ICT – Page 6 – Go Lean…Caribbean

Tag: ICT

Transformations: Caribbean Postal Union – Delivering the Future

Posted on May 13, 2016 in Government, Implementation, Industries

Go Lean Commentary

“The stone the builders reject has become the chief cornerstone” – The Bible; Luke 20:17

Now in the days of email, postal mail has become inconsequential; affectionately called “snail mail”. Governments around the world provide the overhead of postal operations, though they are mostly unprofitable and sneered upon. There are some exceptions however …

Germany’s Deutsche Post
SwedenPostenAB
Finland’s Netpost

… these feature some of the business models in postal services that have become impactful to their local communities. From the best-practices gleaned from these above countries, the model of the Caribbean Postal Union (CPU) was forged. The CPU is a subset of the roadmap defined in the book Go Lean…Caribbean; this is the mission for physically and figuratively delivering the future. This roadmap, for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), focuses on the political transformations and the practical transformations to elevate the Caribbean region, individually and collectively.

The Go Lean book details the Germany, Sweden and Finland experiences (Page 99) in contrast to the US Postal Service (USPS). The USPS is not the model for the Caribbean to emulate. The Go Lean book describes the USPS as a failing enterprise. Previous Go Lean commentaries have identified better role models for the CPU: logistics/e-Commerce giant Amazon in the US, and Alibaba in China. These companies provide logistical solutions to their marketplaces; the same as the CPU can deliver the logistical solution for the Caribbean’s modern commerce. This model can transform Caribbean society: its people and institutions. The USPS is an old-dying model; the CPU, on the other hand, is a new, transformative model. See the VIDEO here that relates the disposition of the USPS as an enterprise.

VIDEO 1 – US Postal Service Faces Big Changes Amid Struggle to Deliver on Profitability – https://youtu.be/Lnjfua5wY5U

Uploaded on Dec 5, 2011 – The likelihood that a stamped letter could reach its destination by the next day will be virtually eliminated due to billions in U.S. Postal Service cuts announced Monday. Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe joins Gwen Ifill to discuss the cuts and what’s next for the postal service and its customers.

This is commentary 3 of 4 – from the movement behind the Go Lean book – on the subject of transformations: how to move our region from the deficient-defective status quo to a new status, the undisputed title of “greatest address on the planet”. All these commentaries detail these issues, considering:

Perfecting our Core Competence
Money Matters – “Getting over” with “free money”
Caribbean Postal Union (CPU) – Delivering the Future
Civil Disobedience – Still Effective

The Go Lean book details this quest to transform the Caribbean; it features a how-to guide, a roadmap for elevating the region’s societal engines of economics, security and governance. It leads with economic issues, not political ones! But as established previously, there must be political transformations before practical transformations can take place. In order to explore the benefits of the CPU practical transformations – a consolidation of all existing postal entities – must take place in the region. This is a heavy-lifting task. Imagine the management and staff of those agencies in the member-state governments; they now become a part of the CU Federal Civil Service.

See Appendix below for the list of the National Postal entities – all members of the Universal Postal Union – that constitute the 30 Caribbean member-states.

The Go Lean/CU plan calls for this consolidation on Day One/Step One of the implementation of the roadmap, during the Assembly phase. This requires the type of political transformation that involves every stakeholder in the community: residents, businesses and institutions. But this effort can be communicated as a “labor of love”, with very little down-side. What is at risk? The rejected, ignored, expensive postal operations that is currently a drag on member-states resources. It is time now for these rejected entities to be the cornerstone of the Caribbean transformation.

To the everyday man on the street, he will see changes … on the street. There is the need for formal street names and house numbers. For all the regional member-states, except the US territories of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, there is no mail door-to-door delivery. With the CPU business model, the streets will be structured as a marketplace with grid numbers and postal/ZIP codes, and with pick-up and delivery.

The focus of the CPU is not just to deliver postal mail, but rather to deliver logistics … and the future. Just like Amazon and Alibaba do so much more than just sell merchandise online, the CPU will facilitate a complete eco-system for Small-Medium-Enterprises (SME’s) to thrive in the region: finding customers for their wares and collecting payments. This is key to growing the regional economy to $800 Billion.

