a bulk package. So by listing these items individually, you can make a tidy profit.

7.- Tap into international markets. Just because there isn't a market for something in your local area doesn't mean that there isn't one anywhere. With eBay, you can span geographical boundaries, so try selling these types of items worldwide.

8.- Make a quick buck selling "fad" items. Take advantage of passing trends. We've all heard those stories about people going nuts and bidding thousands of dollars on items like Beanie Babies. If you do spot a trend, you'll have to be speedy if you want to take advantage of it, though. These trends tend to go as fast as they arrived!

As you can see, there are a TON of ways you can make money on eBay.

Business Valuation

2008-12-29T14:34:00.000-03:00

The process of valuation of a company is not a simple process, but it is not complex either. It is always necessary to consider there exist two parts, of which the buyer always will think that the company is “expensive” and the sale part who thinks the opposite.

Under both points of view, the main thing is the cash flow that the business generates. Flows of money are the ones that let to a company subsist and grow! The sale part overvalues his company by diverse reasons, generally:

Emotional: Whenever one creates something, this it happens to be like a son. More if it has been the monetary support for the family.

Mark: A company that has a powerful mark does not mean that its company is worth millions. Since without cash flow of money and investments, it is impossible that mark generates money.

Actives: The involved machines and machineries are depreciated generally by obsolescence or countable depreciation. Although these are fundamental part of the company, not always they are most important.

What people say: Often the clients, relatives, competitors, friendly, etc. Tend to give “information” or aid for the company. Remember that they only give “ideas”, are not presents in the day to day and they have not contributed with money, effort and sacrifice to take the business ahead. Although the commentaries are good, not always they give to the best advice and the best visions for the company.

History: History is the pretty part of the company, is the past. What matters is the present and like drawing for the future.

Words of Motivation

2008-12-29T14:32:00.001-03:00

It is not enough to have good inventiveness; the main thing is to apply it well.

That your attitude is the motor of your success, and not the brake responsible for your failure.

The best form way to cause a dream becomes reality, is to wake up and to see what you have to your side and to work by that dream.

In order to achieve more success it is necessary to be arranged to risk to more failures.

The ten first words are more important that the ten thousand following ones.

Intelligence consists of recognizing the opportunity.

Dream and give to the forms and opportunities so that others can dream.

The great spirits frequently have found one violent opposition on the part of the mediocre minds.

If you want to be successful quickly, look for ideas that are better to those than you are using nowadays.

The ideas do not need to be new; they only need to be better.

The AdWords Golden Rule: 3-30-3

2008-12-28T09:35:00.005-03:00

The AdWords golden rule (3-30-3) we can call it these way: 3 seconds- 30 seconds- 3 minutes.

3 seconds:

If you could get your ad sponsored by Google AdWords, you must get the attention of all the users of the Google Seeker for almost 3 seconds. If you get it, you are infront of the 90% of your competition!

Get the attention is a superior ability in the electronic marketing World. And 3 seconds is the time that your consumer needs (maybe less) to answer their whishes, needs, problems. Also in this time they will decide to make the second step: Clik on your ad and enter to your “landing page”.

30 Seconds:

Now our challenge is to keep interested our user, at least for 30 seconds, in the landing page. It looks like a huge amount of time, but it could be an excessive time if they are not interested.

3 Minutes:

And now, does the user make what you want him to make for the next 3 minutes? This is filling a form, buy some product or service that satisfy their needs or solve their problems, or anything that you marketing objective have.

The basic idea to implement a successful marketing campaign in the first 3 of the golden rule is… to join the 3 moments.

1.- What the costumer has in his head when he imagine his problem, needs or whishes.

2.- What the costumer write in the seeker (search intention), directly or a consequence of the first act.

3.- What he look at the ads zone.

Believe me, what the consumer has in their heads and what they will write in the search engine is not a result of magic, you can and must know it, revealing systematically seriously your market before you configure your campaign.

Determine which ad it is presented when you write your search intention in the search engine, it depends in the intelligent configuration of your campaign.

