The Blog-Health-o-Meter reads Fresher than ever.

Crunchy numbers

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 7,800 times in 2010. That’s about 19 full 747s.

In 2010, there were 12 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 47 posts. There were 42 pictures uploaded. That’s about 4 pictures per month.

The busiest day of the year was March 30th. The most popular post that day was Smart Pills to Smart Scans: The future of Medical Devices.

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were facebook.com, bx.businessweek.com, linkedin.com.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for virtual, smart grid, social entrepreneurship, smartphone growth, and virtual world.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

1

Smart Pills to Smart Scans: The future of Medical Devices March 2010

2

Smart Grids, Smart Homes and Smart Healthcare – Will 4G change the way we live? August 2009
2 comments

From machines to humans – How virtual are we getting? May 2009

Logos and their meanings June 2010

Is it the end of SMS based Ad business model for Startups? June 2009
5 comments

What are the implications?

Convergence in technology has to ideally drive down the prices making gadgets more affordable. But royalties from licensing or companies going out of business (which leads to monopoly) may in fact offset that or even increase the prices. In some cases innovation will also get stifled because startups or new entrants will hesitate to take an existing technology forward with the fear of getting sued.

Read more about it in the Economist – The Great Patent Battle or the New York Times article – An explosion of Mobile Patent Lawsuits.

For the minority, who end up in decent careers (which may not even be closely related to what you studied in college), the ROI may justify the degree in some way. But for a majority, especially those who are in unrelated careers that hardly pay anything, a college degree perhaps is not a good investment at all –

Here are some statistics for 17 Million Americans with a college degree (from the article in the Chronicle)

– Obviously, 17 Million are in a job that does not require a college degree
(if you include people in careers not related to their college degree, this number will be higher)

– 5,057 janitors in the U.S. with Ph.D.’s, other doctorates, or professional degrees

– 317,759 Waiters and Waitresses (over 8,000 of them have doctoral or professional degrees)

– 80, 542 Bartenders

– 49,452 Postal service Mail carriers

More occupations are listed below:

This is something that administration and policy makers who emphasize on education as the solution to Jobs should ponder about. Moreover, since many employers seek experience over a degree (unless you are from an ivy league school or in the tech industry) should the emphasis be more on vocational training and practical experience instead of theory in a random subject.

Did it ever occur to you that by clicking on a Facebook “Like” button, you are implicitly agreeing to “endorse” and have your name associated with an advertisement (Social Ads) for whatever you Liked? And did you know that by agreeing to use Facebook, you have given them the permission to use your name and picture in the Ads (read FB terms of service below in this post)

Here are some of the Ads I saw recently on Facebook with endorsements from people (annotated in red boxes) in my friend’s list. I guess Facebook is just using names for now, but may enable the display of your profile pictures in near future.

All these Ads, called “Social Context Ads”, are being aggressively pitched by Facebook to Advertisers, according to a Wall Street Journal article.

Now if you are happy about endorsing certain products (for free) and recommending them to your friends, it is absolutely fine. However, in doing so, you need to be selective and conscious about where and what you click the “Like” button for. But for those of you who care a lot about Privacy and want to opt out of this totally, fortunately, Facebook provides that option in their privacy settings (if you are able to navigate through the maze of 160 settings). The settings for advertisements are under Account -> Account Settings -> Facebook Ads (See below. Also note that Facebook says your Profile picture can be used in Ads)

Wait, thats not all. The above setting is just for Third-party Ads. There is one more setting below this for Social Ads based on your Actions on Facebook. Make sure to set that too…

And just so that you know, here are the terms of service you agreed to (in order to use Facebook):

About Advertisements on Facebook
Our goal is to deliver ads that are not only valuable to advertisers, but also valuable to you. In order to do that, you agree to the following:

1. You can use your privacy settings to limit how your name and profile picture may be associated with commercial or sponsored content served by us. You give us permission to use your name and profile picture in connection with that content, subject to the limits you place.
2. We do not give your content or information to advertisers without your consent.
3. You understand that we may not always identify paid services and communications as such.

So next time you click on those “Like” buttons, you better know the implications of the simple click. And you also now know why Facebook will never have a “DisLike” button because then, they’ll never make money off these Ads.

Plug, a location-based App and platform for events, one of the first few products from Mobinett Interactive, gets you all this interaction right into your palm. From event information such as the agenda and maps to networking to keeping tabs on all the interesting stuff thats happening around you during the event, Plug offers several features that will engage all the stake-holders in an event – organizers, attendees and sponsors. Plug’s leaderboard makes an event really exciting by  giving it the feel of a game and increasing participation.

Plug is currently in private beta. You can download the Apps on iPhone and Android, or access Plug on any smartphone through a mobile website. Text messaging interface for Plug is also available as an optional feature.

Take the tour and learn more about Plug at http://plug.mobinett.com.

