Spirit of Israel

Recently following very informative news reports appeared:

·         Economic Times / 19 Feb 2017

         “ Israel, a startup oasis in the middle of a war zone “ 

{ http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/small-biz/startups/israel-a-startup-oasis-in-the-middle-of-a-war-zone/articleshow/57225306.cms }

Extract :

A small country of over 8 million people — mostly immigrants — with no natural 
resources, no local market and surrounded by enemies, Israel is a political startup where survival instinct is part of the DNA.

It has 6,000 active startups, 350 MNC R&D centres, has seen exits worth $ 9.2 billion and venture funding worth $ 4.8 billion in 2016

How does Israel do it ?

Lessons from the tiny, closely networked country may not be directly relevant for India.

Yet, in a year when India’s startup world is on a rough ride, both the NDA government and the industry stakeholders would do well to look for some inspiration there. 

Government as Catalyst 

“Our biggest job is to not stand in the way of the hi-tech private sector,” says Simhon.

For example, he says, a lot of Israeli startups focus on DEFENCE-RELATED TECHNOLOGIES. 

And there was a view in the government that a committee should vet which countries can buy these Israeli companies and which cannot.

 

“Restriction in itself wasn’t bad but it would have unnecessarily created hurdles for the startups. Let’s just say that as of now we have no such committee,”

says Simhon with a smile.

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·         Business Line / 20 Feb 2017

     “ Hi-tech Tel Aviv to old town Jerusalem ; a whirlwind trip

{ http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/news/variety/israel-diary-hitech-tel-aviv-to-old-town-jerusalem-a-whirlwind-trip/article9550717.ece }

Extract :

Start-up nation

Israel is the original start-up nation.

And almost all are tech enterprises: from cyber security to artificial intelligence and robotics, Israel’s entrepreneurs are right up there. The numbers are mind-boggling.

The country has something like ,

·         6,000 start-ups,

·          

·         90 venture capital funds

·          

·          200 angel funds,

·          

·         25 incubators

·          

·         70 accelerators,

·          

·         16 tech transfer offices

·          

·         350 multinationals

that have set up R&D centres in the country.

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 MY   TAKE  :

In terms of population , India is 162 TIMES BIGGER than Israel . If we emulate how Israel managed its START – UP eco-system , ( GettingOut of the Way ) , we can become the biggest START – UP NATION on the earth 

{ https://myblogepage.blogspot.com/2017/02/here-is-clue-get-out-of-their-way.html }

When our  neta  ( Shri Narendra Modiji ) meets the Israel neta ( their PM , Netanyahu ) later this year , it is possible that he might ask :

“ Sir ,  are you not afraid that the defence technologies that your Start Ups develop , might land up in the hands of your enemies , enabling them to copy it ? “

I suppose , Shri Netanyahu might reply :

“ May be !

  But there is no way they can copy the Spirit of Israel “

20  Feb  2017

www.hemenparekh.in/ blogs

Not a BAD idea – only a little EARLY !

Some 9 months back , when I proposed a Universal Mobile-based Attendance System { UMAS } , it is possible that some might have considered it impractical / non – feasible

I invite them to take a look at the following news report appearing in Times of India ( 19 Feb 2017 ) and re-consider ,

From  BAD to  MAD  /  01  June 2016

{ https://myblogepage.blogspot.com/2016/06/from-bad-to-mad.html }

“ New Office Sensors know when you leave your Desk “

About a year ago, in a widely reported story, journalists at British newspaper the Telegraph found little black boxes installed under their desks.

The devices, which had “OccupEye” emblazoned on them, detected if employees were at their workstations.

Not shockingly, writers and editors were suspicious, worried that bosses were monitoring their moves, even their bathroom breaks.

The National Union of Journalists complained to management about Big Brother-style surveillance. The company insisted the boxes were intended to reduce energy costs, ensuring that empty cubicles weren’t overheated or over-air-conditioned, but the damage was done, and the devices were removed.

Sensors that keep tabs on more than temperature are already all over offices—they’re just less conspicuous and don’t have names that suggest Bond villains.

“Most people, when they walk into buildings, don’t even notice them,” says Joe Costello, chief executive officer of Enlighted, whose sensors, he says, are collecting data at more than 350 companies, including 15 percent of the Fortune 500.

