escape velocity

It’s ‘obvious’ for companies to be established with a set of growth goals. You plan for X growth in ‘Year 1′ and 2X growth in ‘Year 2′ and so on. Local establishments aim to be regionally known, regional ones aim to go national, and national aim to go global. In a way, aspiring to grow is the only way (that most of us know) to stay in business. In some ways, it’s like running downhill, you’ve got to accelarate just to stay in balance.

Then again, there are some companies that do not have growth plans, or let’s say their strategy is to stay small and profitable. Not everyone manages to sustain themselves in such a state. Retail shops do. But not many companies are able to. Or, maybe some are. Some technology companies survive being small, and stay so by taking few projects, and also working on a niche area.

Micro breweries are another example. I just found this through the blog of 37Signals, whose folk seem to take up every opportunity to justify how to stay small and happy. I guess they believe their company has similar principles.

The posting refers to an article on Chow.com, where the interviewer asks Vinnie Cilurzo, a Microbrewer on the importance of their local company going national, to which he answers…

Not at all……I get calls from distributors all the time from all over the country. But we do this more for the lifestyle…..I can ride my bike to work. …..I think you can get caught up way too much in growth. We don’t have any growth goals.

I guess it’s good to be clear about whether one is in business to grow or to live a lifestyle

Blogs come in many avatars.  And, for someone following people’s writings through blogs, sifting through the various types of content can be quite exhausting.  But, thanks to new social utilities like Twitter and Facebook, I guess we are witnessing a culling in the blogsphere. I guess this is a good trend too. This way, Blogs would remain as focused and ‘information rich’ mediums, while other forms of information sharing moves to newer niche services.

People wanting to update what they are up to are switching to Twitter, and people who are trying to keep in contact with their acquaintances, share photos, talk about life etc, are doing so using Facebook.

Furthermore, the new Facebook has crossed over in to the Twitter space, with it’s ‘what are you doing now?’ feature, where people are litterally ‘twittering’ within a closed group of acquaintances. And to top it all, since services like Facebook only allow access to ‘friends’ we see more personal and detailed updates being shared with each other.

All in all, it’s nice to be witnessing a natural process of sorting of information dissemination happening on the Web, and I guess this is good.

How advanced is the ‘West’ be compared to the ‘East’! Half a century maybe. Going by the fact that way back in 1965, the Gemini 4 mission enabled United States conduct it’s first ever spacewalk! And, only 43 years later did the Chinese manage to send their men to space! Now this is not history or ground breaking. It’s just ‘me too’,  ‘good job guys’, ‘Oh, better late than never, welcome to the club boys!’.

Space exploration is a ‘country versus country’ thing.  It’s a showcase of a country’s growing technological prowess. It’s not a ‘yay! we build rockets too’ thing, it’s a finally, ‘we too’ build rockets thing… But what happens when a private company gets in to this space.  That’s exactly what happened when Space X an American company, showcased it’s capabilities in an area that’s traditionally the domain of a few privileged countries.  I just saw a video that shows them successfully launching Falcon 1, a space vehicle.  Now, ‘this’ is history, as it is the first ever privately developed rocket that has made it into space. Notwithstanding the fact that this was their fourth attempt.

I wonder how long it would be before a private company in the ‘East’ takes up a space mission.  Technically, it isn’t possible in China, unless they usher in democratic reforms and privatisation :). Then again, who knows what’s going to happen in the next 50 years in Asia! That leaves India! Well, we are yet to put our first man out there! It’s still a long way to go.

Just read reports that India’s Reliance Entertainment has pumped in $500 million in equity towards a 1.3 Billion investment that would help Hollywood’s Dreamworks establish itself as an independent studio!

According to Reuters the deal with Reliance allows the studio co-founded by director Steven Spielberg to leave Paramount Pictures. Apparently Spielberg has not been having a good time at Paramount where he often clashed with it’s studio chief.

I guess this is a win-win for both parties. Spielberg gets to go ahead with a new company, and Reliance Entertainment gets to build their brand further.

The LA Times says that this occasion might be a reason for Hollywood to celebrate. “With so many companies foundering, in a desperate search for funding or totally out of business, seeing DreamWorks back up and running with a nice chunk of cash in the bank is probably music to the ears of agents, producers and screenwriters everywhere.”

This isn’t the first time that Hollywood’s seeing Asian participation in it’s business. The last I remember was Sony’s purchase of Columbia Pictures back in 1989! Not sure there were many Asian entrants since.

Well, am quite glad to see more and more Indian companies going global

“I am essentially racing for free. No salary. No bonus. Nothing on the line.… This one’s on the house. And you know what? At the end of the day, I don’t need money.… Not only will I be fine, my kids will be fine, my grandkids will be fine.”

Now, that was Lance Amstrong, saying what he seems to believe in!

Inspired by Olympic triumphs of older athletes (the 41-year-old swimmer Dara Torres and the 38-year-old marathoner Constantina Tomescu-Dita for example) Lance seems to believe that he can return to racing and weave his magic! And, having come second in a recent 100-mile mountain bike race, he might as well have a reason to do so.

A lot of people say that it’s best to get out when you are at the top. At 37, almost three years after having retired, I guess it’s either a lot of courage and conviction or just vanity and megalomania!

Whatever be the case, I am happy to note that Lance Amstrong is not (yet) history. It doesn’t matter whether he wins or not! He proved that one can kickass after having fought and survived cancer, and now he is bent upon proving that a sporting life doesn’t end by one’s late 20s / early 30s. So…way to go ‘Mellow Johnny’.