The golden prize of the golden rule is for those professionals with the first “3” and it is called Relevancy and it has two indicators (behind): Cliks rate (CTR) and quality index (IQ). There are a lot of auxiliary tools that can help you to catch the users attention, according to your market, rise your CTR and IQ, and of course maximize your financing efficiency of your AdWords strategy.

6 Reasons to offer your company to the stock-market

2008-12-28T08:27:00.003-03:00

1. - You need more money. This one is one of the main reasons to emit shares of a company for its sale to the public. Perhaps in this case, it has established an income-producing company and it needs capital to grow. It has already gone to his banker and obtained some cash by privates investors or by a risk capital, but now really it needs much money and a banker of investment.

2. - The company is new (a company of Internet, for example). and you need enormous amounts money to gain participation in the market. The market provides you money, although its company is not income-producing at the moment, because the market is investing in its future gains.

3. - Often a company will use its own shares to acquire other companies. It is what usually is called “to print your own money”. In the corporative world it is called “fusions and acquisitions”.

4. - You want to sell your company without losing the control. In a private company, the owner frequently gives the control or obtains a new partner who means how to direct the business to him when he collects capital. When obtaining the money of the public market, the proprietor obtains cash when selling, but it maintains the control of the business. Many shareholders have little power to influence in the operations of the company in which they have invested.

5. - For reasons related to the familiar patrimony, Ford Motor Company emitted shares to the public because the family had many heirs but lacked liquidity. When selling to the public a part of the company, they collected the cash that the family needed for the heirs. The way is interesting in which a private company uses this strategy.

6. - To become rich and to invest in other parts. To create a business looks like to construct a building of apartments and to sell it. When you construct a business to sell it by shares of a public supply, only one part of the assets fragments; it is divided in million parts that are sold the public. The creator can then continue being the owner of the majority of the shares, and still maintain the control and generate much money when selling it to million buyers (instead of a single buyer). The good things come in small packs.

Wired Magazine: Top Technology Breakthroughs of 2008

2008-12-26T16:30:00.002-03:00

The economy may be tanking, but innovation is alive and well.

When it came to products, incremental improvements were the name of the game this year. Phones got faster (iPhone 3G anyone?), notebooks turned into netbooks and pocket cameras went from recording standard-definition video to HD.

But the world's corporate and academic R&D labs were busy laying the foundations of some amazing future technologies in 2008. They produced concepts such as silicon chips you can swallow for personalized medicine from the inside out and a fourth fundamental element in electronic circuitry. And engineers cranked out a few less groundbreaking — but no less important — inventions, like a space-age swimsuit to help Michael Phelps slice through the water faster than a river otter on a jet ski.

Here's our countdown of what rocked our world in 2008 — and what will change yours in 2009 and beyond.

Minerals Flotation Process Optimization

2008-12-26T13:38:00.007-03:00

Building PCA Models for Fault Detection in an Industrial

Rougher Flotation Circuit.

Luis G. Bergh and Felipe Niada.

Automation and Supervision Center for Mineral Industry, CASIM.

Chemical Engineering Department, Santa Maria University, Valparaiso, Chile.