They’re hidden in lights, ID badges, and elsewhere, tracking things such as conference room usage, EMPLOYEE WHEREABOUTS, and “latency”—how long someone goes without speaking to another co-worker.

Proponents claim the goal is efficiency:

Some sensors generate heat maps that show how people move through an office, to help maximize space; others, such as OccupEye, tap into HVAC systems

The office-design company Gensler has 1,000 Enlighted sensors lining its new space in New York. Embedded in light fixtures, the dime-size devices detect motion, daylight, and energy usage; a back-end system adjusts lighting levels.

The sensors also learn employees’ behavior patterns. If workers in a given department start the day at 10 a.m., lights will stay dim until about that hour.

So far, Gensler has seen a 25 percent savings in energy costs. It estimates the investment—installation cost the company about $1.70 per square foot, or roughly $200,000—will pay off in five years.

Legally speaking, U.S. businesses are within their rights to go full-on Eye of Sauron.

 “Employers can do any kind of monitoring they want in the workplace that doesn’t involve the bathroom,” says Lewis Maltby, president of the National Workrights Institute.

And as long as the data is anonymized, as Enlighted’s is, some people don’t mind tracking if it makes work life easier.

 “It doesn’t bother me. It doesn’t feel intrusive,” says Luke Rondel, 31, a design strategist at Gensler. “It’s kind of cozy when you’re working late at night to be in a pod of light.”

A majority of U.S. workers the Pew Research Center surveyed last year said they’d tolerate surveillance and data collection in the name of safety.

Up to a point, perhaps. The Boston Consulting Group has outfitted about 100 volunteer employees in its new Manhattan office with badges that embed a microphone and a location sensor.

Made by Humanyze in Boston, the badges track physical and verbal interactions. BCG says it intends to use the data to see how office design affects employee communication.

 Outside critics have called the plan Orwellian and despotic—“It is a little bit invasive,” says Ross Love, 57, a BCG managing partner who volunteered—but the data collected is anonymized, and the company has pledged not to use it for performance evaluation.

Going even further, Enlighted is piloting a BADGE THAT LETS A BUSINESS TRACK SPECIFIC INDIVIDUALS VIA AN ACCOMPANYING APP.

CEO Costello says it’s more efficient to find a co-worker this way than it is to send a volley of e-mails and Slack messages and hope for a reply.

The badges haven’t yet made it outside Enlighted’s offices, but there’s already interest from clients who want to use them to arrange in-person gatherings more easily, like a Facebook group come to life.

“You get used to it,” Costello says. And if you don’t, try not to get too overheated about it and storm out of the building. You might just blast your colleagues with cold air.

 

19  Feb  2017

www.hemenparekh.in / blogs  

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Added on  20 Aug 2021  :

Here is a clue : Get Out of their Way !

Two days back , ISRO launched 104 satellites in one go ( against 36 of Russia and 29 of America )

May not be soon , but someday even this record will get broken

How did ISRO manage this “ unimaginable “ feat ?

Short answer :   By imagining

Long answer :    By government getting out of ISRO’s way !

No doubt , ISRO must be , periodically , sending some documents to the Central Government , but I believe it does not need umpteen permissions / approvals / authorizations , at every step

Nor must it be bothered by visits of “ Inspectors / Auditors “ from ,

·         Labour Department

·         Pollution Control Department

·         Fire-fighting Department

·         Building Permissions Department

·         Excise / Octroi Departments

·         Income Tax Departments …..etc

More or less , it is free to set its own “ Objectives / Targets “

But more importantly, it is enabled to implement the same with minimum ( or “ NIL “ ? ) interference from the governments ( Local / State / Central )

Now , let us look at some other recent , interesting news :

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·         Economic Times / 18 Feb 2017

           China to face pressure to ensure enough jobs this year - vice premier

    China will face pressure to ensure sufficient job creation this year, vice premier Ma Kai said on Friday, even after authorities beat targets and created more than 13 million jobs last year.

The government should increase coordination between employment and economic policies and encourage job creation through innovation, Ma said at a State Council meeting on employment on Friday.

China targeted 10 million new urban jobs in 2016, and said on Monday it hoped to create 50 million new jobs over the five years to 2020 and keep unemployment below 5 percent.

