Social Entrepreneurship Vs Foreign Aid - Kind of Like The Pig and The Chicken

There's been a lot of discussion about the effectiveness of foreign aid, INGO's and donations versus social entrepreneurship when it comes to dealing with issues of poverty, infrastructure development, etc., especially in developing countries -- and I can't help but think of the classic story about the chicken and the pig, which goes something like this:

A pig and a chicken are walking down a road. The chicken looks at the pig and says, “Hey, why don’t we open a restaurant?” 

The pig looks back at the chicken and says, “Good idea, what do you want to call it?” 

The chicken thinks about it and says, “Why don’t we call it ‘Ham and Eggs’?” 

“I don’t think so,” says the pig, “I’d be committed, but you’d only be involved.”

Although we can't make blanket statements, but for the most part, it seems to me social entrepreneurs are committed, whereas foreign aid and donations are involved. You can't bring about sustainable change without having your skin in the game.

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How to Count Beans when you don't have QuickBooks

I still recall the sense of relief when I mastered (well, sort-of) the art of start-up accounting during my first CEO gig. Our accountant (who visited us twice a month) gave me a crash course in QuickBooks, taught me how to read PNL, Balance Sheet, A/P, A/R - and also how to make entries for money coming and money going out. I have never been good at accounting, but I got QuickBooks - and pretty soon, I was dangerous enough to keep track of the business via these wonderful reports that QuickBooks could spit out on-demand.

But then came the two companies that I set up in Nepal, so far away from QuickBooks land. The first one is a software company, and we hired an accountant, an auditor (and also a lawyer to complete the triumvirate) -- and they were able to concoct something in Excel that let me get the reports I needed -- so far, so good. However, the second company we set up in Nepal last year - our solar energy company Gham Power -- now that totally threw me off.

For starters, there's more retail activity compared to software business - lots of client transactions, inventory to track,  VAT calculations, import tax, custom clearance, supplier credit lines, etc. etc., and I was very afraid. So I asked our team to get a decent accounting system in place - "it must be computerized, and we need to have up-to-date data each day", I said. 

Taking a cue from my startup experience in the US, I first suggested QuickBooks, but our accoutants found the interface too weird - "this is made for people who don't know accounting, we are accountants and we do direct ledger entries, dammit!". Well, you have to pick you battles, so I let them figure out the right course.

First - they brought in a software called Tally, I think with a trial license (the actual license cost was about USD $1,000 plus yearly support fee - yikes! higher than my beloved QuickBooks). Then they took about a month to set it up, and then told us it still wasn't right, and probably will not be right until we bought the actual license AND got a consultant to set it up.  Phew!

Meanwhile, I needed our numbers, so there was a parallel system in place using good old Excel, which takes 2 full-time staff to maintain - one to record each financial transction on paper and compile paperwork, the other to make entries in Excel. Needless to say, it is far off from where it needs to be, but sort of gets the job done.

Now I'm at a point where I'd rather just have someone scan all the financial paperwork and send it to a QuickBooks consultant who'll at least get me what I need. But one would think there's gotta be a better way - right?

I'd love to hear from fellow startup entrepreneurs in this part of the world (Nepal, India, China, etc.) on this. What has worked for you? Anyone use QuickBooks, or found a QuickBooks for this part of the world? Is Tally our only option as far as software goes? 

Until then, we keep counting beans using Excel, while dreaming of QuickBooks.

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My Fall from Grace to Watch TV Online

Over the years, I've been trying my best to recover from TV addiction, and by the end of 2009, it's been limited to watching Lost, Supernatural (my wife's colleague turned us on to this by lending us first 4 seasons on DVD, to which we happily traded whatever sleeping hours we had left on any given night), Tivo (Craig Ferguson and Charlie Rose mostly), then the occasional sports (NFL and NBA), then the occasional Netflix "watch instantly" movies.

While that may sound like a grand accomplishment (at least to me), you have to understand that I haven't fully recovered from my addiction.

