Musings of a Computing Professional

Odometer Miles vs. Range Miles in a Tesla Model 3.

2018-08-05T18:35:00.000-07:00

Bird Island @ Point Lobos State Reserve

iles are quite tricky to understand when it comes to Tesla cars. (Why only Tesla? Probably all-electric cars). While the battery in each car is specified to have a range — a long-range Model 3, for example, can be charged fully to a range of 310 miles — the actual odometer miles that one may realize during a drive can be substantially less.

We had occasion to drive to Point Lobos State Natural Reserve recently. Google Maps recommended we drive down 101 South, through 156 West, and finally via 1 South, for a total of 81.6 miles, one way.

Terrestrially speaking, by using Googe maps, we estimated that the drive would add about 2*81.6, or about 165 miles, give or take a few.

At the end of the trip, however, I was surprised to see the following:

Remaining range miles: 59, after a start range of 279 miles. (279 = 90% charge limit, as recommended by Tesla). In other words, we used up 220 range miles.
Odometer mile difference: 170.

Thus, one can define an odometer/range efficiency of 170/220 ≅ 77% for this particular drive.

Although the Tesla console does recommend where to stop for a supercharge during long drives, it is also good to keep in mind a 75% thumb rule, based on the efficiency defined above, as to when a replenishing charge would be required.

At the Tesla Shareholder Meeting, 2018.

2018-06-05T23:20:00.000-07:00

As I expect to get my hands on my Model 3 in a few days, after a wait of nearly 27 months after registration, I felt a need to attend the Tesla Shareholder Meeting today, held at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California. Equally importantly, as a shareholder, I wanted to hear from Elon Musk how, in his words, Tesla is doing.

When you enter any public arena these days, one should not be surprised if one is subjected to some sort of body scanning. The Tesla meeting was no different.

Where I did get surprised was the manner in which they established that I was a shareholder: If I had pre-registered, they would have known that I am a shareholder, but I went there almost at the last minute without any pre-registration. I had to establish that I was a shareholder by logging into my brokerage app on my smartphone and showing that I did indeed own Tesla stock (in my name).

Roadster II at the Tesla Shareholder Meeting

An interesting fact that came out was that Tesla is experimenting with networking about 50,000 residential PowerWalls in Australia. One can imagine the possibilities: Subject, of course, to transmission losses (and any regulatory considerations) 50,000*14 = 700,000 kWh worth of energy is available in an emergency to many of those 50,000 homes!

Another fact is that the specification Tesla put out last year for the Roadster II -- 0-60 mph in 1.9s, top speed of 250+ mph, 620-mile range -- was just for the base model! One can only imagine what the premium model would have!!

Summary? I'll continue to be long on Tesla stock. Tesla is doing well on the EV front, expects to generate good gross margin on energy storage. There was not much talk on solar energy generation except for a brief mention of a home with solar roof ...

Futility of Dual-SIM Smartphones.

2018-01-20T06:46:00.000-08:00

ual SIMs are considered quite useful, particularly when you are on travel. So, what did I do? I procured a 2nd personal phone, an Android phone. (My first one is an iPhone and we all know that Apple does not have dual-SIM versions of iPhones).

I also procured a post-paid SIM for usage within India.
With considerable skill, I outfitted the dual SIM phone with the two SIMs:

One taken out of my iPhone, served by T-Mobile
One, a post-paid SIM card from Airtel

When you are on travel, I rely on communication Apps, two in particular, other than phone calls and text — i.e., SMS — messages: WhatsApp, Uber. And, the dual SIM Android provides options for only 3 things:

Cellular data
Calls
SMS messages

Out of these three only the Calls can be set to 'Ask every time'; the other two insist on your choosing only one mobile operator. Changing a mobile operator every time doesn't constitute for good user experience (UX). And, in addition to the choice of the mobile operator, the software must also select the proper phone number.

Thus, I reverted to using two different phones rather than using the dual-SIM phone only. Painful user experience (UX), either way.

My $35,000 Tesla Model 3.

2017-08-03T10:46:00.002-07:00

Model 3 was unveiled this past Friday, July 28. Tesla made the production Model 3 available to the first 30 owners, all of them Tesla employees:

While it will be quite some time for me to get my hands on my Model 3, even though I stood in line on 31 March 2016 to sign up for it, it is worth making an assessment of what I'd like (A good review by Tom Randall on Bloomberg.com):

As of today, however, the estimated time for my car's availability is:

and my hope is my $35,000 Model 3 — rather, the $58,000 version 😀 — would be available during that window.