The CPU is designed to deliver the Caribbean’s future for Global Trade and Electronic Commerce. These activities have greatly impacted many societies around the world – think China – elevating their economic engines. The CU/CPU will employ technologically innovative products and services to impact its prime directives; identified with the following 3 statements:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including the consolidation of the state-ran postal operations.

The VIDEO here demonstrates the theme from the Go Lean book, that one organization-institution – like the CPU – that facilitates e-Commerce can optimize the societal engines in the region and impact the transformation of the homeland. The facilitation role will include the attendant functions of order entry, payment settlement, inventory fulfillment, marketplace hosting, customer service contact center and mail pick-up/delivery.

VIDEO 2 – What is E-Commerce? – https://youtu.be/nxSDHBdsWqA

Uploaded on Nov 19, 2011 – What is E-Commerce?
This video provides an explanation of e-commerce, trends in online business, and how the internet has revolutionized the modern marketplace. It also identifies key factors responsible for e-commerce’s continued success.

The Go Lean roadmap seeks to change the entire eco-system of Caribbean commerce and the interaction with postal operations. This vision is defined early in the book (Page 12 & 14) in the following pronouncements in the Declaration of Interdependence:

xv. Whereas the business of the Federation and the commercial interest in the region cannot prosper without an efficient facilitation of postal services, the Caribbean Union must allow for the integration of the existing mail operations of the governments of the member-states into a consolidated Caribbean Postal Union, allowing for the adoption of best practices and technical advances to deliver foreign/domestic mail in the region.

xxvii. Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.

In a previous Go Lean blog, this commentary described how …

“… email and text messages have replaced “snail” mail in advanced economy countries for personal written communications. Electronic Bill Presentation & Payments (EBP&P) schemes are transforming business-to-consumer interactions, and electronic funds transfer/electronic commerce is the norm. So [Internet & Communications Technology] (ICT) must be a prominent feature of any Caribbean empowerment plan. This is why creating the CPU and the Caribbean Cloud (www.myCaribbean.gov) is “Step One / Day One” in the Go Lean roadmap. This is the by-product of assembling regional organs with multilateral cooperation and a separation-of-powers. The roadmap also includes establishment of the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB), as a cooperative among existing Central Banks, and its facilitation of electronic payment schemes so as to enable the region’s foray into electronic commerce and trade marketplaces.

The Go Lean book details a series of community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to foster the best practices for the delivery of the CPU and trade marketplaces in the Caribbean region:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – All Choices Involve Costs	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – People Respond to Incentives	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – Economic Systems Influence Choices	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – Voluntary Trade Creates Wealth	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – The Consequence of Choice Lie in Future	Page 21
Community Ethos – Job Multiplier	Page 22
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Cooperatives	Page 25
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Help Entrepreneurship	Page 28
Community Ethos – Promote Intellectual Property	Page 29
Community Ethos – Ways to Bridge the Digital Divide	Page 31
Strategy – Customers – Citizens and Member-states Governmental	Page 47
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy	Page 64
Tactical – How to Grow the Economy to $800 Billion – Trade and Globalization	Page 70
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Postal Services	Page 78
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Interstate Commerce Administration	Page 79
Implementation – Year 1 / Assemble Phase – Establish CPU	Page 96
Implementation – Anecdote – Mail Services – USPS Dilemma	Page 99
Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change – Group Purchase Organizations (GPO)	Page 101
Implementation – Ways to Optimize Mail Service & myCaribbean.gov Marketplace	Page 108
Implementation – Ways to Deliver	Page 109
Implementation – Ways to Impact Social Media	Page 111
Implementation – Ways to Benefit from Globalization	Page 119
Planning – 10 Big Ideas for the Caribbean – # 8 Cyber-Caribbean	Page 127
Planning – Ways to Improve Trade – GPO’s	Page 128
Planning – Ways to Improve Interstate Commerce	Page 129
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Mitigate Black Markets	Page 165
Advocacy – Ways to Manage the Federal Civil Service	Page 173
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Cooperatives	Page 176
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Technology	Page 197
Advocacy – Ways to Foster e-Commerce	Page 198
Advocacy – Reforms for Banking Regulations	Page 199
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Main Street	Page 201