This was made painfully clear earlier this month when during the same week that I left for Nepal, both Lost and Supernatural started airing new episodes, and I would miss Super Bowl as well. Still, I figured since we have "broadband" (ahem, 512kbps) in Nepal, I'd be able to catch a lot of it on the web. So, my first weekend in Nepal, I go to NBC site to watch Lost - and I get this warning - "You appear to be accessing from outside of United States, f&#( off!". Same with Supernatural. (Superbowl I didn't even attempt to because it was 5 am in the morning in Nepal when the game started, and when I talked to my kids on Skype later that morning, my 6-year son very happily let me know who'd won)

I then tried hulu - it basically told me to buzz off for the same reasons when I looked for Lost or Supernatural. Tried Netflix to see if I can watch instantly - they don't allow access from outside the US either. Hence came my fall from grace - I searched for bittorrent feeds for the shows, and whoala, I had all 3 episodes of Lost and Supernatural downloaded overnight, and the next night around 10 pm, I was all content to start my marathon session of watching all missed Lost episodes, and Supernatural the next night, and I became complete again.

Anyone know if there's a way to access my Tivo'd shows online? I installed the Tivo Desktop thing (even the paid version), but haven't found any easy obvious way to access my transferred shows over the web.

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'Water' by Steven Solomon: A View From the Melting Himalayan Glaciers

Pulitzer Prize winning author Kai Bird who lives in Nepal writes in The Huffington Post about Steven Solomon's book "Water: The Epic Struggle for Wealth, Power, and Civilization" and how water problems add to Nepal's current energy crisis. It is interesting to note that Kai is dealing with the loadshedding problem with diesel generator and inverter-batteries. Also, he doesn't mention his views about solar or any other renewable energy in his writeup, because we feel that renewable energy is crucial to addressing this issue. So, I wrote this response to Kai's article:


Kai - thanks for pointing out this critical issue in Nepal

I'm curious why you haven't explored solar PV as an alternative (full disclosure: I work for a solar PV company in Nepal) beacause using diesel and "inverter-batteries" actually add to the water crisis.

Diesel genset spews out pollutants that cause environmental damage, which then accelerates the melting of Himalayan glaciers, which as you've pointed out is the direct cause of Nepal's hydropower plants generating less electricity.

"Inverter-batteries" also make matter worse because they don't actually add any new energy. Instead, they inefficiently store Nepali utility company's already scarce electricity into batteries to use later as backup during "load-shedding", but with 70% loss-factor. That's why Nepali government is considering a ban on inverters (see http://ghampower.com/?p=426)

Now I'm biased on solar. I left my job in San Francisco to come back to my native Nepal and make solar PV systems available at diesel-generator prices, because decreasing costs of PV are now at a point where developing countries can consider it as an alternative to diesel.

I'd love to welcome you to visit http://www.ghampower.com and our offices in Kathmandu. We are confident solar can help produce a good part of your current energy needs, at costs comparable to your diesel generator and inverter-batteries, but minus the damage to water and the environment.

Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

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Cost of Doing Business in Nepal

When I came back to Nepal to launch our solar venture Gham Power, I had no illusions in my mind that the process was going to be smooth. After all, I was born and raised here, finished high school from here, and have been visiting frequently enough to know that the way business is done in Nepal is very different from what one would expect say in the US.

However, it’s the little things that surprise you, and also drive this point home.

Last week, our staff found out that there was no straightforward way to connect the solar panels to the rest of the wiring. This, of course, was very concerning, since the solar panels *are* the source of electricity, and if you can’t connect them to the rest of the system, there is no power whatsoever.

This problem was because the cables coming out of the panels needed a special type of connector, which is commonly available probably everywhere else in the world, but alas, not in Nepal. We talked to several other solar installer in Kathmandu, and everyone complained about the same thing – “yeah, those *&#%ing cables, can’t find them here, so we just cut them to bare wire and connect it from there”

Little did they know (or maybe pretended not to) that if you cut the cables on the panel, the solar panel warranty becomes void.

So, I did some research, and found a company in China who sells this type of cable. After a couple of emails back and forth, their rep says - “our entire staff is on leave for 8 days for Chinese New Year’s, so order by Thursday, or else you will have to wait for 8 days.” The total order came to be about $170, so instead of doing something elaborate like a TT (Tele Transfer, or “wire”), LC (Letter of Credit), or Bank Draft, I asked the rep if they took a credit card. Answer came back saying – “we don’t have a POS machine, so can’t do credit card, you must send a TT.”

This is Wednesday afternoon. These guys go on leave on Friday.

So, to prepare the TT, I had the rep email me an invoice with all the details spelled out. Our bank only accepts printed invoice, and their office is all the way across the town (30-minute drive) so we had to print the invoice and get to them. That was the end of Wednesday. Our bank says this will get done in the “first hour” Thursday.