ABSTRACT

On line fault detection, for instrumentation and process operation, has become important part of industrial programs leading to improve process operation and therefore product quality over time. Today, great amount of process variables are routinely collected at high frequency by Distributed Control Systems (DCS). Also, many variables, mainly related to the quality of a product, such as the concentrate grade and process recovery in the flotation processes are infrequently available. High problem dimensionality, highly correlated process input variables, rather low signal/noise ratios and missing data are some of the main difficulties found in modeling the process for monitoring and diagnosis purposes. Multivariate statistical projection methods, such as Principal Component Analysis (PCA), have been proposed to effectively deal with these situations. In this work, an industrial rougher flotation circuit is operated under distributed control of froth depth, and chemical reactive dosages, to experimentally collect operation data at steady state, to build a PCA model. The rougher circuit is formed by 5 banks with an array of 2-3-3-3-3 cells of 3000 ft3. Each bank has a froth depth measurement and control and a Metso camera to send froth surface images to be processed. Feed, final concentrate and final tailings are obtained by on stream analysis, using Courier system from Outokumpu. Feed flow rate and its characteristics are also measured. The dosage of chemical reactive are measured and controlled as a ratiowith feed tonnage. The image processing system from Metso produces almost 30 variables characterizing the flotation froth. Some years ago, several studies were conducted to correlate these froth characteristics with concentrate grade. The results were most of the time inconsistent and no industrial application using the full set of information provided by cameras is known until today. Froth velocity is commonly used to modify the set point of froth depth controllers. The hypothesis that froth characteristics captured by image analysis correspond to the so called top of froth, and that the grade on the froth is not homogeneous, but distributed along the depth, will lead to the conclusion that better models can be found only if feed characteristics, chemical reagent dosages and cell operating conditions (froth depth and sometimes air flow rate) are included in the data. However, in one bank more than fifty variables are involved now, posing difficulties to obtain representative models. Therefore, the use of multivariate statistical projection methods is the appropriate tool to model the correlation existing in the data. In this work, the first part of building alternative PCA models is discussed.

CONCLUSIONS.

Flotation control quality is strongly depending on the accuracy of measurements and estimations. The flotation process is complex and it is a real challenge to decide which variables are to be changed in order to drive back the process to a normal operation. The application of multivariate statistical methods, and particularly PCA, is a powerful tool to build linear models containing the essential of the process phenomena with the minimum number of latent variables. The application of PCA models to monitoring flotation cells, based on the combination of froth characteristics and operating variables has been demonstrated.

These PCA models can be effectively used as part of a supervisory control strategy, especially when control decisions are infrequently made.

Cloth Wrinkle Release

2008-12-26T10:59:00.002-03:00

Days ago I was angry of the wrinkles of my shirt, so then… there must exist or I have to develop some product that avoids the wrinkles of the cloth.

It is very interesting the way that wrinkles are formed in the cloth, specifically they are “made” with Hydrogen bonds. In other words, the water and the detergent “activate” the surface of cotton and other materials in the fabrics, and then the activated surface (ion charged) start their interactions.

In this way the product must “destroy” these interactions!

Heat and weight (ironing) has the same effect.

Unfortunately Procter and Gamble have a product for that… Downy Wrinkle Releaser. It was a great idea, but already developed.

So folks, keep on thinking. In the ordinary things or simple problems there are great business ideas and solutions.

The Art of the Elevator Pitch

2008-12-25T13:08:00.005-03:00

What is an "Elevator Pitch"?

An "Elevator Pitch" is a concise, carefully planned, and well-practiced description about your company that your mother should be able to understand in the time it would take to ride up an elevator. The name reflects the fact that an elevator pitch can be delivered in the time span of an elevator ride (for example, sixty seconds and 150-225 words).

The term is typically used in the context of an entrepreneur pitching an idea to a venture capitalist or angel investor to receive funding. Venture capitalists often judge the quality of an idea and team on the basis of the quality of its elevator pitch, and will ask entrepreneurs for the elevator pitches to quickly weed out bad ideas and weak teams.

What an "Elevator Pitch" is not:

It is not a "sales pitch." Don't get caught up in using the entire pitch to tell the Investor how great your product or service is. The Investor is "buying" the business, not the product. Tell him/her how you will run the business.

Creating the "Elevator Pitch"

Six questions your "Elevator Pitch" must answer:

1.What is your product or service?

Briefly describe what it is you sell. Do not go into excruciating detail.

2.Who is your market?

Briefly discuss who you are selling the product or service to. What industry is it? How large of a market do they represent?

3.What is your revenue model?

More simply, how do you expect to make money?

4.Who is behind the company?

"Bet on the jockey, not the horse" is a familiar saying among Investors. Tell them a little about you and your team's background and achievements. If you have a strong advisory board, tell them who they are and what they have accomplished.

5.Who is your competition?

