India's pride - Arvind Kejriwal

Arvind Kejriwal, India's future PM ?

In all probability it is the first time in the world that a governance model of a state is being discussed in a reputed global business school. Arvind Kejriwal's governance of Delhi is being discussed in Harvard Business School as a case study for good governance. It's one of the best lessons of effective administration in Indian democracy by ensuring probity in public life. 

Please listen to this  TED (like) talk (click here) in Hindi delivered recently in Delhi Legislative Assembly Hall by India's only Magsaysay Award ('06) winning Chief Minister, Arvind Kejriwal IRS (retd.) from IIT KGP. 

Kejriwal's life and governance of Delhi is an example and a lesson of the

• trustworthiness in the person, 
• sincerity of actions
• truthfulness in his dealings,
• reliability in his words
• genuineness in thoughts 
• earnestness of approach and 
• guilelessness in his transactions. 

It is a real case study for business schools on how an elected corruption-free government (in Delhi) can do so much good to it's people, get perfect clean chit from central auditing, investigative agencies and finally finish it's term with excess funds !! The people in return rewarding it by more people voluntarily  paying taxes, increasing the government's kitty to carry out these activities. 

Be it the great planning, dedication, commitment, service mentality and discipline in offering

• the adequately equipped freely-run government schools with good teacher student ratio and better facilities than private schools
• the Mohalla clinics which gives free health care for the deserving people to any extent, like a free health insurance,
• the free electricity upto 200 units per month across the population,
• the free water upto 200 Kilolitres per month for the domestic consumers across Delhi or
• the free bus and metro travel for Delhi women, 

there is presently nobody in the country with so much public credibility as Kejriwal. His experience being an IRS officer on how people resort to different tactics to avoid paying taxes, mainly led by a terrorising Inspector Raj, led to his scrapping the post of Inspectors to check for compliance. His approach was very simple and positive, showing people the benefits they get by paying their taxes properly. In turn, the people convinced that their tax money is not being wasted by the politicians (like the Gujarat CM spending Rs 192 crores of public tax money buying a plane for personal purposes), pay up.

The Indian world-class technology education through the Indian institute of Technology (IIT) system has started paying back to the country through Arvind Kejriwal. Hope other IITians too start giving back to the country than running away to foreign shores and pointing fingers .. Recently a Professor from IIM Bangalore, a graduate of IIT Delhi and IIM Ahmedabad, came into the news when his non-governmental organisation Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) managed to get their petition in the Supreme Court taken up by the SC for the discrepancies in the tally recorded in the EVM machines in 347 constituencies of the total 542 Lok Sabha constituencies in the 2018 Lok Sabha elections. A negative verdict could bring Modi's government down like a pack of cards.

Click here for the video link of Arvind Kejriwal's talk in the Delhi Legislative Assembly. Arvind Kejriwal's Aam Aadmi Party's (AAP) five year tenure of Delhi gets over on 14 February 2020 and the state goes for legislative assembly elections in February 2020 itself.

It is my sincere request that a two day session by Arvind Kejriwal should be organised by the Central Government in Delhi for all Chief Ministers of the states in the country to understand how to effectively govern the country and selflessly serve the people.

Hope our politicians cutting across ideologies and affiliations will make this a reality.

George ..

Cytotron..

Bengalurean's anti-cancer kit, Cytotron - a breakthrough: USFDA ..

"It is a great feeling that after so many years of hard work, against all odds, an institution like the USFDA is designating our work as a breakthrough in the treatment of three types of cancers of liver, pancreas and breast" Rajah Ajaya Kumar, the lead developer said.

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bengaluru/bengalureans-anti-cancer-kit-a-breakthrough-us/articleshow/72015631.cms?UTM_Source=Google_Newsstand&UTM_Campaign=RSS_Feed&UTM_Medium=Referral

https://www.elitaindia.com/Cytotron.html

CYTOTRON has been licensed exclusively to Scalene Cybernetics Limited to manufacture and market it internationally. CYTOTRON is also the registered Trade Mark of Scalene Cybernetics Limited. The whole body machine with 864 guns would cost around 2.5 crore (25 million) Indian rupees.

https://ehealth.eletsonline.com/2009/05/beams-of-hope-dr-r-v-ravi-kumar-of-centre-for-advanced-research-and-development-card-bangalore/

Data Centre

https://blog.nexcess.net/what-are-data-center-tiers-explained/  

Industrial visit to Featherlite Pvt. Ltd, Bangalore.

Featherlite, the Rs 500 crores, $80 million, is a name in office furniture in the country since 1965. Students and staff from Operations area of Alliance School of business visited their factory at Bidadi and Experience centre near Cantonment Bangalore on 27 November 2019.

It was a great experience to see the processes that make Fesyherlite a famous name in office furni6in the country besides Godrej.

George 

Easaw to join IESE Barcelona Spain ..

Main building of IESE, Barcelona, Spain.

It was good to learn a few weeks back that Easaw George (Jobin) got selected and was joining IESE Spain in Sept. '20 for an MBA. His long wait to complete employment of four to five years and a GMAT of 710 (though average GMAT at IESE is 686) has finally paid dividends.

Was surprised to find that IESE Barcelona Spain has been ranked among the top 10 Bschools of the world at global rank 10 and the second in Europe for 2019 (click here for the link..). When I checked the 2018 ranking, IESE was at global rank 6 and Europe rank 1. 