Issues related to the CPU business model have previously been detailed in these Go Lean commentaries, listed here:

Skipping School to become Tech Giants

The Future of Money

How to address high consumer prices

Truth in Commerce – Learning from Yelp

Net Neutrality: It matters here … in the Caribbean

Robots help Amazon tackle Cyber Monday

Role Model Jack Ma brings Alibaba to America

Where the Jobs Are – Computers Reshaping Global Job Market

Amazon’s new FIRE Smartphone

Grenada PM Urges CARICOM on ICT

Increasing trade is a successful strategy for growing the regional economy; this will undoubtedly mean increases in jobs and entrepreneurial opportunities. The CU/CPU/Go Lean plan is designed to foster and incubate key industries for the goal of transforming and elevating the regional economy.

But any transformation to the Caribbean societal engines must be permanent! The Go Lean book declares that for permanent change to take place, there must first be an adoption of new community ethos, the national spirit that drives the character and identity of its people. The roadmap was constructed with the primary community ethos of the Greater Good, not a profit motive and not a nationalistic motive; but rather a commitment for the “greatest good for the greatest number of people”.

Now is the time for all of the Caribbean, the people and governing institutions (like Postal Operations), to lean-in for the changes in the book Go Lean … Caribbean. This is a Big Idea for the region, that of a Cyber Caribbean effort (Page 127), in which trade marketplaces play a major role. This roadmap is not just a plan for delivering the mail; it is also the delivery of the hopes and dreams of generations of Caribbean stakeholders; it is about delivering the future: a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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Appendix – Universal Postal Union (UPU) Members, as of 2009

Country	Governmental authority	Regulatory authority	Designated operator
Antigua and Barbuda			Antigua Post Office
Aruba^{[N 1]}			Post Aruba – for Aruba, Bonaire, Curaçao and Sint Maarten and the Dutch SSS Islands.
Bahamas^[2009]	Ministry of Public Works and Transport	None	Bahamas Postal Service
Barbados^[2009]	Ministry of Home Affairs	None	Barbados Postal Service
Belize	Ministry of Public Utilities, Transport, Communications^[2]		Belize Postal Service^{[N 2]}
Cuba^[2009]	Ministry of Informatics and Communications	None	Empresa de Correos de Cuba
Dominica	Ministry of Public Works, Energy and Ports^[4]		General Post Office (GPO)^{[4][N 2]}
Dominican Republic^[2009]	Ministry of Public Works and Communications	None	Instituto Postal Dominicano (INPOSDOM) (Dominican Postal Institute)
France^[2009]	Minister for the Economy, Industry and Employment	Electronic Communications and Postal Regulation Authority (ARCEP)	La Poste for Guadeloupe, Martinique, St Barts and St Martin
British Overseas Territories			Anguilla Post Office^[7] Bermuda Post Office^[8] BVI Post^[13][14] Cayman Islands Postal Service^[15] Montserrat General Post Office^[18] Turks and Caicos Post Office ^[21]
Grenada			Grenada Postal Corporation^[2]
Guyana			Guyana Post Office Corporation
Haiti			Office des Postes d’Haiti
Jamaica			Postal Corporation of Jamaica
Netherlands	Ministry of Economic Affairs	OPTA/Authority for Consumers & Markets (ACM)	PostNL for some of the Dutch SSS Islands (Saba, Sint Eustatius and Sint Maarten)
Saint Christopher-Nevis-Anguilla			St. Kitts & Nevis Postal Services
Saint Lucia			Saint Lucia Postal Service
Saint Vincent & the Grenadines			SVG Postal Corporation
Suriname			Surpost
Trinidad and Tobago			TTPost
United States	United States Postal Service^{[N 5]}	Postal Regulatory Commission	United States Postal Service for Puerto Rico and US Virgin Islands

Source: Retrieved March 12, 2016 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_postal_entities

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CPU, ICT, Model, Transform

ENCORE: eMerge conference aims to jump-start Miami tech hub

Posted on April 27, 2016 in Ethos, Industries, Strategy

This commentary is being re-distributed on the occasion of eMerge TechWeek 2016.
The event just ended … April 18 – 19.