·         

Hindustan Times / 18 Feb 2017

     The Zuckerberg manifesto: How he plans to debug the world

 

His 5,800-word essay positions Facebook in direct opposition to a rising tide of isolationism and fear of outsiders, both in the US and abroad

 

“ Across the world there are people left behind by globalization, and movements for withdrawing from global connection “

 

Zuckerberg, 32, told the AP that he still strongly believes that more connectedness is the right direction for the world.

 

But, he adds, it’s “not enough if it’s good for some people but it’s doesn’t work for other people. We really have to bring everyone along.”

 

“Looking ahead, one of our greatest opportunities to keep people safe is building artificial intelligence to understand more quickly and accurately what is happening across our community,” he wrote.

Speaking to the AP, Zuckerberg said he understands that we might not “solve all the issues that we want” in the short term.

“ One of my favourite quotes is this Bill Gates quote,  that ‘ people overestimate what they can get done in two years and underestimate what they can get done in 10 years.’ And that’s an important mind-set that I hope more people take today,” he said.

 

·         Times of India / 18 Feb 2017

“  Inside Israel’s Hotbed of Global Innovation  “

 

The Sosa complex that’s home to 2,500 ventures, 450 partners and 45 investors, is the country’s next big thing to retain its start-up edge. It has received 150 global delegations

Founded in 2014, Sosa is a hip complex that builds physical spaces and networks to help start-ups, investors and MNCs connect and collaborate.

Routinely, global delegations and multinational corporations arrive here to look up Israeli start-ups.

It was this serendipity that lured Enel, an Italian energy giant, to Sosa last August.

It had landed in Israel two years back, scouting for start-ups in cyber-security, drones, smartphones and IoT.

“Israel has the world’s highest concentration of innovative start-ups and smart engineers,” says Iran Levy, Israel- based MD of Enel Innovation Lab.

[ My note :

 Against Israel’s population of 8.2 million , India’s IT industry employs 3.9 million persons . As per recent McKinsey report, nearly half of the workforce in the IT services firms will be “irrelevant” over the next 3-4 years. ]

Enel’s lab collaborates closely with Sosa to screen and shortlist Israeli start-ups it wants to work with.

So far, it has met “hundreds” of start-ups, held four boot camps for delegations from Italy, is working closely with around 20 ventures, has made a few investments and is exploring many more.

Once Enel zeroes in on a start-up, it sponsors a project which could take three-six months to develop the relevant technology applications.

In the volatile world of start-ups, the trick is to find the next wave, stay ahead of the curve and be the first to go in for the kill.

Sosa is one of the many initiatives that Israel, known as the Start-up Nation and among the top five start-up hubs in the world, is doing to retain its edge.

Set up by pioneers of Israeli hi-tech industry, Sosa calls itself the town square of global innovators.

Going beyond accelerators and incubators, it brings together innovative start-ups, hard-nosed investors, supporting incubators and mighty MNCs under one roof.

Now India with 4500 Start Ups , claims to have overtaken Israel

But take a look at the numbers :

The government received only about 1,368 applications,

Of these, only 502 were recognized as start-ups by the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion { DIPP }

And an even smaller subset—just the 111 firms incorporated after April 1, 2016,

were considered for tax benefits.

Finally, the benefits were granted to only 8 start-ups.

REASON ?

We have yet to figure out :

*   Howto untether, our Start Ups , in the same way we have done with ISRO ? “

{ https://myblogepage.blogspot.com/2016/07/in-wonderland-of-start-ups.html }

*   Howto unshackle our Start Ups , in the same way as CHINA ?

{ https://myblogepage.blogspot.com/2016/06/50-million-new-jobs-in-5-months.html }

*   How to unleash our Start Ups to become “ BackFactory of the World “ ?

{ https://myblogepage.blogspot.com/2015/09/back-factory-of-world.html }

*   How to “ Harnessthe Power of Greed “ ?

{ https://myblogepage.blogspot.com/2016/05/harness-greed-to-skill-india.html }

Sure , we can create “ TenMillion Start Ups in ONE YEAR “ !