A couple of weeks ago, I got an interesting forward on logos and their meanings. While I knew about most of these logos, I wanted to post it here for others who maybe interested. Credit goes to whoever put these together…

FedEx Logo

If you look at the center of this logo, you can see two people enjoying a Tostitos chips with a bowl of salsa. This logo conveys an idea of people connecting with each other and sharing.

At first, this logo might not make much sense. But if you look closely, you’ll see the number 1 in the negative space between the F and the red stripes. This logo also communicates a feeling of speed (the illusion that wind blowing on F1 causing it to slant).

The Milwaukee Brewers is a professional baseball team from Milwaukee , Wisconsin (well, duh). Their logo is actually made up of the letters M (on top) and B (below the m). These two letters also form a baseball glove.

This simple looking logo actually carries a lot of information. First of all you can see the letters N and W, the first two letters of the brand name. But what most people don’t see is the compass that points to the Northwest, another reference to the brand name.

Toblerone

Baskin Robins

Sony Vaio

Eight

Carrefour

Roxy

Unilever

Hartford Whalers

Elefont

Sun Microsystems

NBC

GreenLabs

]]> 666 Tushneem FedEx Logo Tostitos Logo Formula 1 Milwaukee Brewers Northwest Airlines Amazon.com Toblerone Baskin Robins Sony Vaio Eight Carrefour Roxy Unilever Hartford Whalers Elefont Sun Microsystems NBC GreenLabs https://tushneem.wordpress.com/2010/04/19/more-than-silicon-award/ https://tushneem.wordpress.com/2010/04/19/more-than-silicon-award/#comments Tue, 20 Apr 2010 02:07:22 +0000 http://tushneem.wordpress.com/?p=649 I was pleasantly surprised and honored when I was recognized with an Award at the Analog Devices General Technical Conference, an annual internal conference where the entire ADI community comes together. The Award which was instituted this year recognizes innovation that enhances ADI products’ value and most often results in customers selecting those products. Being among the three recipients in a $2 Billion company with approx 8000 employees definitely gives a feeling of some accomplishment.

Receiving the Award from Sam Fuller, CTO of Analog Devices Inc.

Here is what Sam Fuller, CTO of ADI, had to say, in his address to the company, about me and the patent-pending software product I created – “Tushneem conceived this idea, developed it and is now continuing to support and evangelize it across the company. Here is a person that has taken to heart some insight that he had and is working really hard to make this a valuable tool in ADI.”

The first Ad below is obviously about communication – “Make sure you get your message out clearly and don’t leave anything for interpretation“. Although this shows communication between two people… more often than not when communication trickles top down in a company, the key message gradually gets lost in translation at each level.

The second Ad below conveys just one important message – “It is the experience that matters in the end… how you deliver it depends on your creativity“.

Takeaways

To do a targeted VC search by keyword (bio) n the USA visit: http://www.punctuative.com/vcdb. A great place to see what’s being funded these days: http://www.onbiovc.com.

1. Spend a lot of time with your customers. They will tell you about features you don’t even know you want (e.g. Sentillian – People like  your device to remind them to feed their dogs, AgaMatrix – Rubber grips on the device was the key selling point more than the complex DSP algorithms).
2. It takes a long time to get insurance companies to reimburse for things.
3. Follow the money. Doctors need to see the advantage or get paid to try new things that are different or difficult.
4. Adoption presents challenges. It takes time to change behavior.
5. Patients are not compliant. Find creative ways to make them (Microchips, Sentillian).
6. You can design it here, and build or run operations from Asia. Places like Hong Kong provide free space and lot of subsidies and tax credits for Startups.

Opportunities

7. Obesity (Diabetes) and Aging (Elderly) are big themes.
8. Cameras ($2), piezoelectric motors and accelerometers ($2.50) are very inexpensive innovative components that can be integrated to create the next generation smart devices.
9. Miniaturization is going to be a big opportunity.
10. Mobile phones are more widespread and interesting than PCs; build on this platform and use them as channels.
11. All the devices will become interconnected and will stream constant data. The data deluge offers lot of opportunities to develop smart algorithms to analyze, filter and flag data.

Technology

12. Getting iPhone applications through Apple isn’t easy. They’re scrutiny can be tougher than the FDA
13. Perfect A/C current needed even with ultra low power in the body. DC is poison according to the FDA
14. Long-life, low-power batteries are going to be critical for invasive devices (lasting 25-30 years)

FDA/Regulatory

15. FDA approvals causes some uncertainty. There will be changes to the 510K process
16. 510Ks take 3 months; PMAs can take years. Acceptance rate is high but not 67%- 80%. Means companies will fail and investors will lose money. The risk is only increasing
17. Investors now want to know where you will fall from a classification standpoint (since the FDA is reassessing the 510k process today). Get a regulatory expert early and get an informal meeting with the FDA, walking them through the plan
18. To get approvals, first get it in South Africa. Then get a European CE Mark – it makes you more interesting to strategics. Finally go for the FDA