In the commentary in 2014, previewing the inaugural event, the expectation was for 3,000 visitors. This time, just 2 years later, the attendance was 13,000 visitors. Congratulations to the organizers on this successful event. Now let’s plan on another successful one for June 12 – 13, 2017.

The original blog – still relevant – is as follows:
—————

Go Lean Commentary

Positive Change!

It doesn’t just happen. It takes people forging it, guiding it and fostering it. The below news article speaks of the effort in South Florida (from Miami north to West Palm Beach) to establish an economic engine of a “tech hub”.

This is a noble, yet strategic undertaking. Success in this “industry space” would mean more jobs, investment capital, and more technology students remaining in South Florida after matriculating in the area’s colleges. These 3 objectives align this story with the advocacies of the book Go Lean … Caribbean.

The book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). The prime directive of this organization is to optimize the economic engines of the Caribbean region. We also want to increase jobs and investment capital, plus retain more of our young people aspiring for careers in high technology fields. But the CU wants to harvest these activities in the Caribbean, for the Caribbean and by the people of the Caribbean.

South Florida is germane to the Caribbean conscience. It is the Number One destination for the Caribbean Diaspora, featuring large populations of Cubans, Jamaicans, Dominicans (DR), Puerto Ricans, Bahamians, and Haitians. The book relates this association by declaring the NBA basketball team, Miami Heat, as the “home team” of the Caribbean; (Page 42).

Right time, right place!

The eMerge Americas Techweek is this week. Also, the Miami Heat has just started the playoffs in defense of their consecutive World Championships.

By: Marcia Heroux Pounds and Doreen Hemlock

A movement to make South Florida a technology hub for the Americas kicks off its first conference this week, aiming to draw more than 3,000 people from entrepreneurs to investors to students — from Broward and Palm Beach counties and from around the world.

Organizers want to build on South Florida’s success as a gateway to Latin America for trade, banking and services, extending that prowess into technology, entrepreneurship and capital for startups. They hope the event — eMerge Americas Techweek — can do for tech what the annual Art Basel event in Miami Beach has done for art: put South Florida on the world map.

It’s an exciting chance for entrepreneurs like Boca Raton’s Dan Cane, chief executive of Boca Raton-based Modernizing Medicine, which developed an iPad application for specialty physicians. He’s among influencers named to the event’s “Techweek100” — South Florida leaders who have had a significant impact on business and technology. He will speak at the conference.

“We jumped at the opportunity,” said Cane, whose 3-year-old company had $17.5 million in sales last year. “We hope to find contacts and connections and begin to develop the right ecosystem in the Latin American market” to export south starting next year.

The eMerge push doesn’t strive to make South Florida into Silicon Valley. It aims instead for a tech center specialized in multinationals looking south, Latin American companies moving north, local startup companies, as well as universities and investors.

That’s why Citi Latin America, the regional headquarters for financial giant Citi, is taking part in what is planned as an annual event. The division employs about 750 people in Miami-Dade and Broward counties and is sponsoring the event, sending speakers and bringing clients, said Jorge Ruiz, who heads digital banking.

“This event is a great example of the things we should do more of,” Ruiz said. It showcases the importance of technology to a range of industries, promotes what South Florida already offers and highlights South Florida’s ability to unite from across the Americas for tech business, he said.

“As people come together, they’re going to realize this is the space to invest in,” Ruiz said.

Universities that train talent for tech jobs are eager to participate too.

“We’re going to bring as many students as possible,” said Eric Ackerman, dean and associate professor of the Graduate School of Computer and Information Sciences at Nova Southeastern University, who also is on the Techweek100 list. Nova has more than 500 students studying information technology.

Ackerman said tech graduates often leave South Florida, figuring they will have better job opportunities in larger hubs known for innovation.

“That’s one of the things we are trying to change — to become an innovation zone for new technology, new products and new services,” Ackerman said. “An event like this says, ‘Look what’s here in our own back yard. Why should I go somewhere else?’ ”

Kimberly Gramm, assistant dean and director of FAU’s Adams Center for Entrepreneurship, is taking winners of FAU’s recent business plan competition to eMerge’s Startup Village.