Thursday we go to bank. We need someone with signing authority as well as the company seal that needs to be stamped on several papers that get signed to prepare the TT. By the time everything is said and done, it is only late Thursday when I can send a scanned copy of the TT document to the rep in China. Fortunately he hasn’t left for vacation, so he ends up sending the shipment first thing Friday morning.

I thought that was the happy ending, but we had one more crazy act remaining.

Normally when something gets sent via UPS, Fedex, or DHL, I’m used to expecting a package shipped to my door. I expected the same in this case as well – but express shipping in Nepal means the carrier brings your shipment to the airport and then calls you to clear customs.

Now, in midst of running a business, I really don’t have the time to go to the airport to custom clear a $170 shipment of $%&*ing cables, so we send our shipper instead. He spent the entire day (“the customs’ computer system was down, that’s why it took long”), but came to our office in the evening with a few boxes of cable.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m really glad we finally have our cables and that we can hook our solar panels without voiding their warranty. But can’t there be an easier way to get this transaction done?

I understand Nepal has all these protective measures to control the flow of foreign currency going out of the country, but maybe there’s a way to set a dollar-limit per transaction and then a limit for the quarter or the year on how much stuff a firm can order without having to go through all these shenanigans. One can only hope.

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Gham Power Inaugurated!

Yesterday was a big day at Gham Power

First, the ad in Kantipur has our phones ringing off the hook. Even though the staff was prepared for the call volume, at times it got overwhelming. If you had to wait long to get connected, sorry about that - we will do a better job in responding quickly to your calls. In the meanwhile, also consider contacting us by email at contact@ghampower.com, or just drop by our showroom in Gairidhara



Second, although it was an unusually wet rainy winter day in Kathmandu (everyone at office took it as an auspicious "sagun" sign) - many friends and family showed up for our inauguration event. Their support has been amazing and inspiring, we feel truly blessed.

Right about the time we had everyone show up for the function, the lights went out and we were all in the dark. Obviously, giggles and jokes started flying around - "man, these guys can't even power up their office, what are we to expect?"

We'd just finished electrical wiring, so Shrawan Dai and Kebal Dai started troubleshooting, while Moon and I were sheepishly trying to humor our guests.

Turns out a big water tanker had parked outside to supply water to the building, and they hooked up their big fat huge water pump's electrical plug directly to our electrical sockets, blowing up our inverter's fuse. Anyhow, about 10 or so very long minutes later, we had our lights (and breath) back, and the show went on..

Then, the highlight of the evening was to see all the Gham Power executives' moms cut the inauguration ribbon



Truly amazing!

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True Calling

My, my.. it was September 2009 when I last posted a blog entry. Well, we can blame twitter and facebook for that a little bit, but what I realized is that blog posts are effective when you can write from your true voice, and let's say I spent 2009 finding my true voice (and glad to report that it's been found ;)

This blog used to be called "business intelligence adventures" because that was my sole profession when I started this blog back in 2005. Since then, a lot's happened - our company Loyalty Matrix got acquired by Responsys where I spent about 2 years (part of the acquisition deal). Then in 2009, we started a new company OpenI - building on the open source business intelligence project we'd started in 2005, and also to scale the partnership we'd developed with Codemandu, our off-shore partner in Kathmandu, Nepal. It's been great to be back in start-up mode again, and the progress at OpenI is very satisfying and rewarding.

However, life is full of strange but powerful co-incidences.

During my 2 years between Loyalty Matrix acquisition and starting OpenI, I started becoming more fascinated with the clean energy industry, and wondered how I could get in. Perhaps part of it was my own mortality trying to find a way into my profession - I wanted my work to contribute towards more serious issues our world faces today.

Then in February 2009, a funny thing happened:

I was on a short trip to Kathmandu to kick-off a project. Right around then, Nepal was hit by its worst energy crisis, and the government-run power company (Nepal Electrical Authority, NEA) had issued a 16-hour daily blackout ("load shedding"). Needless to say, our software development staff was severely impacted. They bought hordes of batteries and inverters, but when you only have 8 hours of electricity per day, that too in two 4-hour slots, it's hard to adequately charge your battery bank. So we looked for alternatives, and the suggestion was to buy a diesel generator.