The IESE Barcelona campus ..

Jobin was waiting for good four years to get the necessary experience to be able to apply to these top schools. My CET colleague Vaidy whose son studied in HEC Paris, which was at rank 13 this year catapulted itself to #3 globally in 2019 as per the Economist list.

When the IESE representative visited Bangalore in Oct 2018, here is the report of the meeting which I attended with Jobin. 

Click here for IESE report of it's European and global rankings for 2019.. 

Wishing that everything goes well for Easaw.

george..

What ails higher education in the world ? - a deep analysis ..

Having been involved in the higher education industry for more than 30 years by now, I have always wondered when some innovative thinking would disrup
t this sector ?

Frequently I have been pained to understand how faculty members in top academic and elite institutions of the world neglect teaching and instead concentrate on research and grants. Even in the best Indian Institute of Technology at Mumbai where I was fortunate to pursue my studies, on few occasions, I found the teaching wanting. What this results in finally is a group of students who have not benefited from the talent and knowledge of the highly skilled knowledgeable professor and instead have to content being taught by graduate students or junior faculty members. This is very true in high ranking institutions .. 

Recently I happened to go through the November '19 Harvard Business Review article on why the global higher education scenario needs to be disrupted. 

Be it the west, East or Saharan Africa, higher education  is getting a fillip .. courtesy, UNESCO and Times.. 

The article does mention about the exceedingly high costs of higher education in different parts of the world.  Since US presently happens to be the hub of global higher education, it is interesting to know the case there. It is said that cost of higher education has increased by over 200% in the past 20 years. The student debt that has increased over 600 % over the past 20 years at $1.4 trillion is presently more than the credit card debt or vehicle financing debt. 

Another trend contributing to the high debts is the unreasonable demand by the students for the best expensive education and their dreams of hitting it big in corporate circles. Not everyone can finally become a CEO or a Chairman.  Students need to be realistic about their expectations.

Another area in higher education which needs disruption is the area of specialisation of students. Students frequently specialise in areas where they do not intend to continue in the future. So finally it is wasted resources spent on that student who has continued with his passion in other areas. Identifying one's passion early on in life and nurturing it is one way we can set right this anomaly and see that the right students get the right education to the exact depth to be able to specialise in the area and help the society and world at large. For example,   It is seen that students who want to study at the Harvard Business School on not getting admission entering the Kennedy School of government at Harvard, waste the opportunity by joining the corporate world, for other students who would have contributed in greater measure to social governance and administration.

Most of the present day jobs offered by employers are just focused on skills that help complete the jobs. In the short run, it is okay, but not in the long term planning for the organisation. There is a mismatch between this understanding between the new recruits and their employers. Jobs are not just getting some skills like accountancy, engineering design, manufacturing, quality control, building construction etc, it is helping identifying the right skill sets to add value to society and self in the long run.

The final area where our higher education system needs a major resurgence is the search among the students for jobs than the knowledge and exposure it brings. This comes through internships initially. These are taken lightly and results in students not being able to identify their passionate area of working. Students need to cultivate learnability of skills than displaying college credentials that do not add value to the tasks being carried out. Being able to acquire skills and additional knowledge through MOOCs or Khan academy is definitely a step in this direction.

I am sure in the coming years there would be enough disruptions that would help align higher education to the needs of the society and the world at large.

George

Is Gig economy the future ?

We all have been introduced to the concept of working from home. But gig economy is different from working from home. A gig economy is a free market system in which temporary positions are common and organizations contract with independent workers for short-term engagements. Examples of gig employees in the workforce could include freelancers, independent contractors, project-based workers and temporary or part-time hires. Techtarget.com The term "gig economy" refers to a general workforce environment in which short-term engagements, temporary contracts, and independent contracting is commonplace.

The growth of the gig economy represents a shift in the way people view work. Instead of a more traditional system where a worker works full-time for only one employer, some workers choose to enter the gig economy for the flexibility, freedom and personal fulfillment that it provides them.

In a gig economy, temporary, flexible jobs are commonplace and companies tend toward hiring independent contractors and freelancers instead of full-time employees. A gig economy undermines the traditional economy of full-time workers who rarely change positions and instead focus on a lifetime career. Gig economy workers may need health, disability or retirement benefits.  A similar strong sense of mission comes through in discussions with major gig economy companies, including Airbnb and Lyft. Both have established "future of work" efforts within their companies (as has Uber).(Feb 12, 2019 Forbes)

The gig economy is when individuals offer their services on a part-time basis to companies both small and large. The sharing economy allows for individuals and families to take advantage of assets they possess and rent them out to people who need them.. Zoomcar is a perfect example of a sharing economy platform.

Over the last several years, the gig economy has grown significantly across the country. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) in US, in 2017, 55 million people, or more than 35 percent of the US workforce, were participants in the gig economy. By 2020, that number is expected to jump to 43 percent.(Sep 11, 2019 fee.org)

We find gig economy jobs are interesting, with more of responsibilities and less authority. Health benefits, insurance etc. are the lookout of the employee. The 10 Highest-Paying US Gig Economy Jobs of 2018

It can be added to that broad definition that the workers in a sustainable economy are financially healthy, which can be defined as able to pay bills, save and plan for the future financially. In this context, the gig economy may not be sustainable. (Ref-Medium.com)

Click here to read an article from Harvard Business Review on Thriving in the gig economy..