Father's Day, 2016.

2016-06-19T00:01:00.000-07:00

ather's Day, 2016. Best wishes to you, if you are a father and happen to be reading this, and hope that this Father's Day is as special to you as it is for me.

In a normal course of a Father's Day every year, the usual things happen: Phone calls to dad, visit dad, provide gifts to dad, Father's Day lunch or dinner, etc.

This particular Father's Day, 2016, is very special to me, however. Why?
In the intervening days since last year's Father's Day, 2015, which was one of the more usual ones, two important things have happened:

Vikram, presenting during Graduation Social

Our son graduated from GeorgiaTech with an MS in Biomedical Innovation and Development, in July 2015. (Since he fulfilled requirements in July, and the commencement is yearly in December, the department conducted a Graduation Social, and he got his diploma by mail).

Ramya, getting her MBA degree.

Our daughter graduated from UC Berkeley with a #haasome MBA in May 2016. This was a more traditional commencement.

It is of course true that the children worked hard to earn their respective graduate degrees.

But, my — i.e., a father's — pride as a result, though, knows no bounds.

Any parent would want nothing but health, happiness & wealth for the children, and I feel a very satisfactory Father's Day, 2016, in their accomplishments.

Has the Republican Party Lost Its Moral Compass?

2016-03-05T15:09:00.002-08:00

ow come we see the spectacle of a broken Republican political party in the United States, day in and day out?

For several months now, we have seen Donald Trump make a mockery of democracy. It started with his public mistreatment of newscaster Megyn Kelly, and continues with his latest: Trump assures America ... he has normal-sized 'something else', with a lot of others in between. The fact that he has been able to get away with the abrasive -- read undemocratic -- behavior unbecoming of any civilized human being, let alone the President of the United States, is testament to the strength of US democracy: Tolerating a certain amount of undemocratic behavior.

Media, of course, finds the Trump's buffoonery valuable for the newsworthy exploitation that it affords. We cannot expect media to chide Donald Trump.

However, is that the kind of personality Americans want in The White House? Is that the kind of personality Republicans want in The White House? Is it acceptable to the Republicans to have anyone, really anyone, who claims Republican membership whether or not to he adheres to the Republican manifesto? Do the Republicans even have a manifesto? Did any Republican even talk to Donald Trump that it is unbecoming of a Republican to display the kind of public behavior he has shown so far¹? Are the Republicans so desperate that anyone in the White House is fine as long as it is not a Democrat? Can the Republicans not think of country first, above their party²?

Where is Republicans' moral aplomb?

You can reflect on these questions before you vote in November.

¹Finally, Mitt Romney did speak out publicly, but more as an individual than as one representing the Republican party.

²Senate GOP: No hearings for Supreme Court nominee.

Rebooting India - A Book Review.

2016-02-04T00:23:00.000-08:00

ebooting India by Nandan Nilekani and Viral Shah is an excellent discussion of how, and under what circumstances, Aadhaar got conceived and its meaningful extensions to improve the manner in which the Indian Government can enrich the life of its citizens.

The book is a bold attempt to infuse technology as a foundation for governmental and societal efficacy, by rooting out opportunities for fraud, bribery, leakage, etc. (I'm poignantly familiar with the strikes against computerization labor unions held in the early 1970s that technology was to be eschewed: Why? It'd rob the unionists of 'meaningful' employment, of course, ...)

The book has 16 chapters of which Chapters 1-2 are about Aadhaar, the concept and its implementation, Chapter 16 is a conclusion and Chapters 3-15 describe additional Aadhaar and related usages, including the most basic: Banking on Government Payments.

Two particular applications in particular are noteworthy for highlighting the advantages of a direct benefit transfer system: Goods and Services Tax (GST), and Electronic Toll Collection (ETC) system.

Nearly every chapter starts off with a story that every [Indian] person can easily relate to.

An important underpinning of the book is the exposure one gets to know about how the Indian Government works through many of its committees, etc. It unravels the complexity that any scalable solution — affecting India's current population of 1.2 billion — ends up facing in the Indian context and that, too, where the Government needs to be involved of necessity. Perhaps Nandan's background, as a former Infosys' CEO, has been a particularly valuable prior experience in tying together the various governmental entities, at times quite disparate.