Don't have any? Think again. Briefly discuss who they are and what they have accomplished. Successful competition is an advantage-they are proof your business model and/or concept work.

6.What is your competitive advantage?

Simply being in an industry with successful competitors is not enough. You need to effectively communicate how your company is different and why you have an advantage over the competition. A better distribution channel? Key partners? Proprietary technology?

What your "Elevator Pitch" must contain:

1. A "hook"

Open your pitch by getting the Investor's attention with a "hook." A statement or question that piques their interest to want to hear more.

2. About 150-225 words

Your pitch should go no longer than 60 seconds.

3. Passion

Investors expect energy and dedication from entrepreneurs.

4. A request

At the end of your pitch, you must ask for something. Do you want their business card, to schedule a full presentation, to ask for a referral?

Youtube video explaining how to do an Elevator Pitch

Details That Mark

2008-12-25T10:31:00.004-03:00

Edward Lorenz, meteorologist and founding mathematician of the theory of the chaos, based part of his thought on the “butterfly effect”, originating of an old Chinese proverb: “the fluttering of the wings of a butterfly can be felt to the other side of the world”. Edward got to say that the fluttering of a butterfly in Brazil could bring a storm in Taiwan. The theory of the chaos says that in certain natural systems, small changes in the initial conditions lead to enormous discrepancies in the results.

Steve Jobs, president of Mac, in the speech to the graduate students at Stanford comments facts of its life that at some time were only details that did not seem to be important for their life. But these details deeply marked the differences that made of Mac a computer of graph and design of cult. That detail: handwriting classes when he was university student in Stanford.

On the other hand is Randy Pausch, ex- professor of computer science of Carnegie Mellon, his dream always was to work in Disney like Imagineer. When fulfilling its dream, that was during one sabbatical year, developed system called Alice to teach computer animations to students in a entertained and didactic way. Alice has been a full success, which is being implemented in several computer science centers at global level.

However, if we extrapolated those small details that mark differences in the organizations, we would create excellence organizations. Following this approach we would try to locate our company more near our clients, with this many companies have created systems of points, surveys, e-mails, contests or other systems to maintain near its clients. What directly falls to the communication between the company and the client. The problem is when the personnel (own or outsourcing) represent the company between this delicate and important communicational relation. If we own a call center or direct attention to the client, the people who are in this “face to face”, reflects the situation or the spirit of the company. Of this grapnel anchor great companies as McDonald´s owns a training of attention to the client, in who the personnel must be in favor always tidy, smiling, kind and amiable with the client, on the other hand if we observed restaurant and the young delay in arriving or does not take care of the client amiably, which happens in the major of the cases, generates in the client a terrible experience and probably it does not return to go to that premises. This type of details really marks to the difference between the success and the failure of a company.

Soon for all the clients and consumers, who always we are in some minute, everything is transformed in the experience of purchase and the importance of this experience expanding it to the post-sales one or to the experience even opening the packing of iPhone, similar to open a collection article. In other words, more than an exceptional product or a fabulous packing, we must focus our post-sales organization, products and in the details focused to the experience of our clients. From this form we will be able to obtain happy clients, with which we will be able to interact like organization approaching us the success based on the effect of the small details that mark differences.

Cash Flow & EBITDA: Similar indicators but they are not the same

2008-12-25T10:27:00.003-03:00

The EBITDA is an acronym that responds to Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization. This indicator has consolidated, in the last years, like the indicator more used to measure the operative yield of a company. Why?

Countable benefit, that is measurement that habitually has considered, is in fact one “fiction” and can hide-and-seek, in his calculation, different assumptions that distorts utility since nor it reflects the operational efficiency (when including the financial cost, that it depends on the structure of financing of the company, or the amortizations that depend on the plan of amortization that each company decides or on the type of equipment that it requires), nor is an estimation of the cash flow (since the amortizations and depreciations are a cost that does not suppose payment).