Not only the clean energy freak in me cringed at this, but the noise, fumes, etc. would be too much of an irritant to have within an office full of sofware developers. Now, I'd seen a lot of homes and businesses in the San Francisco bay area switching to solar power - so we explored if solar would be an option. Turns out there were about 40 solar companies in Nepal - but none of them could provide us with a solution.

First off, they all focused on rural electrification (which is a noble cause, also helped by government subsidies), and the types of systems they offered were just for basic lighting. We were told "solar can't power up heavy equipments like computer servers" :)

So -- an idea was born. Can we build an organization that can provide solar electricity as a viable backup option for urban homes and businesses in Nepal who need more than just basic lights?


A year after - I am happy to report that we just launched our solar energy company in Nepal - Gham Power - that just does that.

Of course, just like many other entrepreneurial adventures, this involved a lot of crazy things. I attened a Clean Energy certificate program at UC-Berkeley to learn more about solar technology and the financial structures to make it feasible. My wonderful friends Mike McCarthy and his dad Tom McCarthy introduced us to Solar Power Inc, a great solar company (public) out of Roseville, CA - who agreed to become a partner and help us bring one of the best solar technology to Nepal. Friends and family pitched in like never before -- both in the US as well as in Nepal -- to make this idea a reality. We had interesting adventures with the Nepali government, shipping companies, banks, vendors (topics for other posts). We put together a truly kick-ass executive team to run the company in Nepal. It's been a truly amazing process.

And to ensure our work with OpenI doesn't take a back seat to this - we got more help into the company so it continues to excel in its independent course, as evidenced by the new and exciting projects we've had the opportunity to participate recently.

Of course, we have a lot of work ahead of us. I'll probably also go nuts travelling back and forth between San Francisco and Kathmandu. I can't thank my wife and kids enough to be so greatly understanding to let me pursue this (I know I'm stretching the limits of their generosity and kindness). I feel truly blessed.

Being a technology geek, one of the hardest thing for me was to accept that it's okay to pursue what you are passionate about even if you don't have much experience or if that wasn't your area of training in school. Also, being an entrepreneur is about creating and growing companies, not necessarily being involved in running the company. I had severe doubts about what will happen to OpenI (and my personal career as a Business Intelligence software guy) if I went after my solar energy dream, but it turns out, they don't need to be conflicting.

One of the hardest lessons is to figure out how you can focus on your core strengths, and then bring in other smart people as business partners to do things which are not necessariy your core strengths. They probably teach this from day one of Entrepreneurship 101, but it's amazing how easily we can fall into the trap of not applying this to the businesses we build.

So, I am changing the blog title to "Adventures in Entrepreneurship" and will continue to share my experiences (more frequently). I'd also love to hear from other entrepreneurs out there about their experiences (similar and different). At the moment, I am just happy to have found a true voice to communicate, and look forward to sharing new adventures.

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Healthcare Speech Notes for Obama

Ok, the delivery was great, but the content could have been more clear if he'd used these notes from Dan Roam:

My Speech to Congress (Health Care)

View more documents from Dan Roam.

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Carrot-and-Stick Model doesn't Motivate Innovation

Great TED talk by Dan Pink:

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Healthcare Debate Explained on Back of a Napkin

Author and visual thinker Dan Roam does an amazing job of explaining what the healthcare debate is all about, all with pictures drawn on the back of a napkin . Here's a link to his blog where he provides more commentary on this, or you can check out the slideshows below:

Healthcare Napkins All

View more documents from Dan Roam.

I wish the media took a cue from this to put the politics and business aside and actually explain the fundamentals of this debate, instead of all the FUD that's been going on in the townhall meetings.

BTW - if you haven't checked out Dan Roam's work on visual thinking called Back of the Napkin -- be sure to check it out. Good stuff!

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Another New Beginning

This week I completed my tenure as an employee at Responsys and started my new venture OpenI -- a company that provides open source business intelligence software and services to businesses that want to be data-driven in their operational strategy.

I guess you can call me a serial entrepreneur now, since OpenI will be my fourth startup -- last one being Loyalty Matrix, which was acquired by Responsys in 2007. I am happy to say that the marketing analytics technology we built at Loyalty Matrix found a way to express itself as Responsys's own analytics product Interact Insight. It was interesting to see the formal structures it requires in a more established company to release a product -- valuable lessons that I'll surely apply in future product releases. It is also great that Responsys will remain a client of OpenI, so that we can advance this technology in a mutually beneficial fashion (and also that OpenI has a few clients from the get go :-).

