35 Bn Loss

I could not even imagine in my worst dreams what it would feel to lose a 35 Bn USD deal. That’s what the team at EADS must be feeling now in contrast to the glee at Boeing headquarters. This completes the cycle in a way; both the team has lost and won the same deal once. This does look like a final decision with the tempered reaction from EADS compared to Boeing of last time and few political realities. Read a bit about the last decision here.

Even thought there is always a thought of losing a deal, but EADS would have known it better after its win last time was over tuned. It is all known that none of the B2B deals are based on merits, or the cases are ever so easy to compare against each other. What decides the outcome is everything other than what is on the submitted paper. It’s the backroom machination that gets you the deal. To top all that, this was a defence deal. Sure even last time there would have been few other deciders and this time the odds were clearly visible against EADS. No need to mention the obvious. Alabama’s loss is Kansas’s gain, few careers lost is few careers built at Boeing. Apart from all these the greatest sadness of a loss is to see disappointment for so many, but life goes on. The best on this, in my opinion, came from Atmore’s Mayor Howard Shell - “That’s like a lot of other things sometimes things don’t happen like you would like for them to …”

I don’t think EADS should appeal, it would not win, and I would be happy to be proved wrong.
World is a tough place to be.

Update - So EADS is not going to contest the decision. Congratulations and Good Luck Boeing !

Bonuses - of bank or Media?

There have already been two countries on the seat of EU Presidency after France, but it seems Nicholas Sarkozy still loves playing the part of EU’s most vocal leader. He has plenty of ideas to be put forward and ensure that France always is the EU’s leading light and lone saviour. Fresh from his summer vacation he made his intention clear of leading the G-20 summit in Pittsburgh, and quickly crossed the border to Berlin. His idea, the radical one as it was put, was to eliminate the Bank Bonuses. Even before there could be a debate on the idea, this ‘another’ effort of Sarkozy glossed the headlines. The German election scheduled for September made it easier for Sarkozy to get support of Angela Merkel. This idea does find favour with the thousands who are still jobless, the fallout of the recession.

It is easy to see why Sarkozy is championing the idea? This ‘reform’ even if implemented would not mean much for France. Alongwith Germany, France does not have any major financial centers to be affected. This is totally different for London or New York, where this idea if implemented might see the business migrate elsewhere. None the less, in all the countries this idea, whether implemented or not, makes a bold and popular headline.

This recession has been tough and there could have been few things that could have been done differently. Many radical reforms are needed; these reforms should be for eliminating the possibility of any recurrence and not only for media attention. One such example is crushing blow on tax havens. I am still not sure how ‘offshore banking’ contributed to recession, and how its death will help in making sure recession of this kind will not happen again. Was UBS alone affected by recession?

As I write this, the deliberations of G20’s Finance Ministers in London have just ended. Not surprisingly, the proposal on ‘bank bonuses’ failed to generate a consensus. It is a setback for both French and German Finance ministers, but I am sure they saw it coming. No setback for Sarkozy, he achieved what he wanted. It’s time for Swedish Prime Minister, Fredrik Reinfeldt to take note.

May I suggest French President to reform the ‘EU subsidy on agriculture’ next?

Chrome OS update on twitter

The title of this post might seem a weird combination but that’s how you can sum up the last two weeks on technology world. The technology world, that average people like me gets involved for their daily activities.

First it was the launch of Google’s operating system, Chrome OS, another out of the world, free product from Google. Even before people like me could understand what Chrome OS is, almost entire media termed as the real threat to Microsoft Windows. It would not be difficult to even get the data from stock market to see how it affected the stock prices of Google and Microsoft. On a random basis, after every 10 articles boldly promulgating the end of Microsoft dominance; one could see an article saying “not so fast” on this analysis. The new OS was heralded as the latest revolution where a whole OS could be based on browser utilizing cloud services for all the desktop apps, e.g. Word processor and spread sheets. Google had indeed dropped “mother of bombs on Microsoft”

A week later after getting world’s update on Twitter, there was an update about Twitter itself. So the world had update on Twitter’s business model, how it wishes to reach the target of 1 billion users and other assorted strategies. It happened cause someone from Europe hacked into the email account of one of the Twitter employee and got access to all the documents that were kept on the same cloud environment courtesy Google. The anatomy of this operation is minutely detailed on web. One password was all that was required to get into this revolutionary concept, the same concept that is going to be part of Google’s Chrome OS. So much for being threat to Microsoft. It took just one week !

