Ideal vision of Companies

No company should try to make temporary solutions to prolong the problem indefinitely and keep making money on solving the temporary problems.

For example, there are a number electrical and electronic companies brought in "planned obsolescence" to bring down the number of hrs of usage of products so that the customer keeps rebuying the new version of the products to replace the old ones. One such company is Apple.

But, at the other end of the spectrum, there are many companies that are into sustainability and try to repair or replace parts to enhance the longevity of the products.

I am yet to come across a pharma company with an ideal vision.

A pharma company's vision and mission should ideally be "To eradicate the problem of _____"

Fill in the blank of what it is it that you want to solve the problem fully.

And once that problem is solved, the division or the company should shut down or change its vision to eradicate another problem.

Ironic visions of Companies

It is very rare to see companies these days with the kind of vision that is actually required for the betterment of the humans. Say, a vision of a company in the healthcare industry "We intend to understand, find solutions, eradicate the disease and close down by 2030"

The true purpose of a specialised healthcare company would ironically be the successful conquest of the diseases in the area and shut shop when it is done. Any other reason for its existence raises a stink about its real purpose. Unfortunately, today, most companies are only profit oriented and they actually have the ability and the audacity to slow down the solutions to the market giving out incremental solutions despite having a full solution that can save many lives. And what can anyone do about it as long as these are shareholder and employee friendly instead of being society friendly.

The nature of some of these companies should be more on the lines of UN peacekeeping missions where once the task is done, the mission is closed and the people move on to the next role. Sure, companies can even encourage employees to find one stop solutions and reward the employees with life time salaries and shut the shop. The prize of attaining full lifetime salaries for all employees in the next few years may help the employees reveal such solutions to the market. But, the shareholder/management too needs to be of the idea to support the ironic vision.

A bloody good idea

You would think the world of medicine and finance don't mix... Well, not until now...

The following is an idea I gave to a market development head of an organisation in the business of stock and commodity exchanges. I got selected for this company based on this idea and many others I gave, but I have declined the offer. If this idea is indeed implemented, I would have at least managed one of my ideas to actually take off and see it in the real world.

Problem: Hospitals need a regular supply of “whole blood” and “packed cells” for giving it to patients. Maintaining a constant supply of these of the right blood type at the crucial life/death scenario is difficult.

Idea/Solution: Trade blood contracts on the exchange.

Buyers: Hospitals

Sellers: Blood banks, NGOs that do Blood donation camps/drives.

Benefits:

·         Helps hospitals get the required quantity and right type of quality tested blood in advance.

·         Helps hospitals save more lives and being more reliable.

Details:

In India, during a medical emergency, the onus is on the patient's relatives to arrange for replacement of blood. India has many blood banks, all functioning in a decentralized fashion. In the current system, there is no tool to find number of blood donors of the required blood group in current time and place, there is no interaction between blood banks, no exchange of blood or its components.

“Whole blood” is the blood available in human beings. Whole blood is extracted from the body during blood donations. The human blood has both solid parts (Red blood cells, White blood cells, Platelets, etc) and liquid parts (called serum). The whole blood can be stored upto a period of 15-21 days at 4°C. Whole blood is given to patients in case of major blood loss as in the case of accidents. The cost of a pint (Indian pint = 350ml) of whole blood is approximately Rs.650. This cost is not for the blood, but for the testing, transporting, storage and personnel cost.

Whole blood can also be separated into components and be stored. Certain components of the blood need to be given to patients in certain cases. Whole blood minus the liquid parts is called “packed cells”. Packed cells are given to patients usually in OBG cases. The cost of a pint (Indian pint = 350ml) of packed cells is approximately Rs.650-700 (slightly higher due to separation/sedimentation charges)

5.1 million units of blood are collected every year in India. The demand of blood is very high and there is a deficiency of 30-40 percent of blood as per WHO norms.

(Src: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/fromthefield/218536/119745403644.htm)

There is also a supply demand gap in the different states and areas. The main proposal of this idea is to make the commodity exchange as a marketplace for buyers (hospitals) to buy blood from the sellers. The sellers have expertise in procuring fresh blood, testing for diseases, classification based on blood types and storing them. The buyers can buy the required quantities of the right blood type from the sellers. This will enable hospitals to save more lives and become reliable from a patient’s point of view.

                This idea will enable the suppliers (Blood banks and NGOs) to try to increase their sourcing and increase voluntary blood donations in India. The suppliers will try to have captive donors and contact them for regular donations which will boost the blood supply available in India and close the supply demand gap.

Types of instruments (future/option) and contract specifications are to be decided.

Constraints/Challenges: Hospitals need a license to buy and store blood from the MCI (Medical Council of India).

Market size: There are a total of 2609 blood banks in India as of 30^th June 2009 out of which there are 753 private hospitals with blood banks.

(Src: http://cdsco.nic.in/html/BloodList.html

http://bloodbanksdelhi.com/content/LicensedBloodBanks.htm,

http://www.indiabloodbank.com/bloodbanks.php)

Vision of Mankind 2

Referring to my previous post on the vision of mankind, http://ajitjagan.blogspot.com/2009/11/vision-of-mankind.html, I think I have found a solution...

The vision of mankind is same as that of cockroaches. And that is to propagate and have continue the generations.

I think the cockroaches are better at risk management than all of mankind combined. They have survived for millions of years with just one technique: "When you sense risk, run like crazy". We human imbeciles haven't even learnt that well. The amount of humans dying/suffering as a ratio of total human population is greater than a similar proportion for cockroaches. The mighty cockroaches have survived metrorites, ice ages and what not.

Humans also just want to survive and keep propagating. They want to reduce the risk of dying and being extinct. So they started cultivating food to avoid starvation, started using fire to protect themselves from animals and from the cold, etc. One day, when the next ice age occurs or meteors strike, temp of earth reaches 50 degree celsius or water submerges all land, we may have technologies and ways to survive extinction.

Say for the next ice age of 100,000 years, humans may freeze themselves in machines and come out automatically when the ice age stops. We may genetically modify ourselves to breathe underwater or live in 60 degree celsius without being burnt.

Humankind sees the benefits of diversification. From experimenting with ligers and tigons, now we have gayism nad a few crimes of people mating with animals. What next? Interspecies mating? Maybe the human genes can get better with the diversification and a hardier gene pool with hardier characteristics for better survival for gene propagation.

Humans dont want to accept a simple reality of death of the human kind at some time. So the adventurous imbeciles keep doing something or another to change the reality. So far, so good imbeciles! But at the end of every millennium, you are no greater than a cockroach whose goal is to just survive and propagate its genes to the next generation.

Vision of Mankind

I realised the value of a vision or a dream sometime ago. Every individual and every organisation needs it so that it can continuously go forward and keep on its path and to overcome obstacles in times of difficulty. It gives a certain drive, motivation, energy and something to look forward to each day. So I wonder what is the vision of mankind as a whole? What does it want to achieve once all the infightings are sorted out or not?

One should read Scott Adams book "Gods Debris" and from there comes certain ideas... I can see things happening as predicted in that book. The world is coming together as a whole, especially with the help of the internet. People all over the world can come together and decide on various important topics staying far away. Internet unites everyone like nothing else has ever done before. It is a social fabric in a way intertwining everybody's life into it. And as more people use it, more people are going to spend sufficient amounts of time on the net. So what next? Similar to people vote in a country to choose elected representatives to solve people's problems, what will the people of the world come together to do? What is it that Humanity wants? What does the mankind look forward to? What is the vision of Human existence as a whole?