Some examples of gig economy jobs are given here. 

Driving and delivery gigs are a popular part of the gig economy job sector 

Freelance Writer. 

Rent a Room in Your Home. 

Rent Your Parking Space 

Rent Your Storage Space 

Handyperson Work 

Landscaping/Lawn Care 

House or Office Cleaning 

Babysitting/Petcare

According to one definition, it is "a labour market characterised by the prevalence of short-term contracts or freelance work, as opposed to permanent jobs". And - taking opposing partisan viewpoints - it is either a working environment that offers flexibility with regard to employment hours, or it is a form of exploitation with very little workplace protection. (www.bbc.co.uk)

Click here to read an excellent BBC article on the gig economy ..

A gig economy is a free market system in which temporary positions are common and organizations contract with independent workers for short-term engagements. Examples of gig employees in the workforce could include freelancers, independent contractors, project-based workers and temporary or part-time hires. www.techtarget.com

One of the biggest upsides of the gig economy is that it offers flexibility to the employees. Unlike traditional employees, gig workers are free to choose what types of jobs they do and when and where they do them. The ability to work from home helps in balancing work and family schedules and demands. A gig is a temporary job. The employee often works on a specific project for a company, either as an independent contractor or a freelancer. Sometimes these gigs are full-time, and other times they are part-time. One downside to gig jobs is that they typically don't offer health insurance or other benefits. Balancesmb.com

The decision makers in society should discuss with local educational authorities to find how the gig economy concept could be popularised among the masses. Gig economy creates millions of entrepreneurs with great flexibility and infinite creativity. The downside of not having a permanent job with employee benefits could be offset with possibility for accepting highly specialised and highly remunerative jobs that need intense knowledge and training for execution with flexible and often intense working hours running into 12-16 hour work days. 

Knowledge is more valued in a gig economy that education. While education gets one a job, knowledge and skills can get the person a livelihood. Will the external environment be matured enough to accept the redefinition of job and assignment ? Every task becomes an assignment that needs to be assigned to properly qualified and skilled people who can do it satisfactorily to the customer's needs and desires.

Some of the gig jobs and rates of payment are given here..

Deep Learning/Artificial Intelligence: $115.06 Per Hour.
Blockchain Architecture: $87.05 Per Hour.
Robotics: $77.46 Per Hour. 
Ethical Hacking: $66.63 Per Hour.
Cryptocurrency: $65.37 Per Hour.
Amazon Web Services, Lambda Coding: $51 Per Hour. 
Virtual Reality: $50.18 Per Hour.
ReactJS Developers: $40.75 Per Hour. (Ref- Thebalancesmb.com)

Click here for the case I wrote on the gig economy for classroom discussion ...

George..

Why the new one - Samsung Galaxy M30S .

Last week I got the new Samsung Galaxy M30S from Amazon for Rs 17 K /-. Great value for money.

Display - The 6.4" Super Active Matrix Organic Light Emitting Diode (S-AMOLED)  display consumes less power, is more sensitive to ouch and offers a more vivid, colourful display. 

Camera - is a 48 MP triple camera at the rear and a 16 MP camera at the front

CPU Processor - The CPU is 2 nos. quadcore of 1.7 GHz and 2.3 GHz each making it in effect equal to an octacore processor of 2GHz capacity for each core .. 

RAM, Internal Memory - The 6GB RAM and 128 GB internal memory makes it super fast with lot of real estate for data storage.

Battery - The 6000 mAh battery makes for a longer battery life. Given the super efficient S-AMOLED display, the life of the battery is extended still further, for example 29 hours of video playback. 

External Memory - The external memory can be extended to 512 GB. 

Cost - Just Rs 17000/- Great Value for Money ..

Considering the pace at which mobile phon technology is growing day by day, this mobile is definitely an add-on to my existing iPhone 8S which is a 2GB RAM, 64  GB memory great phone..

Enjoying the leaps of technology ..

George..

Challenges of the Indian Automotive sector..

At a function organised by Travancore Management Association (TRAMA) felicitating my friend Saji Varghese on his new assignment as Sr. GM of MRF in Gujarat, I found his talk to the TRAMA audience in Kottayam on the challenges faced by the Indian Automotive sector very informative. .. 

It was very well researched and insightful, educative too 👌👌 He touched on five main aspects, 

1. Impact of BS VI norms - the strict BS VI (Bharat Standards) norms by-passing the BS V, straightaway from BS IV, to be made compulsory on all vehicles sold in India from 1st of April 2020, has made quite a few heads turn, causing great uneasiness with auto manufacturers who are on a run to see that their inventory of BS IV vehicles is done away with before the cut-off date. This has resulted in automobile and heavy vehicle manufacturers cutting off their production and getting ready to bring in new environmentally superior variants.

2. Impact of auto aggregators like Uber and Ola in India - It is for sure, no doubt, Uber and Ola has changed the personal travel landscape efficiently and cost effectively for ever in the country. Even though in India, Ola presently caters only to the population in 110 cities with ten lakh ( a million) driver partners and Uber to forty cities, the cost effective value addition it has brought to the passenger experience is something beyond explanation. Particularly in big cities like Mumbai, New Delhi and Bangalore, it has made a big difference to the way people commute daily to their work and back and plan inter city visits and so on.