{ https://myblogepage.blogspot.com/2016/01/ten-million-start-ups-in-one-year.html }

18  Feb  2017

www.hemenparekh.in / blogs

Idea whose time has come ?

Following news reports are the pointers :

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·          Business Line / 16 Feb 2017

How ‘anytime, anywhere’ work is turning a double-edged sword

The ‘uncoupling’ of paid work from traditional office spaces via smartphones, tablets and laptops is having an ambiguous effect, says a new report.

The report ( Working Anytime, Anywhere: The Effects on the World of Work ) has called for policies by governments and managements to help all stakeholders adapt to this rapidly changing nature of work that is throwing up challenges as well as opportunities.

The report adds :

TODAY’S OFFICE WORK AND, MORE BROADLY, KNOWLEDGE WORK , IS SUPPORTED BY THE INTERNET AND CAN BE CARRIED OUT FROM PRACTICALLY ANY LOCATION AND AT ANY TIME

·        

www.SkillCrush.com / 01 Feb 2017

50 of the Best Companies Hiring Remote Workers

 

Who actually sits in an office these days ? Everyone knows that being a remote worker is where it’s at.

New data shows that 6.1a million individuals in the US can be categorized as remote workers

THESE REMOTE WORKERS ARE ACTUALLY SAVING COMPANIES BILLIONS !

Gallup estimates that active disengagement costs the U.S. $ 450 billion to $ 550 billion per year.

Plus, remote workers are cheaper for companies and not limiting yourself to people who live within an hour of your office puts the company at an advantage.

Not every company has realized this awesome secret but many have.

Here are some of the best ones across various industries. Many of these are from data compiled by FlexJobs.

Dell / Aetna / American Express / Xerox / Apple / Humana / ADP / Cyber Coders / US Dept of Transport / IBM / SalesForce.com / Microsoft / Thomas Reuters / Red Hat / Kaplan / Mozilla / Novartis / Lockheed Martin / Nielsen / American Heart Association / Bausch & Lomb / SAP / Forest Lab / Patch / Adobe / Appen / Kenexa / GE / Teradata / Automattic / CISCO / Rackspace / Intuit / Qualcomm / Ultimate Software / Google / NetApp / Accenture / Weyerhauser / Gannett / 3Com / Compaq / Jet Blue / United Airlines / Baxter Healthcare / Citibank / New York Life Insurance / sears / Wendy’s  

·         Times of India / 17 Feb 2017

     Digital adoption in India is pervasive’

   IBM CEO Says : Future for Country Lies in Cognitive Tech

India is witnessing one of the most pervasive adoptions of digital technologies in the world, IBM CEO Virginia 'Ginny' Rometty said here on Thursday.

Rometty said IBM also sees India as a "wonderful opportunity" to use its platforms for technology start ups and small and medium businesses to scale, including scaling to the world. "That is one of the fastest growing opportunities we have here," she said.

Rometty said India's next path should be to make the world cognitive.

"Cognitive is India's future," she said earlier in her keynote address the event.

IBM has its biggest employee base in India, an estimated workforce of 1.3 lakh, working in R&D, and providing IT services for India and the world.

 Referring to security, she Rometty said, "You will never be able to put up enough walls or perimeters of security" (a line that seemed also to be a reference to US President Donald Trump's desire to build a wall on the Mexican border and ban immigrants from certain countries).

 

The writing is on the Wall  ! On a VIRTUAL  WALL !

I once again urge our Policy Makers to appreciate that the way out of,

·         Slowing down of economies of most countries of the World,

·         De-globalization / Protectionism / Desire to get out of WTO obligations

·         Resistance by local citizens of the developed countries  to “ Economic Migrants “ from poor countries ( including building of Walls )

·         Addition of 12 million youth to our “ Working-Age “ population per year

·         Slowing down of our GDP growth due to demonetization ( Jobless Growth ? )

·         And , lastly the hanging sword of drastic reduction in H1B visas …etc ,

Is to turn India into ,

 BackFactory of the World ?

{ https://myblogepage.blogspot.com/2015/09/back-factory-of-world.html }

They may also want to read :

CanIndian IT re-invent itself  ?

{ https://myblogepage.blogspot.com/2017/02/can-indian-it-re-invent-itself.html }

 

 

17  Feb  2017

www.hemenparekh.in / blogs