The EBITDA has the advantage, therefore, to eliminate the slant of the financial structure, the fiscal surroundings (through the taxes) and of “the fictitious” expenses (amortizations). Of this form, it allows to obtain a clear idea of the operational efficiency of the companies, and to compare badly of one more a more suitable form or that makes different companies or sectors in the purely operative scope.

A quite common error is to consider the EBITDA like a measurement of the cash flow of the company. The error comes from the fact that the interests and the taxes are real expenses, and therefore excellent in the calculation of the box flow. It either does not consider the realized investments (that according to the sector, for example the technological one, can get to be very excellent) or the capital variations that also have impact in the cash flow. To tie EBITDA and cash flow also would suppose to assume that all the sales are received, all the debts are pleased, and everything what it is bought sells. Which evidently is not true.

In this sense, many criticize the EBITDA like “a malleable” indicator, in whose calculation different assumptions can be realized, and that therefore can serve to make up the true results of an organization. Which, facing carrying out investment decisions, can be fatal since in financial terms, unique the excellent thing is the cash flow: the money that really generates a company and that can serve to recover the realized investment. The problem is that the EBITDA is an indicator reasonably simple to calculate, whereas the cash flow demands to spin finer.

Like conclusion, it would be necessary to say that the EBITDA is a good indicator if it is used with precaution and so it is designed, and it is an enormously dangerous indicator if it is taken like unique measurement of the capacity of a company to generate “cash”. That it is what matters.

Innovative Christmas Tree

2008-12-24T11:35:00.000-03:00

Merry Christmas Folks!!!

We wish you the best for all of you. I we want to present to you some great idea for an innovative Christmas tree, which can be used as a marketing innovative idea for a beer brand.

As you can see, the tree was made with beer bottles and the star with bottle covers. It looks great!

Colored Flame Candles.

2008-12-23T12:16:00.000-03:00

Few years ago we thought to have nice candles in our favorite restaurant, but the difference was to have colored flame candles.

It was thought because we want to have a special “date”, and typical candles would not bring that sensation.

After months of development we get some red/purple colored flame, using as “fuel” lithium hydroxide and isopropyl alcohol. The result was great, but the problem were the lithium combustion in the candle… so our candles would not be able to work in closed areas. We keep on thinking how to do it, but there are some USA and Chinese companies that have this product. So we were near to have a nice product, but if we had thought it before we would had a nice invention.

So my friends, don´t fall if your idea exists. Just keep on going.

Anyone Can Become a Millionaire

2008-12-22T18:13:00.000-03:00

Becoming a millionaire isn’t all that difficult and there are countless ways to achieve that milestone. Some people do it through real estate, others start their own business, while some simply get lucky by winning the lottery or winning big on a game show. What is even more interesting is that you don’t have to be wealthy to begin with nor do you have to earn six figures to reach this goal.

I know some people who earn well over $100,000 and all they have to show for it is a large mortgage payment and a fancy car that depreciates faster than a glass of milk left outside in the summer sun. Anyone can become a millionaire and there are five things you need to do to have the best shot of making that a reality.

1. Earn Income.

Clearly, the more money you make, the faster you can reach that milestone, but that doesn’t mean your average Joe with an average income can’t obtain millionaire status. Better yet, get married so you have dual incomes. The wonderful thing about having dual incomes is that even with two people in the household, your income may double, but your expenses typically don’t.

If you don’t earn even an average income, all is not lost. It is up to you to do something about it. A negative attitude about your job or your earning potential won’t change anything. Be proactive and make the decision to improve your situation. It is your life, so take control and realize that things don’t change overnight. It may take a few years of slow growth before you reach the point where you want to be, but you can do it if you try. Remember, short of inheriting money from a relative or winning the lottery, you will need income to become a millionaire.

2. Live Within Your Means.

Ok, so you have income but now what? It doesn’t matter how much money you make if you spend it all or spend even more than you make. It might be nice to eat out at nice restaurants every night, or to always be on the cutting edge of designer fashion but, this will only make you feel like a millionaire. This doesn’t mean you have to live a miserable and miserly lifestyle, but you simply need to live reasonably.