Another message that is evident throughout the book is how traditional hierarchical thinking — in governments, in particular — is against meaningful progress. While this is something Agile practitioners have been noting for quite some time — See, for example, Can A Big Old Hierarchical Bureaucracy Become A 21st Century Network? — what is interesting in this book is to that it describes solutions that circumvent the stifling that governmental bureaucracy can create.

A very useful book to study, certainly for anyone that wants to create an IT-centric solution for the pan-Indian market.

US Independence Day Celebration, 2015, Personal Style.

2015-07-04T18:56:00.000-07:00

ndependence Days of individual countries are celebrated with differing themes all the world over. Today, July 4, is US Independence Day.

Certain institutions take this opportunity to celebrate the day in their own unique way ...

Google Search Page Image, 4 July 2015

Take Google, for instance. Its highly spartan search page sports this following image for today: A July 4 picnic.

And, CNN.com has compiled, in July 4th fireworks: 5 fun things to know, a collection of 31 photos that proclaims: "From American flag biker shorts to a stars-and-stripes onesie, these celebrities wear their patriotism on their sleeves as well as more surprising places. You could ring in the Fourth of July like these stars, but note that some of these looks are kind of like fireworks: best left to the pros."

BEKANT Desk sit/stand, black-brown, black
48" max height

Which brings me to my approach for Independence Day celebration this year. Granted, this is more personal than national in purpose: Bought a sit/stand desk to obtain independence from having to sit at a desk whenever I work with my computers.

For quite some time, I have been quite cognizant of the ill effects of sitting for long hours at a desk. See, for example, the Mayo Clinic article, What are the risks of sitting too much? Consider the following excerpts from the article:

Too much sitting also seems to increase the risk of death from cardiovascular disease and cancer.
...

Rather, the solution seems to be less sitting and more moving overall. You might start by simply standing rather than sitting whenever you have the chance.
For example:

Stand while talking on the phone or eating lunch.

If you work at a desk for long periods of time, try a standing desk — or improvise with a high table or counter.

...

Me, at the standing desk

Now, you understand why I went for the standing desk solution. (Picture at left). Some independence from ... cardiovascular disease and cancer.

Don't you want a similar independence for yourself?

Customization of Web Streaming for Classical Indian Music - An Unscientific Observation.

2015-06-05T14:04:00.000-07:00

usic Genome Project®, we learn from Pandora's web site, is what powers the music service. In this post, I want to share my observations in customizing the web site for Indian Classical Music.

The only mechanism for customization of Pandora Radio is the Thumbs-Up/Thumbs-Down pair. (In How Pandora Radio Works, author Julia Layton describes in good detail how you can use the Pandora software to customize the music you'd want to listen to).

Indian classical music, as all other classical ones, is based on the 7-note octave, and so I figured it'd be easy to customize the music service. I created Hindustani Music Radio and Carnatic Music Radio stations. It took me several weeks of Thumbs-Up/Thumbs-Down activity before the stations became quite faithful to my original intention, even though the Music Genome Project claims that the number of music genomes in some classical systems is as many as 450 and, thus, I expected the music service to converge faster than it did. (At one point, when the number of Thumbs-Up/Thumbs-Down feedback was not probably enough, the Hindustani Music Radio would play Carnatic Music songs!)

If any of you listens to these two stations, and like them, my sharing them would have been well served. (I expect to continue to refine the two stations with more Thumbs-Up/Thumbs-Down activity as the future unfolds).

Another recent value we see on the Internet regarding the use of customization: Sloan Kettering and Pandora Music Genome architect to ‘prescribe’ music for cancer patients,

Healthcare and Boeing?

2015-05-02T15:33:00.001-07:00

ealthcare and Boeing, the aerospace giant?

Yes.

Not exactly the kind of healthcare schemes that employers are interested in, regarding their employees. But, a system for ensuring that patients get wholesome care by their doctors.

As much as we are surprised by this unexpected connection between healthcare and Boeing, it probably was a similar surprise to the discoverer of the idea, Dr. Atul Gawande, a Harvard-trained surgeon. You can get a good feel for this surprise in his 2012 TED Talk titled How Do We Heal Medicine? Although the talk is a bit more focused on surgical patients, it is probably applicable in many non-surgical situations too. (You can find the transcript of the talk on the web).