3. Rapid introduction of Electric vehicles - complying with India's adherence to the 2015 Paris Treaty on Climate Change, it is required that by 2030, we transition to EV range of vehicles to reduce the Carbon footprint of our vehicles and try level best to limit climate change. People like me, have taken decision to postpone our new vehicle buying decision till more efficient and cost effective EV models come to the market.  By 2020, Indian market will have Tata with their INR 10-12 lakh EV, Mahindra with their 10 lakh EV, Hyundai with their INR 25 lakh Kona and so on. Toyota is also planning to enter the market later in 2020, while Suzuki is trying with it's Wagon R EV model anytime early 2020.

4. Market uncertainty forcing prospective buyers to postpone their purchase decisions- most of the buyers who were planing to buy their cars after studying the market have decided to postpone the buying decision till the air is cleared regarding governmental support and pricing structures of the automotive companies. Also setting up of the necessary support infrastructure across the country will also consume some time.

5. Poor economic growth of Indian economy over the past six years - With change of government in 2014, the country's economic progress has been low, resulting in slow automobile industry growth in general.

6. Trend among new-age youngsters to avoid hassles of car ownership with rise of Uber and Ola - Who wants to invite trouble and headache in the cities driving cars, when the whole driving experience can be outsourced to startups with enterprising individuals ready to connect the people with the driver and owner of cars at very low and effective rates. In the bargain the passengers avoid the expenses and hassles of insurance, fluctuating fuel prices, frequent maintenance and replacement of spare parts, headache of going behind police cases, courts etc in the case of an accident etc ? I do not own a car in Bangalore for the past two and half years, how peaceful it has been ??

7. The second hand vehicle market facing a glut of old vehicles - with few buyers and high supply has had an impact and raised doubts on the resale value of cars on the second hand vehicles market,

My former MRF tyres boss felt the main reason was mishandling of economy by the new government over the past six years. He was of the opinion be it Ola or Uber, they also need cars, it also results in sale of cars. India car population is one tenth that of China. So there is great scope for sale and growth.

As BS VI introduction is mainly on fuel, the automobile should be able use cleaner fuels. Though automobile changes are much less , mostly tighter piston clearances etc. why should automobile sales plummet ? Nobody prevents selling BS VI cars before April 2020. 

Good planning will make cars available, so that you need worry about inventory of old cars, it will be sold out. Major reason for lower sale of commercial vehicles is low growth. That is the main reason for other vehicles too.

The concern made about the Electric vehicles is the same arguments people made when computers were introduced. There are also allegations that EVs being blocked by Petroleum industry bigwigs and auto industry captains, But will that strategy work when India has already committed to the international community at the 2015 Paris Treaty on Climate Change to bring in radical changes in the automobile vehicle pollution to help achieve UN goals of limiting global temperature change to within 1.5 deg Celsius to slow down climate change.

The difficult automobile industry changes have made families limit their spends on dress, eating and socialising, this has got cascading effects on other sectors of the economy too.

Overall the illness in the automobile sector is not only pulling back the auto ancilliary industries sector, it is also impacting other areas of the economy, pulling them back.

Hope our leaders take sensible economic actions that can help revitalise the economy and get the automobile industry back on track.

George.

How to get a Live Linux USB ?

*How to start working on live Linux USB .. a cheat sheet*. 

Linux Ubuntu Mate 19.1 is the latest Linux .  The below instructions tell you how to prepare a live Linux USB. 

1. Get a 8GB blank USB 

2. Download the 2.5 GB Linux *Ubuntu Mate 19.1 iso file* from Ubuntu website to laptop (or get from any comp mag any other iso)

3. Open Windows USB startup disc creator

4. Make USB a live USB by installing the Ubuntu Mate 19.1 iso file 

5. Switch off laptop/PC 

6. Ensure live Ubuntu USB in USB port

7.  Switch on PC and allow to boot from USB.. 

8. Enjoy .. Ubuntu live USB

9. To enjoy Internet click on network icon, connect to wi-fi using login/password 

10. Open YouTube, put your headphones and enjoy good music or video. Nothing to beat Ubuntu audio and video playback . !!

The Laptop RAM is the RAM and the 8GB USB is your hard disc. Switch off using menu.

You can this way work on Linux on any windows machine without disturbing your windows files. From Linux, using file explorer you can even enter your windows machine directories and read and write on windows docs .. 

I would like to see all of you well versed to work on the FREE Linux OS, as an added skill, besides the old, stale, dumb and costly proprietary OS Windows .. 👍👍 

If you work on Facebook, Google, Android on smartphone, YouTube, Whatsapp, LinkedIn etc .. you are *already a hardcore Linux fan and user* joining 85% of global computer users using Linux for  tough backend database and enterprise operations. This tutorial will help you start using Linux front end software .. 

Enjoy great freedom using FREE and OPEN SOURCE software .. 🙏🙏🙏

Copyleft 2019, Alliance University, Bangalore. Prepared by George Easaw

My experiences with Ubuntu 19.10 ..

It's my weakness - to experiment and understand the latest developments in the personal computing world. And Linux OS offers me the best experience as I get the latest IT developments incorporated into the software. 

Last Friday, I installed the latest Ubuntu 19.1 - Eoan Ermine, as a live USB and has been using it since then. It's a great feeling to know that we are working on the latest in the IT world with special emphasis on the file system and the new Nvidia support.

