IT Rapid Deployment Kit White Paper

A few months ago I wrote the attached white paper (8.7 Mb. PDF file) based on my experience in deployments around the world. Usually these deployments are in places where conditions might be difficult and usually are associated with events such as natural disasters, health related emergencies or even political transitions. Hard to reach, unreliable or non-existent utilities, and absence of reliable communication facilities are common in these places and situations.

International donors and non-governmental organizations make efforts to reach these places and assist people on multiple arenas, ranging from basic health assistance and food programs, elections monitoring. It is common to see deployments of experts on particular areas but often they lack the equipment, and in many cases, the basic skills that today are needed for day-to-day communications activities such as creating and establishing an internet connection, setting-up a wireless network, set-up and configuration of email accounts, printers, etc. These are real needs that must be covered in order to streamline the work of these staff as well as for safety reasons. There is no longer the option of calling the IT guy to come up and fix these issues. Many of these skills are today as basic as learning to drive. No matter what position you are in it is needed.

In this white paper, I attempted to provide an explanation and a hands-on checklist of the basic equipment needed for these situations. The emphasis is on the ability to "hit the ground running" meaning that the need to be fully functional from the information technology perspective and be able to communicate starts immediately, often as soon as the plane lands. Because of that, all the examples, images and illustrations explained here are related to equipment that people can carry with them in addition to whatever other luggage they might travel with. It is based on my own experience in activities all over the world

Download the 8.7 Mb. PDF file

Miguel Garcia Gosalvez
www.miguelgarcia.org

Smart Grid: Google and GE teaming up

By now we all know that Google is no longer (if it ever was) a search-engine related company. Obviously it is much more than that and is trying to be part of all aspects of our lives. We have enjoyed, for a while now, services like web search engine, email, word processor, spreadsheet, library, news provider, etc. Back in November 2008 I wrote about how Google is using the information gathered to provide innovation services such as real-time information about the spread of Flu infections. As we know Google doesn’t stop and continues innovating on all kinds of fronts. Here is another example.

Back in the Fall of 2008, Google teamed up with General Electric (GE) to assist building what they called the Smart Grid. This will provide two-way communications, using the power grid, between customers and suppliers. This may not sound like anything new. In fact, though, the interesting thing about this is the new approach.

Google’s approach goes one step further by trying to take advantage of the flows of information that can occur. For example, utilities can better monitor electrical usage while users can obtain more accurate and faster (even real-time) information about their own electrical usage.

What lies behind all of this is even bigger and is an attempt, by both Google and GE, to push for policy efforts that facilitate and enable the availability of renewable energy generation in the United States. With a SmartGrid like the one proposed, we should be able to manage better our home energy use in order to reduce costs. Later on, and if the whole green technology movement catches up, we should be able to power our electrical cars when energy costs are lowest based on real-time consumption data (see RechargeIT Google initiative) or even sell to the grid the excess power we generate at home, for example through solar panels, wind, etc.

Some skeptics think that this will never happen or is many years away. Despite their arguments, I believe that when companies such as Google and GE make this kind of agreement (and back them up with resources in terms of minds and money) we should expect some results. Let’s see what happens!

Published at Infonomia the week of February 23, 2009.

Miguel Garcia-Gosalvez

http://www.miguelgarcia.org/
http://www.casals.com/

MBAs vs. Ph.Ds. The debate about innovation is open.

I just finished reading “The Venturesome Economy”, a new book by Columbia Business School Professor Amar Bhidé that I highly recommend. The book focuses on the sources of innovation and why some innovations receive funds from venture capital companies while others do not. The answer seems obvious but, according to Bhidé, it is not. His research leads him to suggest that successful innovation is unrelated to the creation of new solutions but depends instead on inventing new applications for existing solutions.

Over the last few years many articles and lectures, especially by the CEOs of large corporations, have expressed concern about the United States losing its leadership position in innovation against emerging economies, especially India, China and even Brazil. Part of the argument is the lost battle about the so-called hard sciences (Mathematics, Physics, Computer Science, Engineering, etc.) not interesting as many students as they used to. While this is happening in the U.S., emerging economies have focused on ensuring that their most talented students receive the best possible science education. Paradoxically, many of them go to the United States where the percentage of foreign Ph.D students has been growing for the last few years.

Malcolm Gladwell, in his latest book "Outliers", mentions that Asian students perform much better in Mathematics, Physics, etc. than the rest simply because they work much harder. Many people in the U.S. fear that this will allow these countries to overtake the U.S. in innovation and consequently the emerging market economies will become much stronger and even superior to the U.S. economy.

Professor Bhidé argues that hard work and innovation per-se is not enough. His main argument is based on the idea that U.S. companies are much more sophisticated when it comes to marketing, distribution, sales and customer service. He claims that these are the factors that provide the advantage over the rivals. We all remember the typical examples such as Betamax being better than VHS or HD-DVD being better than Blue-Ray. These technologies did not succeed despite their technical superiority. All the other factors (marketing, distribution, etc.) ended up being more relevant. Bhidé insists that for the U.S. to keep its advantage as an economic power, there is a need for more and better MBAs, not more Ph.Ds.

I believe there are enough arguments on either side to merit more research and debate in the area of innovation, both on technical and business aspects.

Published at Infonomia the week of December 9, 2008.

Miguel Garcia-Gosalvez
www.casals.com
www.miguelgarcia.org