Some of South Florida’s largest tech companies also will exhibit at eMerge. Those include Citrix Systems of Fort Lauderdale, C3 Cloud Computing Concepts of Delray Beach and TriNet Group of Boca Raton, said Lonnie Maier, president of the South Florida Technology Alliance, a group that promotes local tech.

Investors and consultants to startups also are heading to eMerge to network and build business.

New World Angels, a Boca Raton-based group of investors, will share a booth with the Miami Innovation Fund to offer entrepreneurs advice on launching or growing their ventures, said Rhys Williams, executive director of New World Angels and a Techweek 100 leader.

“Technology investing is a contact sport. There are few textbooks or classes of relevance, so this conference is a timely way to keep current on your knowledge base and pick up new knowledge, skills and contacts,” said Williams, who also is a judge in the eMerge Launch competition where more than 200 companies will compete for $150,000 in prizes.

Of course, South Florida faces hurdles in its quest, tech leaders said.

The area needs to overcome a long-time image based on sun and fun. And it needs to show critical mass in tech, especially success stories of entrepreneurs that grew startups to global players — much as conference organizer Manny Medina did, starting Miami-based Terremark and selling it for more than $1.4 billion to Verizon.

Enterprise Development Corp. President Rob Strandberg, whose group works with startups from Boca Raton to Miami, will be busy making introductions between entrepreneurs and potential investors at the conference. He’s also a judge in the Launch competition.

EDC executive director Linda Gove will participate with the Boca Raton incubator’s startup companies.

“Investors are taking notice of South Florida companies to a far greater extent than they were,” Strandberg said.

Joe Levy, CEO of Fort Lauderdale-based startup ClearCi and also named to the Techweek 100, said the perception of the area as a tech hub is changing.

“Folks used to ask me, ‘Why aren’t you in Silicon Valley?’ ” Levy said. “We don’t get that anymore.”

South Florida’s Sun Sentinel Daily Newspaper – April 27, 2014 – http://www.sun-sentinel.com/business/careers/fl-emerge-broward-palm-beach-20140427,0,1252077.story

The Go Lean roadmap calls for agencies within the CU to champion technological start-up endeavors, much like this week’s eMerge initiative.

There is much for the CU’s planners to glean by the observation of the planned events this week. The Go Lean/CU approach, in the absence of the actual establishment of the Trade Federation is simply to:

1. Look
2. Listen
3. Learn
4. Lend-a-hand
5. Lead

This approach is codified in the book, with details of community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocates; as follows:

Community Ethos – Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Foster Genius	Page 27
Community Ethos – Help Entrepreneurship	Page 28
Community Ethos – Promote Intellectual Property	Page 29
Community Ethos – Impact R & D	Page 30
Community Ethos – Bridge the Digital Divide	Page 31
Strategy – Agents of Change: Technology	Page 57
Separation of Powers – Patents & Copyrights	Page 78
Implementation – Self-Governing Entities	Page 105
Implementation – Impact Social Media	Page 111
Ways to Better Manage Image	Page 133
Industries – Ways to Foster Technology	Page 197
Industries – Foster e-Commerce	Page 198

We hope for success for eMerge Americas Techweek. We hope our Caribbean brothers living and working in South Florida participate, engage in and benefit from this initiative. Then we hope that they would repatriate some of this passion, knowledge, and experience back to their Caribbean homelands.

Lastly, we cheer for further basketball dominance. Go Heat!

Download the book – Go Lean…Caribbean now!!!

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Events, ICT, Jobs, Miami, Sales, STEM, Transform

[Top]

PC industry swoons …

Posted on April 24, 2016 in Economics, Industries, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

“Live by the sword, die by the sword” – Matthew 26:52; The Bible

The history of the Personal Computer (PC) industry is synonymous with change. The product and industry came along and force change everywhere on everything; not just on businesses, but for families and households as well. Just consider this photo here. All of these transformations happened because of the ubiquity of personal computers … and the internet.

The trend of upward mobility in the PC industry started 35 years ago. The IBM PC, running Microsoft’s MS-DOS operating system – was introduced in 1981. In fact, due to the impact of the PC, Time Magazine named the computer as Man of the Year in 1982.