Ubuntu 19.1, the latest kid in town ..

The real great improvement in this model is the support for ZFS file system and memory storage provided.

ZFS is a local file system and logical volume manager created by Sun Microsystems Inc. to direct and control the placement, storage and retrieval of data in enterprise-class computing systems. The ZFS file system and volume manager is characterized by data integrity, high scalability and built-in storage features - techtarget.com

For example, it can support high storage capacities, ie. maximum file size is 2^^64 bytes, maximum volume size is 2^^128 bytes, maximum number of files is unlimited.

The GUI is great, it works on Gnome version 3.34 and is supported till April 2020, when we expect Ubuntu 20.04 to be released.

I was listening to some Youtube videos on the headphones, and it was simply marvellous. Besides, the colour rendering of the Youtube videos was very very natural, sometimes even better than the original. The colour is very pronounced but not jarring to the eyes ..

The OS speed has improved and I should say it is one of the fastest around, as fast or even faster than MX Linux released two weeks back. The download file size was only about 2.1 GB.

While working on it for about 8-10 hours, I felt a lag only once for about 20 minutes, some operations were happening in the background, but otherwise, the speed was simply great ..

Libre Office is the Office suite supported in this OS, while Mozilla Firefox is the Internet browser, Thunderbird the email client.

I am sure the FOSS community would continue surprise the IT world with more exciting options and facilities in the future.

George..

Future batteries - Nobel 2019 for Lithium ion battery ..

 Battery tech. would not have grown but for them..

In this article we are trying to trace the past and present of energy storage, as we know the future development of the human race depends to a large extent on how we are able to use energy to power our daily technology backed lives.  

Click here for an excellent video explanation of how the Li-ion battery works .. 

The history behind the portable energy storage through chemical batteries dates back to the early 19th century when it was found that electrons could be made to flow from the an electrode to another and this electron flow could be captured to emulate the flow of electricity.

The Lead acid battery developed by the French Physicist Gaston Plante in 1859 is still being used in automobiles and is one of the biggest inventions for more than a century in portable power. The automobiles used lead acid batteries for lighting and the initial spark to light the fuel, but not for running the heavy duty vehicle.

All electronic goods need less power and disposable chemical batteries have been a source of power for many years with portable electronics like the camera, music player and so on. When miniaturisation became the need of the hour, the focus shifted on how to increase the speciific energy capacity of batteries, ie., developing smaller and smaller batteries generating more and more of power, storing more and more power and finally sharing more and more of this power .. The research focused on finding better materials for the Anode and the Cathode.

The Lithium-ion battery has been one of the greatest discoveries in the past ten years as it has brought the miniaturisation revolution to almost fruition.

Most of the people seem to get confused with how, the same anode and cathode, seem to take different polarity in the activities of the battery. In the charging phase, the electrons move from the Anode to the Cathode. In the discharge phase, electrons move from the Cathode to the anode.

By a process called intercalation, ions can be inserted between layers of metals giving them a higher charge. Intercalation is the reversible inclusion or insertion of a molecule (or ion) into materials with layered structures. - wikipedia.org. 

Prof. Goodenough worked on substituting metal sulphide Cathode with metal oxide Cathode which were intercalated with Lithium ions but did not collapse when the Lithium ions were discharged. Goodenough's battery was twice as powerful as Whittihgham's battery and could be charged and discharged. By 1980, this triggered the wireless electronics revolution because of its low weight and portability. By intercalating the element layers with positively charged ions we can create positively charged electrodes which will attract the electrons during the charging phase. 

Yoshino's contribution to the development of the modern day Lithium-ion battery is that he replaced the graphite electrolyte in the battery with the more stable Petroleum coke. This brought out the latest Lithium-ion batteries which could be recharged over multiple cycles as the electrolyte did not collapse and thus had a longer life. Pure Lithium which was very volatile resulted in accidents and with Yoshino's design it was replaced by Lithium Cobalt oxide which was more stable, safe and could be manufactured in a variety of sizes that could fit into miniature electronics devices.

TESLA is using the same Lithium ion batteries which contain Colbalt, mostly mined from the Cobalt mines of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Africa. While a mobile phone battery may have upto 10g of Cobalt, a laptop battery can have upto 500 g of Cobalt and a car battery upto 10 kg of Cobalt.

Collapsing battery prices, courtesy Scientific American, Dec '18

While research is progressing around the world chemical engineering laboratories for finding better electrodes and intercalating materials, we can be assured that the world of miniature electronics is also bound to grow with potable power sources, especially in the defense and aviation sectors.

Like the automatic watches and battery powered watches moved to the Quartz crystal slid-state type watches presently, we can expect the batteries of the future to move from the electrode cathode variety of present day to the solid state type. 

The above graph shows how from $1000 per KWh in 2010, we have moved to $200 in 2020, it is expected the cost will stumble down to $80/KWh by 2030. Then only we can say EV can have a parity with cars. Magnesium-ion batteries which can store double the capacity of Lithium ion batteries are the future of batteries according to Scientific American. 

In short, we can say that the future of batteries is not the electrode and electrolyte type, though for the time being it is the best and has even got the Nobel Prize of 2019, in the long future it is going to be solid state device. 

George..