Start by purchasing a home that you can comfortably afford and drive vehicles that suit your lifestyle without straining your budget. You don’t have to be pulling down $75,000 a year and drive a 1992 Civic Hatchback or live in a dump, but throwing your money at a 4,000 square foot home in a gated community with luxury cars or SUVs that cost as much as one year of your salary won’t help you become a millionaire. Some may argue that an expensive home and real estate in general is a good way to become a millionaire.

3. Save Money.

This isn’t rocket science but if you earn a reasonable income and you live within your means, guess what, you will probably have money left over to save. The problem most people have is they put savings last, as an afterthought. People pay bills, buy things and then whatever is leftover they try to save. That is the wrong way to save. I’m sure you’ve heard it before, but pay yourself first. Whether it is $100 a month or $1,000 a month, think of the savings as a bill that needs to be paid and do it regularly. If you are unable to save money you will find that your only wealth is in the form of material things. START SAVING TODAY!

4. Invest Wisely.

Now that you are saving money, you need to invest it wisely. Sticking it under the mattress isn’t going to help you reach your goals any faster. You don’t have to read the Wall Street Journal or watch CNBC everyday while actively managing your portfolio in order to be a good investor. Some of the best investment advice is to simply buy and hold and to buy low and sell high.

It is also important to remember that real estate is part of your investment picture, but it shouldn’t be all of it. Too many people stake almost everything they have into a primary residence and expect it to appreciate in value. Just like any investment, generally speaking, over time you will make money. There isn’t much debate about that, but relying heavily on real estate is no different than if you rely on one stock to fund your retirement.

You can become a millionaire by simply buying a single stock and holding onto it for 20 years if it goes up significantly just like you can buy a home $500,000 home and have it double in value in 20 years. Take a lot of the risk out of the picture by making sure all of your eggs aren’t in the same basket and develop an investment strategy that will provide steady growth.

5. Stick With Your Plan.

If you have done the previous four items the only thing left to do is to continue doing it and stick to the plan. As far as income is concerned, always be on the lookout for ways to increase your income, whether it is through climbing the ladder at your current job, finding work elsewhere, or maybe even starting a business on the side. Increased income will mean you can save even more, provided you aren’t foolishly spending the additional money. As that additional money gets tucked away into savings or investments it will continue to grow even more quickly.

It Isn’t Hard to Do if You Work at It

Unfortunately, most people are looking for a way to get rich quick or to capitalize on the next big thing. It is true that some people have made their wealth through playing the real estate market, while others have done so by investing in a few stocks that exploded, but this is the exception and not the norm. If the above list seems overly simplistic, that’s good. There are no secrets to becoming a millionaire and almost anyone has the chance to make it happen. The process is simple:

1. Make money

2. Don’t spend all of your money

3. Save some money

4. Invest that money

5. Repeat

Certainly, there are many factors in play that can make this easier or more difficult for different people. This is simply the process that you can use in order to reach that goal, whether it is in 5 years or 50, if you follow a few basic steps you can do it.

Fast Coke Cooler

2008-12-22T17:02:00.001-03:00

Once we thought about one machine that could cool my coke can in a few seconds. Is the opposite of a microwave oven.

It could be with a charge of CO2 at high pressure flux, but the problem is the amount of gas needed to cold all the fluid in the can (the price of that charge of CO2 make it economically unavailable). Another way is to force the natural convection in the liquid, heating one side and cooling the other… the problem is the time and the amount of heat extraction needed in a short time.

Obviously traditional heat transfer can not do this, by my opinion, so it is needed to use another kind of technology to do so.

We are still thinking who to do it, so if you have some idea it would be great!

10 Tips to Boost your Business

2008-12-19T16:24:00.000-03:00

When you began your business, probably you made a deep investigation. Perhaps you looked for aid of advisers; perhaps you obtained data from books, magazines or other sources of information. You invested much in terms of money, time, sweat and tears to begin to raise your business from zero. Then… what follows?