I don’t know which corporate would trust its documents by way of word processor, or spread sheets to be kept on Google’s servers. Extrapolate this to every other document and you get an OS based on Cloud Computing.

Microsoft is not only about technology, it is much more than just a tech giant.

2008 - Top 50 innovative companies

I think this should be the most watched in times of recession,corporate instabilities and sinking businesses. Business Week is out with the list of 2008 top 50 innovative companies, it determined along with Boston Consulting Group. The description by BW for the list says it all; “Smart ideas for tough times: The 50 companies that make up our annual ranking nurture cultures that value creative people in good times and bad”

The list in itself is not surprising, but few rankings are.There are new names as well, like India’s TATA Group, Reliance Industries and gaming company, Nintendo. The list spans across the industries from Finance, Banking, Telecommunications, Oil companies, Retailers to Car manufacturers.

Apple keeps the topmost position with its iPhone becoming No 3 in smartphone category. Its nearest rival in the segment, Nokia is at number 10, powered by its convergence themed handsets. Google is number 2 in the list, and though not many would think Microsoft as an innovative company, it is very close to Google at No 5.

The first new entrant on the list is India’s TATA group. It has been hogging the global media after its buyout of Corus and most recent acquisition of Jaguar and Land Rover. But what made it entry, and gave it No 6, was the 2500 dollars, world’s cheapest car 'Nano'. The second new entrant is Nintendo, powered by gaming that also improves your fitness. Reliance Industries, one more new entrant is at number 19, which has been diversifying in grocery retailing from its traditional petrochemicals.

The hottest social networking site, Facebook, finds itself on number 25 and McDonald's on number 30. It was surprising to see Intel at No 48 and the No 50 lies with American Express.

The recessionary times will separate the grain from chaff, and it is only comforting to see innovative companies across the industry verticals.

PR Co-incidence

We have seen lot of strange co-incidences across the world many times. I don’t know how many of us noticed, but there was one such co-incidence this week as well. It was about two big corporate names fighting their PR battle.

First case is of British airways, which is now facing one of the worst PR disasters ever. BA would never have imagined that the much hyped opening of Terminal 5 at Heathrow by the Queen of England herself, would land it in such a trouble. There are reports of heaps of 20,000 backlogs of misplaced luggage. One can only imagine the plight and helplessness of the harried BA customers. The prediction of Martin Broughton, BA Chairman that the new terminal would “put some fun back into flying” came totally true. Who can tell more about it than Naomi Campbell herself? The job of BA CEO Willie Walsh seems to be secure as no one other than harried customers have asked him to be sacked. BA might term it as ‘teething problem’ but it has made a huge dent into image of BA How is British Airways fighting its way back to reputation? It is taking use of its website and put a permanent “We’re Sorry” board to apologise to its customers.

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Internet website is being put to use across the Atlantic as well. Two American corporates are fighting an epic PR battle, which is getting interesting with each passing day. The case is 35 Bn USD contract of US Airforce refueling aircraft. Boeing would never have dreamt that it will lose the contract after already supplying refueling aircraft previously. To add insult to injury, the contract was won by joint group of Northrop Grumman and Europe’s EADS (parent of Airbus). Boeing has appealed against the contract and trying to invoke popular sentiment of job loss to the case. It ran full page advertisement in the major US newspapers about the tanker deal, saying “Why It Doesn’t Add Up”.

Northrop Grumman was fully prepared to return the favour. It didn’t use the newspapers but its website. It put a picture of the deal winner plane with the words “It DOES Add Up” This particular deal is a case study who has even a slightest bit of interest in sales strategy and more has to come.

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Two corporates in the same week fighting their PR battle through their website in the same week. It could not get any more interesting.