Reference :

1. Koshy, Jacob, How did the Li-ion battery set off a technology revolution, The Hindu, 13 October, 2019, Last accessed 14 October, 2019.

2. Scientific American editorial staff, Batteries - beyond Lithium, Scientific American, Dec 2018, Last accessed Oct, 2019

GAGAN, ISRO and Indian Railways

Imagine 350 LIVE TRAIN UPDATES on location and speed of trains, arriving every second, 24 x 7, at the Centre for Railway Information Systems (CRIS) central computers in Delhi from the 12,000 trains playing on the Indian Railway network, enabled by the GPS Aided Geo Augmented Navigation (GAGAN) system of ISRO, relaying both location and speed every 30 seconds from all the 12,000 trains on Indian Railway networks across the country in REAL TIME ..  

That's a lot of data inputs transmission in one of the largest Data Analytics experiments being planned by Indian Railways in human history, ably supported by ISRO.. 

This is the future of Indian Railways which is sure to offer lot of other unimaginable benefits for the rail traveling public in the country .. 

Presently with the partially realised system at CRIS HQ, ND, about 140 rail updates are being handled and analysed every second, which by Oct 2020 is expected to reach 350 updates per second. 

Way to go Indian Railways and ISRO .. 🙏🙏

Click here for the Economic Times link ..

george..

Waste plastics and Renewology ..

When the Australian American Indian of Kashmiri descent, MIT alumnus and Renewology co-founder and CEO Priyanka Bakaya told the world the mounting plastic wastes problem of the world cannot be solved just by reducing and reusing, the world paused to look at what she had to offer. 

Renewology and Priyanka, Entering a circular economy for plastics  ..

 

Bakaya feels reprocessing plastic wastes of all types and forms, into fuel, especially Diesel, with conversion ratios of 60 barrels of Diesel for every 10 tons of waste plastic from land and the oceans, (with 75% less Carbon footprint over conventional oil processing) can only help solve the world's mounting plastic wastes crisis. 

60 barrels of diesel (1 barrel =159 litres) is 9540 litres. Diesel, @ INR 70/litre, it is INR 6,68,000 revenue from every 10 tonnes of waste plastic.

20% of waste plastics is used as initial fuel to energise the process while 5% turns into char. The rest 75% is what is converted to Diesel, so in effect, this is a self-sustaining model ..

Besides the many land-based waste plastic processing centres in US, the first water-based waste plastics collection and conversion centre is fortunately and sadly on the world's most polluted river, Ganges at Varanasi, India. 

Finally MIT is showing the world how it can bring effective, self-sustaining,  innovative, lasting solutions to pressing problems of the world.. 

Will this be a game-changer finally ?

http://news.mit.edu/2019/renewlogy-plastic-waste-1010

OR Taha ..

Operations Research by Hamdy Taha has been one of the best OR books I have come across after the text book by Ravindran, Philips and Solberg, Wiley. 

I have not seen any other OR book as exhaustive and simple as these books where most of the OR concepts have been explained well.

George

Private trains on Indian tracks by 2024 ..

The Chairman of the Indian Railway Board Pradeep Yadav recently made a very startling disclosure that Indians will soon be able to travel in luxury and comfort in private trains on Indian tracks by as early as 2024.

What are the questions people would ask the Railways ?

• Safety - would traveling public be offered better safety equipments and live monitoring of tracks to prevent accidents ?
• Security  - would the traveling public be more secure inside the train, especially single women passengers ?
• Passenger amenities - offer new and innovative amenities ?
• Luggage handling solutions - will innovation be brought here ?
• Costs - would privatisation hike up the costs and make rail travel prohibitively costly ?
• Availability of seats and capacity - to start with private operators would be working side-by-side with the Indian Railways augmenting the Railways capacity. Slowly as more trains and routes would be open to private firms, the competition would increase. 
• Reach - would private trains run on all sectors being run by IR now or only on profitable routes
• Number of players - how many private players would be allowed on any single route ?
• Are the railway tracks across the country capable of handling high speed trains ?
• What will happen to the existing employee base and how will they be retrenched ?

For the private players, the questions that need to be clarified by the government are as follows

• Entry parameters
• Exit parameters
• Minimum trains to be operated
• Minimum distance to be covered
• Minimum facilities to be provided
• Minimum stations to be serviced
• Minimum overhauling facilities
• Who will resolve mutual disputes with the Indian Railways that could arise ?

The steps would be akin to the liberalisation and privatisation plans for the telecom and air travel industry in India. The privatisation in the two above sectors has worked out smoothly. It has offered great benefits to the Indian public. Indian private telecom players now offer the world's ONLY FREE domestic telephone calls to any part of the country. Would railways privatisation also offer great prospect of service and travel to the Indian public ? 

Presently Dedicated Freight Corridors (DFC) between Delhi and Mumbai and Delhi and Kolkata already offer private freight trains for the past thirteen years. It is slowly picking up.

For Indian Railways, 62% of  revenues come from movement of freight and 38% from passenger movement transporting 8.26 billion passengers and 1.16 billion tonnes of freight for the year ending 2018. 

As an experiment on privatisation, IRCTC (a quasi govt agency under Railways) is offering two rakes called Tejas on private basis where each customer is given a Rs 25 lakh personal insurance, in addition the customer is given preferences on the pick-up and delivery of passengers and their luggage from homes to destination, including the type of food and the type of accommodation etc. The flexibility offered to the passenger is possible only because it is run as a private entity.