For the business mans and entrepreneurs who survived at the beginning of the adventure to create a successful business, now you will be thinking as they are the following steps to grow your business by on your present levels. Several possibilities exist, 10 of we mentioned which them in these lines. Choosing or the suitable alternatives to let grow your business they depend on the heading, sources available, whichever money, time, sweat and tears you want to return to invest. If you are ready to grow, we are ready to help you.

1. – Open a New Store. This can not be the best option to expand your business, but it is in the first place because this is generally what commonly the entrepreneurs think when they consider his expansion. “The physical expansion not always is the best answer for a successful growth without a deep investigation, planning and finances”. But if of all ways you are considering a new location, we gave these tips to you for that:

Be sure that these maintaining under growth and utilities by more than five years.

Look at the global, economic tendencies of your heading and of your clients, to know the potential of your business.

Be sure that your administrative system and your equipment are extraordinary, you will need because open and to raise them the new premises.

Prepare a complete plan of businesses for your new location.

Choose where and how you will obtain the financing.

Choose the new location thinking about the best thing for your business, does not stop your pocket.

2. – Offer your business like a Franchise or a business opportunity. Is an excellent alternative, as long as your business is structured, and you have the expertise to be able to develop the franchise, yet the work, time and details that are required to develop this alternative. Besides the strategies, planning, control and development that is needed. We also can help you in this adventure.

3. – Register you product. This can be effective, like means of growth at low cost, particularly if you have a service, names or products. With this alternative you can receive money with respect to the sale rights and use of your systems, software, marks, etc. Whenever it is successful. To also register reduces your risks and is a low cost in comparison with the price of beginning your company to produce and to sell your mark or product.
For this find some partner for the registry, begin looking for companies that have or offer products or services similar to yours. But before generating a meeting or a contact with any company, look for a competent lawyer that one specializes in the registry and rights of intellectual property. This it is the best way to diminish the risks of losing the control of your product or service.

4. – Create an Alliance. An Alliance with a type of similar company can be a powerful form to expand your business quickly. If the thought to share the commissions of your sales by virtue of an alliance makes you might feel discomfort, first observe the complete image: if you want get the money for you, you really are destroying you. It is important that you observe that an alignment of this type with other companies that already have long lists of clients. It is the quickest way for the success.

5. - diversify. To diversify is an excellent strategy of growth, because it allows you to have many ways of cash entry that can help to beat the complicated periods, and by all means, to increase the sales and margins. Under this premise, we presented/displayed four ideas to diversify to your products or lines to you on watch:

Sell complementary products or services.

Teach or to make tie classes to your business.

Import/ export your products or of others.

Become a speaker.

6. - Reach other markets. It is serving your present market to you? , exist other markets? The other markets or manifolds markets help to increase your sales remarkably. Beam to fly your imagination or looks for consultant's office to develop or to look for these new markets that are generally parallel to your present markets or clients.

7. - Get a contract of the government. One of the best forms, for the small companies, to grow quickly is to have to the government contract. Only the 2002 federal government of the United States bought goods and services by more of U$ 235 billions. Obvious it is necessary to have a little patience and time to obtain contracts and contacts of the government, since it is generally needed a great amount time, work and investigation to generate a proposal of this type. If you are not prepared for it, to complete the forms, to fulfill the terms and conditions you are only wasting your time. This can sound discouraging and like a loss of work, but the good thing for gaining a contract with the government is that the company maintains the contract by enough time generally.

8. - Fusion or acquire a new business. The processes of fusion or acquisition of a new business usually are complex and generally require of enough work and development, but we presented/displayed four points to you that can help you to achieve the success in this process:

Retention of clients: Effort to maintain the clients of the two or more companies. Because the fusion processes or buy a new company requires long time to standardize the operation of the “new company”, often the clients are in waiting list or later. This can cause a numerous loss of clients.

Retention of executives: It retains and it maintains the best executives of both companies, is best and the most shining option. Since they remain generally in the new company the executives of the greatest company, in decline of the other, but excellent executives in the smallest company exist generally.

