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Iryna
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This is fascinating! While we have 100 different apps on our phones, WeChat could substitute all of them together! I am surprized this is not the case yet in US or Europe, but potential answer to it could lie in its nature. From what I understand, WeChat is almost a monopoly. It resembles a system, which is tied to many other apps and creates dependency of both consumers and suppliers. While ultimately convenient, this platform does not have a proper competition, hence, can introduce any ‘rules of the game’ that are most beneficial for the WeChat business rather than for the consumer. Does Chinese government offer any anti-trust regulations in this industry? What if WeChat decides to earn additional revenue by charging subscription fee to both consumers and suppliers? Are there any market forces that could prevent it from charging extra high fees at all?
I really love this post – it feels very relevant to the current battle against corruption in Ukraine too. And while the new government has done several steps to cut the corrupt middle man (by digitalising administrative work such as ordering passports and other similar services), it feels that eGovernment in its full beauty will only work when the government is on board. Additionally, for the emerging markets, where this is one of the most pressing issues, such investment might be unaffordable in the first place. My question is: how can we spread this great practice across other countries? How can we persuade corrupt governments to implement the mechanism against their common practice? My feeling is that this could be via a strong push of joint effort of many countries (e.g. in EU it could be one of the requirements or recommendations for its members).
Great post! I was participant of the Core myself and this was an amazing experience indeed! I agree with your suggestions regarding future potential, and would like to stress the need for the HBX to spread out more so that full time students can take advantage of it. Having such an amazing modern technology literally on campus makes me wonder why we have not been exposed to it yet in some shape. Could this be used to run interactive TOM simulations and FIELD global immersion? Can we speak to our case heroes, who cannot make it to campus, with the help of HBX?
Thanks for sharing this – looks like the right move from Disney, and so much more chances to actually improve consumer experience. There is of course a question raised regarding privacy of the data, which some consumers might not be willing to give away to the company (at the time of launch 19% of respondents felt uncomfortable with this idea – http://www.themeparkinsider.com/flume/201312/3801/). While no privacy move seems to be inevitable, Disney should consider some retention incentives for such clients, at least at the beginning. I also think that while the band is an amazing innovation, Disney should expand new technology usage beyond it and apply to more innovative and up to date experience in their parks (such as augmented reality, virtual reality etc).
Great article! I agree that Facebook is not just implementing environment-friendly changes in the day-to-day operations, but pioneering healthy practice among other companies, beyond tech industry. For instance, they shared designs of their data centre with other companies to help spreading the most efficient ways of running data storages. This initiative (called OCP – stands for Open Compute Project) is now used by many other companies, among which are Apple, Microsoft and Goldman Sachs. Facebook goes extra mile in the transparency of communication with other industries on the mutually important topics, such as environment, serving as a great example for future knowledge and efficiency exchange.
Neil, absolutely agree with this post and importance of addressing the issue giving the scale of film industry. While I absolutely agree with you that this problem should be addressed externally (with the support from the government etc.), I also think that we should not underestimate the importance of the company itself and how much can be done to reduce waste and become ‘greener’. I also believe that improving internal conscience could actually drive expenses down.
For example, simple things like substituting plastic water bottles with the coolers could safe considerable amounts of money. Additionally, film companies can become more efficient by cutting spend on flights and having conference calls and video calls instead; employees travelling from and to shooting locations should adopt car-pooling as a standard practice; smoking should be banned at the shooting location; energy efficient office lighting could be implemented.
Great article, Alicia. I think that Nike is making a great progress with less water used in the apparel by constantly innovating and changing their materials. To expand your point regarding need for the broader effort within industry, it would be great to find out, which levers can Nike use to persuade its suppliers to change levels of water used as well. The amount of water used during the raw materials preparation (cotton, for example) could add up significantly to the overall water over-utilization. How difficult it could be to expand the effort and would other players of the supply chain agree? Program that would help to improve water quality standards across all value chain and restrict water usage to minimum levels could have a great potential, but the question is, how much upfront investment would be required by Nike in particular to make it happen?
Great post! I am following Tesla innovations closely as well and have a question regarding effectiveness of the solar power overall and the way these could be addressed.
While I agree that solar energy will definitely contribute to greener future world, it is currently extremely expensive and not highly efficient: current efficiency ranges between 20% and 40%. To add, this efficiency is even lower if the surface is not clean. These two issues add up to high capital investments and maintenance costs, making this source of energy an option for very niche market. If we want every household in the world to switch to solar source of energy, how can we make it affordable? How can we review maintenance costs? Could we potentially use other materials?
I loved the article as I am a strong believer myself in the self-driving cars and their positive effect on our future! I have two questions in regards with the future of self-driving cars. First is the effect on the automobile industry overall. Many researches suggest that self-driving cars will also become sharable by numerous households (using subscription model), decreasing overall number of cars by 30-50% in next 10 years. This will affect overall size and performance of traditional automobile industry. And while there are more and more companies innovating in this direction, would you not expect a tremendous push back from auto giants, which might considerably slow down selfless cars adoption? My second question relates to the safety. In the environment where we will have a mix of human-driven and self-driven cars, how can we make sure that these two do not contradict each other on the road and do not create even more accidents?