As Dr. Gawande himself observes, things seem to have gotten out of hand since the medical community "... has now [in 2012] discovered 4,000 medical and surgical procedures. We have 6,000 drugs ..."

Surgical Safety Checklist as seen at 15:20 in the video.

Amazon.com Widgets

The essence of his discovery is that we need a system in providing wholesome care for the patients, a system he found in use in the aerospace industry. A system of checklists that ensures that all the considerations needed in the treatment of a surgical patient are taken care of:

Before induction of anaesthesia (sic)
Before skin incision
Before patient leaves operating room

And, then, he goes on to reveal that "We implemented this checklist in eight hospitals around the world .... We found that after they adopted it the complication rates fell 35 percent ... The death rates fell 47 percent. This was bigger than a drug."

Remarkable.

Moral? You can't keep doing things the way they were done before. Every now and then, you need to reinvent ...

My First Uber Trip.

2014-06-17T02:35:00.001-07:00

ver since I learnt about the infusion of capital of Uber at an unusually high valuation, and definitely after I came to know about an UberCHOPPER service in Bangalore, I had been awaiting for an opportunity to experience the Uber service myself, complete with the use of the iPhone App, starting from requesting the service ¹.

The Uber App is itself a nice mashup with an understandable foundation of Google Maps. Requesting the service was a pleasant experience: The screenshot at right is how it appears when you have determined the pickup location. There are two UberBLACK cars available for service in the vicinity at the time.

Usual smartphone navigation will enable you to make a request for the service very easily and, afterwards, the App monitors the movement of the vehicle until it reaches the pickup location. There is also a minute counter that tells you how soon it will reach the pickup location, a feature immensely useful when your mind is in a hurry.

The ride itself is a pleasant journey: It is as if you are getting ride from someone you are used to. Yes, it is true that you met the driver the first time, and maybe you will never meet him again, but a certain friendly conversation ensues. I used the UberX service for this ride.

The scale of operation possible for a service such as Uber's holds tremendous potential for charging for the service a highly economical price, not to speak of the complementary ability to raise the price according to the demand, all through a click of the mouse.

Probably the most liberating experience is the opportunity to shake hands with the driver and walk away.

¹I did take part days earlier in a ride where someone else requested the service, and I was one of the riders; being able to request a service for yourself is a more complete experience.

How Corporations Help Society.

2014-04-06T10:56:00.000-07:00

A good example of how corporations help society can be found in this blog post: Second innings with Google’s gCareer program. Since the blog authors are generally of Indian origin, cricket metaphor has been used talk about 2nd careers.

Another example is how Microsoft has influenced the Redmond area in Washington state.

It seems that it is a lot more effective to have corporation-sponsored activities than government-sponsored ones.

Minimalist Approach has Advantages.

2014-03-14T14:48:00.000-07:00

hen you move to a different town, as we did recently by moving to the Seattle area, an important realization hits you: You are indeed able to live in a minimalist manner, out of suitcases, so to speak. And, life is a lot simpler!

14 March 2014: Doodle for Google

Minimalist approach has other advantages.

Take the Google front page, for example. This simple front page has been the gateway for many people for their searches and for the diurnal goodies that Google itself leads you to: Today, it is about Doodle for Google, a scheme which invites young artists — Grades K-12 — to submit their doodles ...

The iPhone 5S.

Or, many of the Apple products.

Who would have thought that the iPod, iPhone and the iPad would take the world by storm? They have done so because of the simplicity inherent in them. Even though Android smartphones seem to have surpassed the iPhones in market share, there is still a certain aesthetic beauty about these iDevices.

The upshot? I now have an increased respect for minimalist anything.

(An Almost) Perfect Parking Experience in Oakland, California.

2014-01-12T10:59:00.000-08:00

The smart way to park.

crambling for change before driving to a different location where you have to allow for parking has been a painful phenomenon. Until recently, that is.

I'm not talking about using a credit card to pay for the parking at a curb; this method, while definitely better than scrambling for change, doesn't come close in convenience. What if you need to extend the parking duration? Do you have to call the toll free number, and get into voice-mail jail? Pain.