Unify the processes and technology: A reason by which the fusions must to be delayed is by the difference in the used technologies or the architecture of the organizations. Due to this it is necessary to unify these points in the two companies, to diminish the time and the work necessary to work like a single formation force. Of equal way, when the two companies own similar architectures and technologies, integration usually is rather simpler and expeditious.

Keep the focus: Keep the focus in the “great prize”, generally tends to take place a nebula in these processes that do not let see or what is the future or the goal to reach.

9. – Expand globally. A company not only grows in terms of clients and sales, but also when reaching new markets. Consequently your presence and mark generate major confidence, which facilitates the introduction of new products and/or services. Not necessarily it is needed to buy or to merge with another company to obtain a global growth, if not that strategies and vision in great and in the long term. Another form to be able to obtain this is through the search of new distributors or representatives in other countries, that they are those who know the custom and the behavior “the new” clients.

10. - Internet. Bill Gates, president of Microsoft, said that in the future only two classes of businesses will exist: those that have presence in Internet, and those that do not have businesses. It can sound a little excessive the commentary, but really Internet is a powerful and useful tool that is an integral part of the today businesses. 80% of the traffic to the pages Web of the companies take place generally by finders (google, yahoo, etc). At the moment they exist more than 2 billions of searches of Web pages per day, that duplicate every 100 days, so that to make your page visible is vital to present your company.

Client loyalty in a crisis time. How to make it?

2008-12-19T13:11:00.001-03:00

The attention to the consumer, according to Larry Hochman, is the key factor in the success of the companies. Still more in the present conjuncture, because “the crises usually hit the demand”. Hochman is met by the successful transformation that had British Airways in the valuation of its users. In the good ones and bad weather one is due to be loyal, because the value of the mark is not in the promise of the perfection, but in recognizing and accepting the weaknesses when plus the clients need. It is more and more clear that a greater understanding of how a service of quality generates a competitive advantage for a company. These small details mark differences, and we are able to generate those differences and strategies, as example are these five points.

1. - To recognize that the client has more power than ever, as much to punish or as to recognize a company positively. Today the client has more information, alternatives, power and control.

2. - The clients want a simple life, which implies less bureaucracy, speed in the time of delivery of the solicited thing, whatever the requirement.

3. - The confidence to construct a faithful relation with the client is fundamental. “It trusts our company? , Why it does not trust us” It requires of great courage to the company to make these questions and later apply that information to execute solutions.

4. - Knowledge that the consumers want information to the rate and speed of their lives, that is to say, that adapts in the style of the clients.

5. - It is not the product but people which make the difference. They are the people those that provide the service and that cannot be copied by the others. It is the competitive advantage for a company.

The 5 P of Entrepreneurs

2008-12-19T12:49:00.000-03:00

After years like engineer and entrepreneur, every day I am convinced more of the necessity than I have called the 5 essential P for an Entrepreneur. Not necessarily we must have a phenomenal idea or a new product, our success “almost” is assured if we developed and we have the following concepts in mind:

Professional: We must be a person who carries out our work with skill, application, seriousness, responsibility, honesty and effectiveness. Not leaving ends loose and able to fulfill its word.

Proactive: We must be of those people who cause that the things happen and not to be a mere observer of them, a creative one. Often inventor of businesses and more than nothing a detector of the real needs of its clients. And to be able to solve those problems and needs.

Perseverant: We never must ourselves give by won, we must know how to handle the decision times of its clients and to be always present and alert.

Patient: We must have all the patience of the world, the patience reaches all it. “The patience is the mother of all the sciences”. The good businesses not always are fast in executing themselves. It thinks about Dell that were delayed enough years in arriving where is, and also google.

Passion: Give you completely, everything to which you put passion result. The day that you lose the passion and you bore by your business or entrepreneur, think it, already arrived the moment from retire.

Many will be able to say that several of these characteristics are desirable in many activities. It is certain, but in this activity I consider them all necessary and essential for the success. If you have the 5 P of the entrepreneur and an idea or business working, we will help you to that this dream who you are living makes reality.