OpenI will partner with Codemandu, a software development company in Kathmandu, Nepal that has provided the engineering help for OpenI in the past. Codemandu will help us deliver support and integration work for our clients. So -- if you have software projects in business intelligence, reporting, and/or analytics (or know of someone who does) -- we are here for you :-) Basically, if you are an on-demand company that stores transactional data for your customers, we can help you build an on-demand analytics product based on OpenI -- something you can private-label and up-sell to your customers.

So, needless to say -- next couple of months are going to be crazy, and pretty exciting. Personally, I have a lot of pent-up ideas on making BI more accessible and actionable, and we will be toying around with these ideas in OpenI. And given the nature of open source, these experimentations will happen in public domain -- and so you'll see some fun stuff appear on this blog and OpenI site.

The BI landscape has definitely evolved since OpenI started back in 2005. Most of the big guys (Busienss Objects, Hyperion, Cognos, SPSS) have been acquired by even bigger guys (SAP, Oracle, IBM). On the open source BI side, Pentaho and JasperSoft have done a remarkable job in leading the sector. Plus there has been a great deal of movement in on-demand BI as well - with Swivel, GoodData, and PivotLink, and also at desktop level with Tableau. We will definitely give our best shot to stand on the shoulders of these giants and raise the bar a bit differently.

I recall Sting (lead singer of The Police, for the benefit of our younger readers) say this in a Rolling Stone interview once when asked about his unique singing voice -- something like "Nobody can sing like me -- I'm not saying that I have the best voice in Rock 'n Roll, it's more like someone can sing better or worse, but they can't sing exactly like me"

So, this I can say -- OpenI will be unique in its approach to BI. Stay tuned..

cheers,

Sandeep

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OpenI 2.0 RC1 is Released

OpenI is an open source BI software for SaaS or On-Demand deployments. I have been involved with it since 2005, and it's come a long way since then. We released the release candidate RC1 for version 2.0 on June 17th -- and it's good to see our ranking go back in the top 100 of sourceforge.net.

For those of you who dabble with software that involves reporting and analytics, it is worth a look -- there is a demo at http://demo.openi.org/openi (login: openi2/openi2) -- and it's always great to hear your feedback.

Please pass the word around.

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Yours Truly @ Nepali Business Forum @ ANA 2009 - Oakland Convention Center - July 4 11:30 am

For the past few months, I have been working with a few friends - Niley Shrestha, Jagdish Pandey, Sanjay Khatri from our virtual Nepali Business Network - under the guidance of Rita Stecklein "Dijyu", to put together a business forum at the upcoming ANA (Association of Nepalis in Americas) convention. The venue is at the Oakland Convention Center, and our theme is to highlight entrepreneurship amongst Nepalese around the world.

It has been a fun process - soliciting speakers, refining the theme, and also collaborating with Bineet Sharma, Pukar Malla, Kumar Pandey, and friends at CAN-USA - we had a last minute change in speakers rosters where yours truly had to jump in from the bench -- and here is the formal announcement:

Namaste!

The Nepali Business Network (NBN) is pleased to announce and host the Business Forum at the Association of Nepalis in the Americas (ANA) - 2009 Convention.

When: July 4th (1130–1230 hours)
Where: Oakland Convention Center, 1001 Broadway, Oakland, CA 94607

The Forum presents experiences of members of the Nepali diaspora engaged in business and entrepreneurial ventures. In particular, the credentials of our speakers (Mr. Bhawani Sapkota, Mr. Ram Sah and Mr. Sandeep Giri) span the fields of software and IT products, mobile telecommunications, and commercial and residential real-estate. The speaker profiles can be found in the ANA and NBN websites.

We invite and welcome your attendance at the Business Forum. Come listen / participate in the interactive discussion focused around the ‘Nepali Experience’ in areas of business, commerce and high technology as well as sharing of thoughts and ideas on some questions around entrepreneurship.