Enter Parkmobile.

Swami Vivekananda 150-yr Celebration

Recently, on Jan 11, I had occasion to attend the culminating event of the year-long Swami Vivekananda 150-year birth anniversary celebration at the First Unitarian Church of Oakland. (Aside: This is the same place where Swami Vivekananda addressed a gathering in 1900).

If you are equipped with a smartphone — these days, who isn't? — you have nothing to worry about, almost. (I'll get to the 'almost' in a minute). You get to an empty parking spot; download the app if you don't already have it on your phone, setup your payment method, and off you go.

It gets better. The app initiates an alarm 15 minutes before the expiry of the parking session. You can extend the session right from your mobile app. That's it.

What's the 'almost', then?

Original parking session.

Extension of the parking session.

When you activate a parking session, as shown on the left, the app charges a transaction fee. Seems reasonable. But, when you extend the parking session, as shown at right, the app promptly charges you another transaction fee.

Why do we have multiple transaction fees? It should be, from a customer's perspective:

One parking session, one transaction fee.

This is why I regard this parking experience as almost, but not quite, perfect.

Epilogue

I understand, of course, why this is the case. Every time you make a transaction with a credit card company, the credit card company promptly charges the merchant a certain transaction fee, and the merchant has resorted to passing on the transaction fee to the customer. What I'd prefer the merchant do is to pass a single parking transaction fee to the customer and handle the mechanics of multiple transactions behind the scenes. Using a meaningful average of extensions that all customers will request, the merchant can charge a single parking transaction fee by accounting for the extensions. For example, if the average extension for all customers is 0.4, the merchant can charge a single parking transaction fee, in this case $0.35*1.4 or $0.50.

Chromecast, an Example of a Well-Productized Device.

2013-08-16T14:50:00.000-07:00

The Chromecast Device.

Within minutes of unpacking the Chromecast device, you can see it working beautifully on your HDMI-equipped TV, getting controlled by your iPhone or iPad¹! No reading manuals, nothing.

Thanks, Google!

You notice that any TV with an HDMI input, the Chromecast, and your iPhone or iPad work seamlessly.

Suddenly, Google has made it possible for everyone to see that you don't have to be in a walled garden in order to have good Internet experience! Articles such as Suddenly, Google is making great hardware make a great deal of sense.

I see only a bright future for Internet-connected devices!

¹Of course, it'll work with Android devices too.

A Journalistic Faux Pas, Internet style.

2013-03-15T09:19:00.002-07:00

Journalists make every effort to report news and information correctly. However, once in a while, mistakes happen.

An example is today's on CNN.com.

The front page provides the title "Apple downgrades Tim Cook". You wonder why Apple downgraded Tim Cook. When you click on the link, however, you are taken to another web page where the title is "Apple employees downgrade Tim Cook".

Big difference.

Apple as a corporate entity is different from its constituent employees although, in many cases, the employees have a say in what Apple, the corporate entity, does or says.

In this particular case, it is a subset of Apple employees that subscribe to Glassdoor.com that have downgraded Tim Cook, and I quote:

Apple employees who reviewed their CEO on Glassdoor.com say they still like Tim Cook -- just less than they liked him last year.

I'll bet that most people would have clicked on the link based on the short title on CNN.com's front page.

Is this responsible Internet journalism? Of generating more clicks to a page?

Who won in the 2013 US Presidential Election?

2012-11-09T07:54:00.001-08:00

Of course, we all know that President Obama was reelected to the 2013 White house with a 303-206 majority in electoral votes last week. But, the real win is for two important constituencies:

Education
Economy (Middle class)

Education. The advent of China and India as potential economic forces in the world economy needs to be taken note of. The 21st century belongs to a properly educated workforce. Not merely in overall education emphasizing liberal arts, etc., but one that provides proper grounding in technology too. President Obama's passion towards this cause is unmistakable. Did you see such passion in the GOP camp?

Economy (The middle class). The backbone of any economy is a vibrant middle class. Particularly when the entire world is getting adjusted to a different 'economic center of gravity' than just the 'West', with both the US and the Western Europe in economic struggle, it takes some proactive
effort to strengthen the middle class than a mere 'hope' that a trickle down economics is sufficient. Such trickle down thinking is tantamount to a mistaken application of the dictum 'God will take care of you'. God will take care of you, provided you do your efforts. The 'you' we are talking about is any Government, and every Government must assess what is needed to be done and enable policies to make those thing happen (and no more).