The entry of private trains is sure going to make our train rides in future more enjoyable.

Click here for more info ..

George..

Ban single use plastics ..

Caranzalem beach, courtesy Indiamarks.com

Just 1 km stretch of Caranzalem beach in Goa generated almost one tonne of plastic waste (single use plastic) in a clean-up drive from National Institute of Oceanography, (NIO) Panaji, Goa last Saturday.  

Imagine the pollution from single use plastics in India with a total coastline of 7517 km .. 

Given that almost 50% of plastic pollution across the world is from single use plastics, can we be a bit more discerning in it's use and disposal ? 

Click here for the news item ..

Plastic trash on beaches come from two sourdces, those deposited by the sea and by tourists. The trash collected by the NIO team in Goa would most probably be beach trash, deposited by tourists. If we create better awareness among the beach tourists to help maintain a good neat beach free of plastic and other litter, it would be a great service to the people around, other prospective tourists and to the beach health in general.

In June 2019, a paper from WWF and Uty of Newcastle, Australia in the Environment Journal, (click here) that humans on an average ingest about 5 grams of micro-plastic a week from the water we drink. Where does our drinking water get this plastic ?  Plastic littered in the drinking sources of water is the way micro plastics are found in drinking water. The study further states that every human on a average consumes about 250 grams of micro plastics a year coming to us from water, food sources etc.

This is indeed a threat. We are aware of plastic being a carcinogen, inducing growth of cancer. Human ingestion of micro plastics is thus a big threat to human survival.

Single use plastics after te use, is littered and either finds it's way into landfills or water bodies, both of which is  a threat to human and animal life on earth.

We need to think of a concerted innovative effort to control this littering of single use plastic around the world, especially around South East Asia, which is claimed to the world's largest user of single use plastics.

George..

Report on Role play - Budget Airlines ..23/9/19

The importance of role lay to get the students to know about the management decision making process cannot be better put through other than through a role play session in the class.

In the Alliance School of Business sem 3 MBA Operations, Operations Strategy we did a role play on the Low Cost Airlines. The case for the discussion was written by the author way back in 2017 and revised in 2019. (click here).

Accordingly we prepared a list of the stakeholders in the case and got the students to do a role play in the class on the same. (click here for the presentation)

The benefits of role play

• Students immediately apply content in a relevant, real world context.
• Students take on a decision making persona that might let them diverge from the confines of their normal self-imposed limitations or boundaries.
• Students can transcend and think beyond the confines of the classroom setting.
• Students see the relevance of the content for handling real world situations.
• The instructor and students receive immediate feedback with regard to student understanding of the content.
• Students engage in higher order thinking and learn content in a deeper way.
• Instructors can create useful scenarios when setting the parameters of the role play when real scenarios or contexts might not be readily available.
• Typically students claim to remember their role in these scenarios and the ensuing discussion long after the semester ends.                                 www.carleton.edu

Kempegowda International airport, Bangalore, courtesy The Hindu.

While doing the role play, we came to realise from the deliberations that happened in the class that the Government policy of LPG plays a big role in deciding the rates of taxes and motivation these private low cost airlines have in giving the best service to the customers in the country.

The customers and the airlines were asking for a roll down of the taxes charged by the government on the tickets, airport usage fee and on the fuel used by the planes, but the government was very silent, given that a large portion of the money the central government receives is from the fuel taxes and surcharges. This is the revenue part of the government on which the central government has a firm and decisive say.

The petroleum companies were pointing fingers at the government citing the policy parameters within which they are forced to work and their helplessness in reducing the taxes. The fuel price increase is the result of global volatility of the fuel prices.

IATA, wanted the budget airlines management to give the best to the customers by way of better coordinated high quality services, better connectivity, more in-flight facilities, on-time functioning of flights etc.

Indigo - India's largest budget airline, 240 planes, 48% domestic market share, June '19

The flying public were also worried about the transportation time it takes to travel to the present Kempegowda international airport in the northern suburbs of Bangalore city. The Secretary of aviation has promised that he will be talking to his counterpart in  the transportation ministry to speed up the Metro construction in Bangalore.

The prospect of a new domestic or international airport coming up at Hosur was a matter of concern for the domestic flight operators as they have one more node in the country to address and which would necessitate their redirection and re-planning of flights within the country.  IATA was fully confident that the new airport at Hosur would convert many of the local train and bus passengers to air passengers, as presently the very high commute time of almost 3 hours to Kempegowda airport was discouraging passengers from travel by air. 

The Bangalore airport handled almost 33 million passengers in 2018-19, third only to New Delhi (69 million) and Mumbai (49 million) during the same period and was ready to commission the second runway by Oct 2019. Since the meeting happened in Bangalore, the issues relating to Bangalore air passengers were highlighted in the high level meeting convened by the IATA and Secretary, Aviation GOI.

The meeting ended with a vote of thanks by the IATA representative.

George

Simple points to youngsters for a healthy life ..

Here are simple 25 tips / actions for experiencing a richer life. Gems to help lead a happy life ..

1. Be physically active - exercise daily / go for long walks / do yoga regularly

      2. Eat food just what is needed, have everything in moderation

This is what WHO asks you to do ..