• What does entrepreneurship mean in a world where ideas are boundless, seamless and traversing at the speed of light, commercial borders are interconnecting and expanding, virtualization is growing and for real and collaborative communications continues to be a click-of-the-mouse away?
• Why do local and global perspectives matter in entrepreneurship and how do they support / influence innovation, marketing and delivery of new products and services?
• In what ways can entrepreneurial vision help explore and harness business opportunities, whether they are in financial investments or in the setup, nurturing or management of businesses?
• How is being a Nepali entrepreneur advantageous in today’s business landscape?

The Forum offers an informative and exciting session with networking opportunities during lunch. It will be held in the Oakland Convention Center. You can attend the Forum with the ANA convention registration card.

We look forward to seeing you soon!!

The Organizing Team,
Nepali Business Network (http://www.nepalibiz.net/)
CAN-USA (http://www.can-usa.org)

Note: The Professional Networking Luncheon is at 1230–1330 hours, immediately following this forum. Seehttp://www.eticketbazaar.com/event/99 for details.

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Remember this in your next price negotiations

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Architecture is mostly an art of building emotions

I watched 2 amazing architects - Frank Gehry and Renzo Piano - on Charlie Rose yesterday. Something Renzo Piano said in reference to Louis Kahn's Salk Institute building in La Jolla really stuck out -- "Architecture is mostly an art of building emotions"

.. wisdom just oozes out of these great men..

Frank Gehry:


Renzo Piano:

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Data Visualization is about Telling a Story

First off -- Hans Rosling is an inspiration to us all in the business of analytics and data visualization. Not only this story is extremely relevant, but the way he shows the numbers -- there is a lot to learn. I will make an attempt here to deconstruct his latest TED talk in terms of what a good BI tool show do, and also how this is a great use case of how great BI users behave:



BI Features Used by Hans Rosling:

• The most prominent is the use of Time as a special type of "dimension". The tool knows that Time will support the concept of a Play button. This is still very novel -- most BI tool, OpenI included, treat Time as any other dimension -- you can drill up, drill down, set date filters, or date ranges -- but that's about it. Taking a lesson from here, what we should do instead is that the moment there is a Time dimension, user should have the option to "superimpose" Time in "Play" mode within a given analysis -- this should result in a Video Player like slider widget appear at the bottom of the analysis with a big old Play/Pause button next to it


• Notice how he first presents the data bubbles in dual-axis graph and then transitions it over to a map view. This makes the concept of "background canvas" a dynamic entity for presenting data. How many other choices a user can have (in addition to dual-axis and map overlay) to use as the context in which the data should be presented


• He keeps only 1 attribute per axis - country in X-axis, and % of population with HIV on Y-axis, and everything else (gender, per capital income, etc.) is treated as a filter (in OLAP speak). This keeps the visual very clear on its message. I have often struggled with OLAP based analyses, which have multiple dimensions on each axis, which makes sense sometimes in the table view, but the chart-view is completely horrid. Single data attribute per axis is a way to address that


• When it comes to drilling further into data, he basically clicks on a country bubble -- and it can either split by income groups, or only the specific country goes on a time play motion while others stay the some, etc. -- the key for me here is that drilling down is best done at the visual level -- somewhere on the chart/graph itself the user should be able to isolate a data group (in this case a country bubble), and have a choice on drilling down or move it back and forth in time

Hans Rosling as a BI User/Presenter

• Emotion, emotion, emotion... he is so far away from the stereotype of a statistician making a presentation. He cares about what he's presenting. The numbers are real people -- they get sick, and they can either get better or they can die.. you can feel that empathy as he presents.


• Al Gore did this first (that I can recall) in The Inconvenient Truth when he brought a crane ladder to hoist him up so he can point to the tallest bar in the chart that he is showing. Maybe a bit too melodramatic -- but it drives the point, and also makes a more visceral connection with the data. Hans Rosling stands on top of a table at the beginning of the presentation to explain the different numbers he is presenting, and the audience is at once connected and engaged


• His bringing of the long metal pole to point to the numbers instead of your generic laser pointer ("I have solidified the laser beam") is another way to get more personal and physical to show how involved he is


• Ultimately he has leverages the BI tool to make a presentation, to tell a compelling story. Earlier in my career, we worked on a feature with another BI tool that automatically generated powerpoints from its charts. Yes, it was pretty crude, and didn't really work that well usabilitywise -- but the point is, this was definitely a feature aimed at helping users build a story off the various charts and grahps and analyses. People want to tell a story -- the BI tool should help them do that.