Didn't we all learn in our childhood that God Helps Those Who Help Themselves?

Let us hope that America has learnt its lesson and our political leaders will work in unison by removing the gridlock in Washington.

As Oscar award winner A R Rahman tweeted, after President Obama's reelection, Jai Ho:

Let there be victory to Education and the Economy.

A Simplistic Model of Performing Earned Value Management (EVM) in a Project.

2012-10-05T09:09:00.000-07:00

Most discussions on Earned Value Management (EVM) will tell us to compute planned values, PV(t), at the time of planning the project, and assess Earned Values, EV(t), as we make progress over time. This is a very easy and effective way of assessing how the project is performing with respect to time, i.e., schedule.

The problem, in many cases, is that Planned Value (PV) cannot realistically be computed at all. In a project that is expected to take about 18 months to complete, with an average of 25 engineers on the project throughout, and the number of engineers changing over time, we can only begin to compute the planned value as time progresses.

A simplistic model, that I realized was possible during a discussion with my fellow colleague Richard Wheeler, is what is presented here, as an example. No need to worry about actual engineers involved, etc., by making the following, very realistic, assumptions [A click on the graph will open it in its own tab/window]:

Planned Value is 0 at the beginning of the project. (7/1/2010)
Planned Value is 2 at the planned end of the project. (12/31/2011). This is also the Budget at Completion (BAC). (The choice of 2 for PV is only to separate the graphs of EV and SPI in the same presentation).
An S-curve is fitted between the beginning and the end of the project. I have used a very simple Excel model of an S-curve in this example; your environment might be better served by a different model suited for your project's environment.
For each of the interim milestones, 4 in the example, there is an associated PV, based on elapsed time. (Milestone 5, M5, is the completion of the project).
When a certain milestone is reached in actual execution, the EV(t) is considered to be the PV at the milestone.
When M3 is reached in actual execution, any schedule variance at that time, SV(t), EV(t) - PV(t), is assumed to persist until M4 is reached.
Beyond M4, I have assumed a linear improvement in EV(t) until M5 is reached.

Of course, one limitation of this simplistic model is that actual costs are not considered; even then, it can be a useful model in some project situations.

Google Fiber, when are you coming to our town?

2012-08-05T09:36:00.000-07:00

This blog post is an alternative, easier-to-follow, representation of an article on Mashable.com, How Does Your Internet Service Stack up to Google Fiber?

Property	AT&T	Comcast	Google	Time-Warner	Verizon
Name	Max Turbo Internet and U-verse U450 TV	Xfinity Extreme 105 Internet and Digital Premier TV	Gigabit + Fiber TV	Signature Home Package	FiOS 300 and Ultimate HD
Price/mo	$188	$180	$120	$199	$318
Internet access speed	24 Mbit/s down, 3 Mbit/s up	105 Mbit/s down, 10 Mbit/s up	1000 Mbit/s down, 1000 Mbit/s up	105 Mbit/s down, 10 Mbit/s up	300 Mbit/s down, 65 Mbit/s up
Monthly Data Cap	250 GB	300 GB	Infinite	60 GB	Infinite
Channels	430, incl. Cinemax, HBO	> 300, incl. AMC, ESPN, HBO, Showtime	162, incl. Showtime	350; premium extra	380, incl. ESPN, NFL RedZone, Showtime
DVRs, Recording	1, 4	1, 2	1, 8	1, 2	1, 2
DVR - hrs	65 HD	60 HD	500 HD	150 HD	60 HD
Availability	22 states	39 states, & Washington, DC	Kansas City, KS & Kansas City, MO	29 states	12 states, & Washington, DC

It should be clear that, for Internet-centric usage, Google Fiber is the best bang for the buck. Yes, their package includes only 162 channels but, if you observe your own channel usage, you may discover that you probably only use a dozen or two channels anyhow.

Why even 162?

Google Fiber, when are you coming to our town? Does 'Bay Area' ring a bell?

Roger Federer, No.7, No. 17, No. 1.

2012-07-12T13:29:00.000-07:00

In a recent article on ESPN.com, on Federer's latest Wimbledon conquest, the first sentence is:

"No. 7, No. 17, No. 1."

