Dell goes private

"Dell Inc. DELL +0.83% on Tuesday said it reached a deal to take itself private, in a $24.4 billion buyout that marks an unofficial end to the era when a handful of young entrepreneurs made PCs the dominant computing device."

"You've gotta get up and try try try" Dell is trying, but it hasn't being easy. Despite its efforts to turn itself around, Dell recognized that will take longer to come around. Dell's decision to go private is an attempt to restructure its business maintaining its value. In order words, being private is the security that a company can innovate, try new procedures and change core business without the fear of the impact of these decisions in the financial market. In addition  Microsoft is one of the big investors of this buyout, which makes us think that maybe the technology industry will see something new coming from this partnership.


Source: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324900204578285582125381660.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_LEFTTopStories

Who's to blame?

This is not a post about Marketing strategy, but I needed to express my sorrow to my country, population of Santa Maria-RS, families, and friends of the victims. 
A terrible tragedy happened in Brazil last weekend; 235 people died in a nightclub fire. This tragedy is especially bitter for me not only because it happened in my country, but because I know how the regulations are and I have been in places like Kiss nightclub many times. In Brazil it is very common to receive a card which bartenders record your tab and you are not permitted to leave without your card verified by the cashier as paid. In addition, large part of the nightclubs in college towns are fill over capacity in celebratory nights, such the begging and ending of the school year. After last Sunday 235 young adults and teenagers will not go back to their family or invest their knowledge in the development of Brazil. 

Who should be accountable for this tragedy?  Based on inspections made previous to the incident the nightclub was up to code, and could be open to the public. That means that the city government standard for safety is not strict enough since 235 people died for lack of ventilation and emergency exit in the building. In addition, the fire extinguisher didn't work when needed. Nightclub owners want to sell and have profit from tickets and drinks. With this in mind they allowed as many people in the nightclub as possible, even though  possible doesn't mean safe. In addition, musicians want to be different. Clearly they didn't notice that using a pyrotechnic device in a closed and crowded nightclub would cause a problem. In addition, the ceiling was too low for a "pyrotechnic show", which is only allowed in open spaces. College kids want to have fun and be with their friends. They were not mature enough to foresee the problems until they saw the fire. Lastly, because of the Brazilian custom of paying for your card at the exit, security blocked the exit when who hadn't paid their bill wanted to leave.  Security thought that there was a fight and people wanted to leave the nightclub without paying. This action resulted in the accumulation of people trying to leave at the same time where some people fell on the floor and could never get up. As of 01/28/2013 4 people were arrested: two of the owners of the nightclub and two performers whose pyrotechnics display supposedly went awry and started the blaze.

It has been a very sad time to Santa Maria and Brazil. Maybe this tragedy helps the country to formulate better safety requirements for venues, and nightclub's owners to be more concern about security rather than profit.  

source: http://noticias.uol.com.br/cotidiano/ultimas-noticias/2013/01/30/nao-vou-entrar-em-jogo-de-empurra-empurra-diz-prefeito-de-santa-maria-rs.htmhttp://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323375204578269641832825014.html?KEYWORDS=Brazil#articleTabs%3Darticle

GMO?

Watch: Real Time with Bill Maher 22 june 2012 in HD GMOs (Genetically Modified Foods)

This is a complicated business ethics issue because Monsanto claims that it is helping the 
world by supplying generically modified seeds that result in more food with increased nutritional value, which is what we need. In the book Hot, Flat and Crowded, Friedman states that the population is only increasing.  So how are we going to feed all these people? On the order hand, GMOs are dangerous because they can impact our health, environment, and our future in a way that is unknown at the current time. In addition, the genetically modified crops are seen as Monsanto's intellectual property, which means that once farmers plant GM crops they need to always come back to Monsanto. This would keep the profit on the company's hand challenging the true meaning of "sustainable agriculture". Companies' marketing strategy is to not tell if a product contains GMOs or not. They take this position in order "to protect consumers" since consumers don't know the actual negative results of GMOs and the term Genetically Modified remind us of people with three arms and one eye. That is true, but then if GMOs are not bad for our health why can't we have the full disclosure on products' labels?  The bottom line is that we, as consumers, should be able to know what are we buying and make our on decision on whether to purchase a food that contains GMOs or not. 



Source:nutribulletblog.com