3. Take enough sunlight during the day

     4. Use public transport wherever possible

5. Observe all spiritual lents, it helps your body systems to recoup

     6. Donate blood at least once a year

7. Help financially and materially those who cannot repay you ..

     8. Eat plenty of salads, leafy veggies and less of meat

9. Read lot of books, discuss and write whenever possible

     10. Whenever possible mentor or help youngsters, the future of the world

11. Care for all aged people, orphans and children

     12. Do not bargain with street vendors

13. Be firm and kind to your children, care for your spouse and spend quality time with the family

     14. Be thankful to God for all the blessings you have received

15. Visit elderly people and people in hospitals / prisons

     16. Spend money carefully and be careful with money

17. Have concern and pray for the weak, aged, diseased and imprisoned people of the world

     18. Speak frequently to parents, Love your siblings, help them, have occasional get-to-gethers

19. Listen to good music and watch great movies ..

    
     20. Drink lot of water (warm if possible)

21. Have a positive frame of mind, speak good of others

     22. Avoid red meat and care for the environment ..

23. Whenever possible eat locally available grains, fruits and vegetables

     24. Be in touch with friends, kin and relatives

25. Be considerate to all plants, animals and birds of the world

These are some simple tips that can help youngsters lead a happy and contended life.

George..

Will Vikram lander on moon wake up ?

A priceless pic of Moon .. Courtesy NASA, LRO.

It was not only Indians and ISRO who were frantic to know what had happened to the Indian lander on Moon, Vikram, the whole world was. NASA's Lunar Reconaissance Orbiter (LRO) sent this image of the spot where Vikram had a crash landing two weeks back on 7 September 2019 early morning.

The lunar night is evident from the dark patch, no sunlight, that was fast approaching from the right side, as the moon is rotating from left to right.

If ISRO had installed the Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator (RTG) on the lander, probably even during the lunar night the search operation could have continued. ISRO has just solar panels on the lander and there are strategic reasons for that too, not to pollute the lunar surface with unnecessary radioactive materials that could be a threat to future lunar colonies etc.

With temperatures going to -180deg C on the Moon during the night, will  the systems on Vikram survive the extreme cold to pick up and still be active when the lunar day starts in 16 days time from now ?

A big question for India and a less hopeful one at that. But the learning is too good.

George.

Green Digital Transformation Initiatives at Alliance University

Green initiatives in the exam area ..

World over climate change is creating a flutter as unnatural events occur and climate changes happen very frequently in different parts of the world. How do we cut our greenhouse gas emissions by half by 2030 and Netzero emissions by 2050 ? (as mandated by UN SDG 2015) ..

We talk about Digital Transformation unmindful and ignorant whether these transformations are green and improve our lives for the better ?

Firstly these digital transformations have to come out from our homes and work area. It is through these initiatives that we are able to convince others of the efficacy of Digital Transformation. That is the best way we can convey the meaning of Digital Transformation measures.

Accordingly we initiated an Green Digital Transformation initiative in the AU Examination process satisfying United Nations Sustainable Development Goal #11 (SDG) 2015.

The immediate advantage is less use of paper and stationery. We are giving a live model to the student community and the community at large at what are sustainable initiatives that we undertake at the University.

Students at Alliance University took a computer based Mid-semester exam (MSE) in computer lab for Logistics and Supply Chain Management subject of semester 2 MBA Operations of the Alliance School of Business using Moodle e-learning LMS at the AU portal site on 19 September 2019 from 2 - 4 PM.

Section A - objective type

Section B - short answer type

Section C - case analysis 

While quizzes in Section A give results immediately, sections B and C need faculty intervention to read and evaluate answers. You are welcome to witness history in the making in Alliance University totally doing away with physical answer sheets ..

We are hopeful that more and more faculty members from the different schools will take to this digital model.

Way to go 🙏🙏

George..

EV Carbonomics ..

This future is not that far ..

Some interesting Carbon Footprint Economics or Carbonomics,

to make you ponder while buying your new car .. I have disposed my old car and have not yet thought of when to go for the new one. 

Would you buy a good second-hand car or a brand new one, (or an electric car), if you cared for the environment ? 

The Manufacturing Carbon footprint of a new average $30,000 IC engine car or electric car is about 14 metric T of CO2. 

So if you do not buy a new car, you are straight away preventing that 14 T CO2 from entering the atmosphere.

It would take 2,25,000 kms running for a modern efficient IC engine car emitting about 220g/km of CO2, just to offset the Manufacturing  CO2 footprint over a second hand car ..

How green is the electricity that powers your EV ?

If you buy an electric car instead, it takes just 90,000 km running to offset the Manufacturing CO2 footprint of 14 T. 

While the average efficient conventional IC engine car has a Carbon footprint of 220g CO2/running km, an average electric vehicle has a Carbon footprint of about 60g CO2/running km. ie. for every 100,000 kms running, an electric vehicle would emit 16 T less of CO2 than a conventional IC engine car. 

With lesser moving parts an electric car would in the long run, have lower Maintenance Carbon footprint compared to an IC engine car.  

Keep these facts in mind when you buy your new car.

A major objection raised by opponents of EV relates to the origin of electricity that powers your batteries. Is this energy green ?? For the time being, this energy is coming from carbon polluting coal and other thermal resources across the country.  Unless we have a sound solar energy policy, ths question will be an issue in the country.

Click here for a doc that gives more idea on Carbonomics ..

George..