Gets you thinking on how well he has done from other points of view. I have given here a simple exercise of determining how well some of these players have done since their 1st Grand Slam win, and how well they may perform in the future. (1st Grand Slam win identifies, in a way, a certain maturity needed for such wins).

Today

I have chosen today's top three Grand Slam winners — namely Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic —, and have added Pete Sampras to this mix.

Player	First Grand Slam Win	Last Grand Slam (i.e., Retirement)	Tournaments the Player [could have] Played through now (or Retirement)	Grand Slam Wins	% Success
Roger Federer	Wimbledon 2003	N/A	2 + 32 + 3 = 37	17	17/37 = 0.459
Pete Sampras	US 1990	US 2002	1 + 48 = 49	14	14/49 = 0.286
Rafael Nadal	French 2005	N/A	3 + 24 + 3 = 30	11	11/30 = 0.367
Novak Djokovic	Australian 2008	N/A	4 + 12 + 3 = 19	5	5/19 = 0.263

Tomorrow

The foregoing table seems to suggest that, if Federer competes for 3 more years, for approximately as many tournaments as Sampras did, there is a good chance that he will win 3*4*0.459, or 5 more, tournaments. Federer will be 34 years old in 2015. In other words, it may be reasonable to expect that his tally of Grand Slam wins will equal 20, i.e., only 3 more and not 5 more, when he retires.

If we extrapolate Nadal's current performance into his 34 years, i.e., for 8 more years, he is likely to have won 8*4*0.367, or 11 more or a total of 22, tournaments. Thus, he might be able to meet 20 Grand Slam wins too. However, given his playing style of utilizing more energy than, say, a more fluid game would use, it is unclear that Nadal will play into his 34 years.

If we extrapolate Djokovic's current performance into his 34 years, i.e., for 9 more years, he is likely to have won 9*4*0.263, or 9 more, tournaments. Thus, he might be able to meet 14 Grand Slam wins, equaling Sampras' record.

Of course, it remains to be seen how the future will unfold.

Heads I Win, Tails You Lose ... Caveat Emptor.

2012-05-24T17:45:00.000-07:00

In the recent Facebook IPO debacle, the role that Morgan Stanley and other underwriters have played is a curious one. (See Morgan Stanley made money on Facebook share drop).

As a routine procedure, it seems that the underwriters typically get to buy an additional number of shares from the company offering stock to the public.

"Investment bankers typically sell 15% more shares in an IPO than they actually have. ... Included in every IPO deal is an agreement that gives underwriters the ability to buy more stock from the company at a slight discount to the IPO price. So if the price rises after the offering, the underwriters can buy the shares from the company that they have promised to other investors, but don't actually have, and book a small profit. ... In effect, the underwriters were short the stock. ..."

So far, so good. Underwriters, in effect, have a call option on the stock.

However, in the case of the Facebook IPO, the stock tanked on the 2nd and 3rd days, ending below the IPO price. So, what did Morgan Stanley do? It bought shares from the open market, and not from Facebook, and sold them at the IPO price to investors — many of them retail — at the IPO price and, of course, pocketed the difference.

Thus, whether or not Facebook stock rose or fell after the opening on IPO day, Morgan Stanley and other underwriters were already set to make money. Beautiful! The underwriters could not lose either way.

This episode reminds me of "Heads I win, Tails you lose." The underwriters, it seems, get to play this game.

Is this fair capitalism? Caveat Emptor.

Choice of Commencement Speakers.

2012-05-20T14:26:00.000-07:00

WISHING ALL GRADUATES EVERYWHERE

The choice of a commencement speaker in American Universities is based quite frequently on worldly accomplishments, rather than being based solely on formal, university-centric, accomplishments. It is as it should be: Even the purpose of formal education is to assist the graduates in helping the world along anyway.

Years ago, we heard Steve Jobs giving a moving commencement speech for Stanford students in 2005. The latest example in 2012: Nipun Mehta, Founder Of Service Space, Delivers Inspiring Graduation Speech To Students At The University Of Pennsylvania. Neither of these have earned PhDs, but both have exhibited a lot of unconventional thinking.

Some additional googling takes us to an interesting TEDx talk by Nipun Mehta on YouTube: TEDxBerkeley - Nipun Mehta - Designing For Generosity.