Ultimately, watching Mr. Rosling is definitely inspirational -- I can only hope that OpenI will one day does the things he's shown us in this presentation. I'm sure we will get there in due time, but it is the spirit in which BI tools are used, and their ultimate message.. that's the important thing to keep in mind as we move the product forward.

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Vote for OpenI in sf.net Community Choice Awards

Please support OpenI by voting for OpenI as the "best enterprise project" in the SourceForge.Net Community Choice Awards.

I promise you we won't forget you once we become famous :-)

Thanks!

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San Francisco Approves Nation's Largest Municipal Solar Project

From San Francisco Chronicle:

Solar project is a go, but still has critics

Despite concerns that the city is getting a raw deal, the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday approved a controversial 25-year deal with a private company to build a photovoltaic solar plant on top of a city-owned reservoir.

And from Recurrent Energy, who will be buliding this plant:

The San Francisco Sunset Reservoir Solar Project

The City of San Francisco is currently planning a five megawatt solar photovoltaic system on the roof of the City’s largest reservoir, located at 24th and Ortega Streets in the Sunset district. Upon completion, the project will consist of nearly 25,000 solar panels that span nearly twelve football fields — becoming California’s largest photovoltaic system and the nation’s largest municipal solar project. This project will more than triple the municipal solar generation in San Francisco and reduce carbon emissions by over 100,000 metric tons, furthering the City's leadership in clean energy implementation.

Everyday when I drive my son to his school, I pass by this big reservoir in the sunset district, and to think that it's going to look like this is really cool (photo simulations from Recurrent Energy's site)

Here's one from Chron with GG bridge in the background:

There have been critics that the city is paying too much money to the private builder, etc. -- and while I'm no expert, the deal does make sense for many reasons:

• This is a great example of a city taking leadership in reducing carbon emissions, producing energy not reliant on foreign oil, and more importantly, right smack middle of the city you have the largest "billboard" you can imagine for public awareness on environmental responsibility
  
• Financially, the city did a smart thing by doing a power purchase agreement (PPA) with the private builder. This way, the city only pays for the energy produced by the plant at a fixed rate of $235/MWH (about 23 cents per KWH, which is approximately similar to buying power from PG&E directly at A-6 commercial rates), escalated at 3% per year over the next 25 years. This may seem high compared to what you'd normally pay -- but what this cost doesn't reflect is the hidden price of carbon emission if the city bought that energy from fossil fuel-based sources. 
  
• I as a citizen of this great city, and I'm sure I'm not the only one, feel a great deal of pride that our city has the courage to take this bold step, and also to offer new programs to promote residential solar (pioneered by the city of Berkeley); and a city thrives when its citizens are proud of it, a sentiment that magnifies all the way up to the county, state, nation, and the entire planent

So, it was a great feeling today as I drove my son to his school -- I proudly pointed out to the reservoir and said "see that? our city is going to cover all that with solar panels that will produce electricity, and help our environment a the same time.."

My son's response -- "you mean we will have electric cars?"

Well, one thing at a time..

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Starter Rental Place in San Francisco

A colleague of mine moving to San Francisco asked -- "where's a good neighborhood to rent? which parts should I avoid?"

His requirements: his job is in San Bruno. Wife doesn't drive, nor wants to. No kids.

My gut response: should live in the city, easier for his wife to get around and make friends, etc. Since he needs to go to San Bruno, should live close to BART. So I sent him this map

Or get a place close to San Bruno BART station. SOMA might be another option.

Anything I might be overlooking? 

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OpenI 2.0 Beta Released

Happy to announce that we released OpenI 2.0 beta today. Check out the updated OpenI.Org site for more news.

With this, I feel I have reached a milestone with this blog. I originally titled this blog "Business Intelligence Adventures", thinking there isn't much difference in my private versus professional life, and as such, I could pretty much blog everything under BI, since that is what I ate, slept, and breathed.

Now as I look at my posts for the last year, they seem to be all over the place, and so I questioned if this is the right blog to post everything under the sun. I think that it is probably better if I blog all BI specific rants over at the OpenI site since that is a much more relevant forum. I really need to free this blog from any topical constraints (probably at the expense of alienating some of the BI-oriented readers) to let this blog evolve through its natural course.

What does that mean? Well, you can probably guess if you look at the last few posts :-) So it will be more about life's offbeat adventures than just BI.

You be the judge.

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