Chris Kraeuter’s Otellini, Hurd, Ellison Sing Itanium’s Praises and Owen Thomas’ Intel Throws Good Money After a Bad Chip discusses the recent push among major industry players to support Intel’s Itanium line of processors. Billions of dollars have been committed to support the Itanium chip, and Intel and its partners plan on dedicating another 10 billion to the effort. It seems that Intel is facing adversity on multiple fronts. It has lost market share to AMD processors in commodity desktop computers, and industry analysts are cynical about Intel’s drive to provide high-end processors. Dedicating an additional 10 billion dollars to “mission critical computing,” which reportedly generates 28 billion dollars annually, helps Intel maintain its much needed partnerships and may also allow it to gain a foothold into an emerging market.
A book on the Lisp programming language has been made available on Paul Graham’s site. Lisp, not-so affectionately known as Lots of Infuriating Parentheses among undergraduate students, is a programming language that I have always wanted to learn but was never motivated enough to make a book purchase. Unlike most popular languages, which are either object-oriented or imperative, Lisp is a programming language under the functional programming paradigm. Exposure to the language will expand a programmer’s thought. Lisp will enhance a novice programmer’s grasp of recursion at the very least.
I have placed a copy of the book here for my convenience. Now that I have a book on Lisp, I have one less reason not to pick up Lisp.
It seems that Ford employees at the Dearborn plant are forced to eat their own dog food. According to CNNMoney.com, Ford’s management has decided to ban competitors’ vehicles from their lots. Unfortunately unlike Google employees, a majority of the production workers at Ford have little influence on the conceptual development of their products. People who work closely on a company’s product have an enhanced ability to evaluate the product and compare it against those of competitors, and if these people determine superior quality of a competitor’s product at a comparable price, then it is natural for those people to decide on a competitor’s product.
Witnessing Ford, an American automotive company, establish a totalitarian policy is very disturbing. The policy acts against free market forces: competition. It seems that Ford’s management would rather create corporate rules to establish a facade of company dedication among its workers than create an environment that encourages the company to be a more competitive force in the automotive industry.
Ford’s new policy would be more effective if it was adopted secretly by the company’s upper management. It must somehow be known to their laborers that their cars are not provided by the company as this should be an expected misconception. This will create a united front among upper management that supports their brand. Knowing that individuals who have the ability to purchase expensive luxury imports prefer a Ford will make the purchase of a Ford easier among Ford’s workers. Having the households of upper management use Ford automobiles exclusively would boost this effect.
Improving the way that Ford automobiles are perceived will further encourage its adoption among Ford’s workforce. Ford seems to have been successful in converting a portion of the market segment for individuals between the ages of 18 and 34 with their Mustang and Focus models. The Mustang has been accepted at many recent import car shows. It should not be difficult for Ford workers to be converted to Ford automobile owners, unless practices within the company discourage workers from making a Ford purchase. If workers are under the impression that the company is interested in merely shipping it without care for quality, for example, then their purchase of competitors’ products is understandable. Pride that is felt by their workers on the products that they produce should not only be something created by their marketing team. It should be heartfelt, and it shall be evidenced through their free choice to purchase a Ford vehicle and showcase it in their plants’ parking lots.
Ford’s reputation has somehow come to mean “Fix or Repair Daily” among automotive technicians. They need to drastically change its image of being unreliable or distinguish its brand from those of General Motors at the very least. How they manage their recent layoffs and how the company can portray concern about its workers will affect the opinions of many people regarding Ford Motor Company. The layoffs are another opportunity for Ford to enhance the automaker’s image.
Guy Kawasaki reinforces ideas about starting up companies and reminds people about the basics in The Art of Bootstrapping. The post can be seen as a good summary of important suggestions made in business literature.
Forecasting from the bottom up is a little gem of advice that can be taken from the article. It is very tempting to imagine reaching 1% of any large group of people and predicting success based on this daydream. Rather than thinking about reaching a humble percentage of a large target group when planning the business, business founders should focus on objectives that they can accomplish in the short term. This will give them a better handle of projected income and will help determine the company’s feasibility.
To counter highly optimistic visions of success, Kawasaki advices a startup to keep a lean team. Keeping a small team will diminish idle time for workers and minimize the need for layoffs. Many researchers have reported higher levels of productivity with smaller groups. Growing a team necessitates the company to feed more mouths. So, it is best to wait on the hiring frenzy until funding is available and additional workers are really needed.
Kawasaki’s sixth point is too focused. This point suggests that startups not purchase the most expensive products for business use. His example uses chairs. Businesses do not need to purchase one high-end business chair when they can purchase four comfortable and functional chairs at the same price. The same can be said about computing devices. Whether or not this suggestion can be applied to products that a company is developing is uncertain. Releasing a product with innovative functionality and without great form might allow the competition to match the innovation and polish the presentation of that functionality with the resources that are available to them. Great form was a crucial part of Apple’s success in the already established portable music player market. Great form might be a necessary for widespread adoption of the starting company’s product.
The degree that the product should be polished is determined by the company’s judgement of “good enough.” Kawasaki’s third suggestion encourages the product’s release when it is a little less than perfect. Customers will have feedback to provide, and implementing features based on customer feedback instead of implementing potentially useful features that will not be used is a sound strategy for startups.
Perhaps, the important factor of successfully launching a business is people. Starting a company requires its people to have a lot of trust and guarded optimism. Meeting and surpassing the needs of its people after the company has stabilized will prepare the company to achieve next level.
The top guys at Google are doing it again. A Reuters report states that Google Execs Keep $1 Salaries. The article also reports Schmidt earned $250,000 while Brin and Page each earned $150,000 before taking up their one dollar annual salaries in 2004. Being able to do something one enjoys, like helping businesses rise, without having to worry about life’s necessities is great. Opting to depend on performance-based portfolio income is something to be admired about any business leader. An increase in their personal financial worth will rely on their ability to increase the value of the business and not on accumulating earned income, which has a weaker dependence on their performance.