If you, as a reader, is a recent graduate, I hope this blog post will help you derive inspiration from these two.

Odds of Winning a Silicon Valley Jackpot.

2012-04-10T21:48:00.002-07:00

The recently announced acquisition of Instagram by Facebook has evoked an article with this title:

$1 Billion Start-Up Jackpot: The Behind-The-Scenes Winners At Instagram.

Clearly, some form of a product that appeals to the billions of netizens is the prerequisite for such a jackpot.

However, here's a little tongue-in-cheek way of analyzing for the odds.

Now, if you are an engineer with all the right personal ingredients to create a startup, you'd do well to consider the following facts:

The odds of someone's winning MEGA Millions jackpot, which reached recently as high as $640 million, is 1 in 176 million, according to California Lottery web site.
The odds of someone's winning the smaller SuperLotto Plus jackpot is 1 in 41 million, also according to California Lottery web site.
The San Francisco Bay Area, of which Silicon Valley is a part, would rank first [in the United States] with 387,000 high-tech jobs.

Now, what are the odds of an engineer's succeeding in Silicon Valley? Consider this:

If the general odds of meeting another engineer with complementary characteristics is 1 in 10 million¹, the availability of a pool of 387,000 of them makes the probability of 1 among those to be your startup partner to be 0.0387, or 1 in 25. If you don't want to admit that all of the Bay Area's 387,000 can be Mark Zuckerbergs², you can narrow the field to Google alumni, Facebook alumni, etc. to, let us say, 10,000. Finding your entrepreneurial partner from among these 10,000, you get the odds of 1 in 1,000. Further, if you feel that you can only really pick one from a very small pool of an elite 100 in Silicon Valley, then the odds turn into 100/10,000,000, or 1 in 100,000.

While the foregoing is a highly simplified model of how one goes about creating startups, one thing is certainly clear:

As a brilliant engineer, you have very good odds of finding an entrepreneurial partner to succeed in Silicon Valley.

¹According to the 2010 census, Bay Area population is considered to be 7,150,739.

²You can substitute your favorite entrepreneur here, e.g., Google CEO Larry Page, Salesforce.com's CEO Marc Benioff, ...

Whither Agile Methodology?

2012-04-06T12:32:00.000-07:00

Agile methodology has been in use in many corporations around the globe. Perhaps the best example of the results of this methodology is the mindboggling frequency with which newer versions of browsers are being made available. (For example, in just over three years, Google Chrome has been released in 18 major versions, not to speak of many more minor versions: Today, it is 18.0.1025.151 m).

In What Agile Teams Think of Agile Principles (subscription), Laurie Williams describes some research she conducted recently that reassures us that the original 12 principles of Agile Manifesto, crafted about 10 years ago, are still very much valid among agile practitioners. Here is an excerpt from the conclusions of that article:

The authors of the Agile Manifesto and the original 12 principles spelled out the essence of the agile trend that has transformed the software industry over more than a dozen years. That is, they nailed it.

This reassurance is valuable because there are still pockets of developer groups that are still uncertain as to whether to embrace Agile methodology.

Buy-Side and Sell-Side Analysts - An Analysis

2012-01-27T21:15:00.000-08:00

Recently, I had opportunity to attend an SVForum SIG meetup on "Cloud M&A: Buy-side and Sell-side Dynamics in 2012 and Beyond". I had to get clear on the two concepts of Buy-Side and Sell-Side before I went into listen to the panelists. This exercise in learning itself was an eye-opener on how phrases get into usage in natural languages.

To begin with, Buy-Side and Sell-Side are not exactly what they seem. Let us start with some definitions, from Investopedia:

The side of Wall Street comprising the investing institutions such as mutual funds, pension funds and insurance firms that tend to buy large portions of securities for money-management purposes.

Read more: http://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/buyside.asp

The retail brokers and research departments that sell securities and make recommendations for brokerage firms' customers.

Read more: http://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/sellside.asp

Buy-Side analysts seem to be really doing what the phrase seems to suggest: Analyze stocks and other instruments to help in potential, eventual, buying of the equities. The Sell-Side analysts, on the other hand, deal significantly with retail investors, and can enable or, influence, buy or sell decisions by the retail investors.

If both buy and sell decisions are enabled by these Sell-Side analysts, why call them only Sell-Side?