Caroline Schwarzman's Profile

Great article! I agree with user123213 that Fitbit might be better off avoiding the medical device market and focusing on expanded capabilities within the fitness category. Currently Fitbit only counts activity in terms of steps. If, however, I wear my Fitbit through a 90 minute hot yoga class the device barely records any physical exertion. There are so many varied types of activity and exercise available and Fitbit has yet to conquer the breadth of that market. Whether they need to move into wearable clothing to do so or not is up for debate but I can foresee a much larger runway with their current user base that would not require them to rebrand or refocus their customer promise.

I think the most compelling piece of your article is the fact that AstraZeneca can now provide a cure and a diagnostic method for doctors and patients alike. Cancer treatment is very personalized and each patient receives a different cocktail of chemotherapy drugs but still so much of that customization process remains a series of trials and errors. This genetic sequencing technology could allow for a much larger degree of precision and help millions of cancer patients identify and eradicate their particular diseases.

The digitization of the auto industry is one of the most fascinating and fast moving trends of the decade. GM’s approach feels a bit provincial though in comparison to other OEMs who are attempting to overhaul the very essence of the car through a proliferation of sensors and ADAS systems. The Onstar Go program may be more readily understood by consumers than chassis technology, but it is a very cosmetic add-on to a traditional vehicle. I would be interested to see how they integrate Watson into vehicle-to-vehicle technology and other groundbreaking innovations in this industry.

Loved this post. At the risk of sounding naive, couldn’t most of this problem be solved in a very analog way? What if kegs had a transparent strip like many medicine bottles so you could see inventory levels at a glance? This would not allow retailers, distributors and manufacturers to share data but it would also be much cheaper for the retailers to manage.

Thanks for sharing Sarah (and also great alias). It is great to see that AbbVie is adopting transparency and displaying their drug pipeline to the market. One thing I would caution is that while AbbVie is new, it is really just a recent spin off from Abbott. As such, I wonder how much of Abbott’s culture has remained intact at AbbVie. Abbott is a historically slow but steady growth company that divested AbbVie in order to differentiate their investment profiles. AbbVie is free to focus on big ticket drugs with more volatile earnings and the result is that they need to invest heavily in costly R&D that enables those few blockbuster drugs to get to market. In this environment I wonder how much they will be able to lower the final cost of their drugs without compromising the drug pipeline that enabled them.

No, not chocolate. No. Why??? This might be the best reason to take immediate action on climate change that I have ever heard.

I am so glad to hear that Mars is really doing something to prevent the disaster that would be losing chocolate instead of just paying lip service to the problem. The areas from which they source their raw goods are some of the least equipped to deal with the massive impact of climate change and I think it is great that Mars is trying to help them through that transition. It isn’t often that companies surprise you like this, especially major junk food manufacturers. Thanks so much for highlighting their good work.

Great post! H&M is such a good parallel to IKEA, which also is striving for sustainability while creating a fundamentally unsustainable product. Your post raises some really important questions about the degree to which a company that has more or less created the disposable fashion category can really ever call itself sustainable. While its efforts to go green are commendable and its scale makes its impact significant, you have to wonder as a consumer if they can ever really do enough to reverse the negative impact they have already made by introducing this fast fashion concept to the public.

Great post and interest (though depressing) read. The point brought up about Miami’s beaches in the comments is really interesting and one that crossed my mind as well when reading your article. All of the steps the city is taking now address disaster prevention but do not protect the parts of the city that drive its tourism and economy. Without its beaches and beachfront real estate how long can Miami continue to be a major US metropolis? Will climate change do to Miami what the auto crisis did to Detroit? If so, why are they not asking residents to change behavior now to reduce the speed of climate change going forward?

Thanks so much for this post. I love your comment about Tyson facing a double impact from climate change. It seems to me that the 2 biggest things they need to change are the methane emissions from raising livestock and the declining returns from unsustainable plant sources and feed. The case we read about Indigo highlights how many different ways companies are trying to create sustainable crops. Instead of investing in meat alternatives, Tyson should invest in companies creating better, more natural, more sustainable feed. They should also research methods for capturing methane output and recycling it into less dangerous GHG emissions.

Great post! Areas like Iceland that rely on their natural biodiversity for tourism face such a unique dilemma as you pointed out, on the one hand driving climate change by bringing more and more tourists to their land and on the other fearing climate change and the impact it could have on that land. This reminds me very much of the Galapagos, an area that has strictly monitored travel in order to minimize the impact that tourists have on the local environment, which is so fragile and easily disturbed. They require all passengers to be part of a tour group and require all tour groups to minimize waste, conserve water and energy, use biodegradable products (such as soap and shampoo), and source local products to avoid introducing new species into the environment [1]. This type of ecotourism is not unique; countries like New Zealand also practice strict standards and impose ridiculously high fines for breaching them. For example, you can be fined anywhere from $400-100,000 for bringing in food of any kind, plants, animals, equipment used with animals, and any clothing used for camping or hiking that has foreign dirt on it [2]. I wonder if Iceland might be able to impose the same standards and fees to their tourism economy. If so, these fees could be used to fund green programs and offset carbon emissions.

1. http://www.galapagos.org/travel/travel/sustainable-tourism/
2. http://www.customs.govt.nz/features/prohibited/imports/Pages/default.aspx