Marketing

19. If you get a clinician on board, think about compensation. If you give them equity, they cannot do trials in their facilities
20. When talking to doctors, overemphasize the clinical benefits, under-emphasize the technology.
21. Reimbursement strategy is the way to go.
22. Try to avoid outcomes data if you can. However, its going to be tough. In the old days you could. Every hospital wants to see it in their own format. 45 patients could be sufficient.
23. With relationships these trials could be done here inexpensively. Someone in the audience is spending $10K to do such a trial

Funding

24. VCs won’t pay to get data. Get money from the Army, NASA, grants, SBIRs. Leave things in the university labs as long as possible

After the great response to the last event on Digital Homes (attended by over 80 peope), the Semiconductor and Electronic Devices (SED) SIG partners with the Life Sciences SIG to bring this panel on Medical Devices.

With the size of semiconductor devices shrinking and their compute power increasing, a number of new devices and applications are being enabled in the medical and health-care markets. From new ingestible smart pills to portable monitoring gadgets (some of which are being integrated directly into Mobile devices)  to smart beds and scanning equipment, medical devices are becoming smarter and changing the health-care landscape rapidly.

While reference designs and integrated chips from semiconductor companies are lowering the barrier for hardware engineers, new software api’s and platforms are creating opportunities for the software folks alike. According to Databeans, the medical electronics market was estimated to be $124.8 billion in 2009, and is expected to reach a market size of about $208 billion by 2014, resulting in a growth rate of 7.2 percent over the next five years.

There are several opportunities in creating these gadgets, efficiently connecting them to each other (through wireless standards such as Zigbee, Bluetooth etc) and building software applications on top to tap into health-care records.

On Thursday, April 1st, an extraordinary panel of entrepreneurs, innovators, technologists, device experts and investors will discuss these new technologies and potential entrepreneurial opportunities.

Learn how these devices and software are changing health-care, and get useful, actionable information and ideas for starting your own company or planning your next career move.

Panelists:

Anupendra Sharma, Investment Partner, Medical Fund, Siemens Venture Capital, Inc.
Robert Farra, Vice President, Research & Development, MicroCHIPS Inc
Sridhar Iyengar, CTO, Agamatrix, Inc
Cory Kidd, CEO & Founder, Intuitive Automata Inc
Tom O’Dwyer, Director of Healthcare Technology, Analog Devices Inc
John Brooks, Founder, Prism Ventureworks & CEO, Reflectance Medical
Rahul Sarpeshkar, Associate Professor of Electrical & Computer Engineering, MIT

Click here to register for the event

Dont miss this opportunity!

The panelists for this discussion who are top-notch include

Abbas Bagasra, Office of CTO, Verizon
Alex Benik, Principal, Battery Ventures
Brian R. Gruttadauria, CTO & Director of Consumer & Small Office Products Division, EMC
John Hussey, Vice President, Consumer and Communications Infrastructure, Analog Devices Inc.
Mark Kasdorf, CEO, Burning Hollow Technologies, Inc

In this first part of two part series, the focus is on consumer electronic devices. We’ll discuss how new standards and communication protocols are bringing a transformation into this segment and leading to a new class of devices. We will also focus on new business opportunities  in both hardware and software applications that will be enabled in the the next few years for entrepreneurs. Come listen to panel of experts and find out how you can benefit- whether you are looking for a job, growing your business or starting something new.

For registration and more details click here.

This is probably the best example of disruption we’d ever see. However, although this was expected all along (Read my post “The convergence of handheld gadgets and what it means to you“), to see the stock market react so much in a day is amazing.

Does this mean the end of Garmin, TomTom and traditional GPS as we know it?

Maybe not immediately and it will depend on what strategy these companies adopt.

What can they do?

There are three strategic paths GPS companies can take…

1. Move from hardware to software and innovate in that space (Which TomTom has started doing – See video below)
2. Move into the smartphone business and compete with Google, Nokia, Microsoft, Apple and RIM headon (Which Garmin has started doing – See video below)
3. Move into the Bottom of the Pyramid markets by cutting on prices of GPS devices

The third strategy is probably what I’d recommend. Smartphones today make a very tiny percentage of cell phone sales globally. Even in the US, according to NPD research feature phones make up 72% of the market with smartphones making up the rest i.e. 28%. In countries like India and China, the smartphone percentage would be much much lower.

So there is still a huge segment of the market that cannot afford a smartphone and the expensive 2 yr contract-based data plans from Wireless carriers and therefore, will not have access to something like Google Maps. Obviously to tap into these markets, GPS companies have to be innovative in figuring out the use case scenarios and the pricing.

Here are videos that show the strategic paths each of these companies are taking:

Google Maps Navigation (Pure software approach)

TomTom iPhone App (Taking the software route)

Garmin Nuviphone (Moving into Smartphones)

Nokia Maps (Moving into maps and location based advertising – Competing with GYM)