Showing posts with label success. Show all posts
Showing posts with label success. Show all posts

Saturday, January 12, 2008

Impossible is nothing!!

Adidas should rope in Ratan Tata as its brand ambassador. With the launch of Nano, Mr. Tata has achieved what the world's automakers said was impossible. Suzuki motors ridiculed Tata's attempts to build such a car. It was called all sorts of names, like it would be an enhanced rickshaw, will not have that much power, no safety features, etc. The features that the boys from Suzuki wanted are all present. I call them boys, because the men are in Tata Motors. The 600cc engine develops 20bhp. Enough for a family of four that used to ride a two-wheeler which is not more than 8 bhp.


Scooter-king Rahul Bajaj and motor-cycle prince Rajiv Bajaj are a classic example of "the grapes are sour" adage. Bajaj first scoffed at the fact the two-wheeler ride is unsafe. Well, Mr. Bajaj, two-wheeler ride is unsafe and actually not meant for a family of four. So, Tata was targeting a market where the family has not enough means to buy a Maruti 800, but wants to travel comfortably. What's wrong, when Mr. Tata says that four people, with luggage on a two-wheeler is dangerous riding? And if he wanted to make the journey safer for them, why should Mr. Bajaj be so worried? And Rajiv Bajaj, the less said, the better. After unveiling the concept car Bajaj 'Lite', Rajiv Bajaj was constantly trying to undermine the Nano. Talking about the feasibility of a low-cost car, he even mentioned that it is impossible to make a car at Rs. 1 lakh. And after the fully functional car was unvieled, Rajiv Bajaj changed tracks and started talking about how the pricing makes the car unprofitable. If the car wasn't profitable, no business would have launched it. So, it goes to say that the car is indeed profitable. The margin will be definitely less and Tata Motors will have to rely on volumes for generating revenue. But, Mr. Bajaj, apart from profits, there is also an underlying social cause. The Tatas are known for this. And Bajaj is not as big as Tata on the social service front. So, stop your cribbing and accept with grace that the Nano has beaten all skepticism and is a fully functional car in its category.


Let's talk of the man who started this all. Ratan Tata, despite facing so much criticism, gracefully said that Nano won't be able to fulfill the needs of every person who needs this car. So, there have to be other players like Bajaj and Maruti who can build such a car. I think the other industrialists should acquire this trait of humility in success from Ratan Tata.


Thank you, Mr. Ratan Tata. You have proved the well-known saying "Where there is a will, there is a way". For once, everything else had taken a back seat and the entire world was talking about nothing else but the Nano. It has become more popular than cricket. Airtime dedicated on channels as well as radio networks and print space in newspapers indicates the popularity of the car. For once, the front page and editorials had something other than cricket. People forgot Harbhajan and Symonds and were discussing about the Nano. On behalf of Tata Motors, Mr. Ratan Tata, please take a bow!!
Impossible is nothing!!SocialTwist Tell-a-Friend

Friday, December 28, 2007

Go Open Source: My policy for the New Year

Yes, that's the plan, my policy and resolution for the year 2008, and possibly in the years after that. Down with proprietary software!! But, I'm not putting all my eggs in a single basket!! All my non-core activities will be done through open source software. In addition to that, I'll also do some of my core work through open-source. But, most of my core-work will remain through proprietary software.


Why open source suddenly? Well, for one, some open source software have matured enough so that they can replace their proprietary counter part for almost all my needs. For e.g. I'm now going to replace the Microsoft Office suite, that I've got, with Open Office. All my presentations shall henceforth be in OO Impress, rather than MS PowerPoint. Most of my writing, being technical in nature, I've already stopped using MS Word. I, instead, use LaTeX to do the job for me. For that matter, Word was not built with an intention to be used for scientific writing. It was for general writing and preparing thesis in non-tech fields.I am experimenting with LyX for my report writing, but I generally prefer writing in Emacs and compiling the stuff at command line in Linux.


I'll be using more of Linux, than Windows, but won't entirely give up on Windows. Why? That's because I have a licensed copy of Windows that came preloaded on my laptop. While Linux is great, stable and free, it hasn't reached a stage where it can completely replace Windows, when the user is a non-techie.


But, my core activities will go on in proprietary software. My research work and coding will continue in Matlab. I'm not switching over to SciLab. That is because Matlab offers loads of documentation and has far more user friendly features as compared to SciLab.


I am open to suggestions on more use of open source software. I would love to use open source software as much as possible. The world outside can help me broaden my horizon.
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