Like most trends, this product has had an arc, a bell-curve per se; but now the curve is trending downward. The PC is being out-maneuvered in transforming society by alternate concepts transforming PC’s. The truth is, businesses and consumers want solutions, more so than technology. So whatever new function or application can perform better than the old function or application will get traction. This aligns with an old business adage:

Build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door.

This adage has been a “battle cry” since the Industrial Revolution; even more so now in the Information Revolution. The battle is …

Man versus machine: Man loses!
Old machine versus new machine: Old machine loses.
For the jobs of the men (and women) associated with the old machines and old technologies, they continue to lose.

This point also aligns with the book Go Lean…Caribbean which prepares the Caribbean economic, security and governing engines to better anticipate and respond to transformational changes in Internet & Communications Technologies (ICT). The book asserts that the Caribbean region has been losing the battle of globalization and technology. The consequences of our defeat is the abandonment of our people. The assessment of all 30 Caribbean member-states is that every community has lost human capital to emigration; people are moving to where the jobs are; many times the new jobs are tied to innovative companies in the technology industries. This is why so many of our region’s college-educated citizens (more than 70 percent) have fled their homelands for foreign shores.

The below news article asserts that change in the ICT industries goes both ways for the industry players: trends come and go; markets will be up and down. The PC, which has been a great trendsetter is now getting trumped by other trendsetters: mobile devices, tablets and cloud computing. See related stories here:

Title #1: Intel to cut up to 12,000 jobs as PC industry swoons
By: Narottam Medhora
(Reuters) – Intel Corp said on Tuesday it would cut up to 12,000 jobs globally, or 11 percent of its workforce, as it refocuses its business towards making microchips that power data centers and Internet connected devices and away from the declining personal computer industry it helped found.

Tech companies including the former Hewlett Packard Co and Microsoft Corp have reorganized in the face of the PC industry decline. Many new tech users around the world turn to mobile phones for their computing needs, and corporations increasingly rely on big machines rather than desktop models to run their businesses. Global personal computer shipments fell 11.5 percent in the first quarter, tech research company IDC said on Monday.

Intel, the world’s largest chipmaker, lowered its revenue forecast for the year. It now expects revenue to rise in mid-single digits, down from its previous forecast of mid- to high-single digits.

Intel’s shares were down 2.2 percent at $30.90 in extended trading.

Most of Intel’s factories are in the United States, although it did not identify where cuts would be focused geographically. It said it would record a pretax restructuring charge of $1.2 billion in the second quarter and expected annual savings of $1.4 billion per year starting mid-2017. (http://bit.ly/1WDPfBm)

The company also said Chief Financial Officer Stacy Smith will move to a new role leading sales, manufacturing and operations. Intel said it would begin a formal search process for a new CFO.

Smith said that Intel now expects the PC market to decline by a percentage in the high single digits in 2016 versus a prior forecast of a mid single-digit decline. Declines in China and other emerging markets are also leading to greater than anticipated reductions in worldwide PC supply chain inventory, Intel Chief Executive Brian Krzanich said on a conference call.

“PC demand, at least in the eyes of Intel, is expected to be weaker than the industry originally anticipated,” said Angelo Zino, an equity analyst at S&P Capital Global Market Intelligence.

He added that although the industry has already seen some of the weakness experienced by Intel, the company’s comments dashed any hope of recovery.

The Santa Clara, California-based company has been focusing on its higher-margin data center business as it looks to reduce its dependence on the slowing PC market. Intel has also made inroads into the mobile devices market, although competitors Qualcomm Inc and Samsung Electronics Co dominate there.

Intel said in a statement the job cuts would be carried out by mid-2017 and the restructuring would “accelerate its evolution from a PC company to one that powers the cloud and billions of smart, connected computing devices.”

Sales of products for the data center and the Internet of things accounted for 40 percent of revenue and the majority of operating profit, it added.

Raymond James analyst Hans Mosesmann, who rates Intel “under perform” said the problems leading to the job cuts were likely more about Intel than the broader tech industry.

“The bigger issue is the restructuring and will it be enough for the company to properly adapt to a changing environment where cloud and IoT competitive dynamics are quite different,” Mosesmann added.

On a per share basis, the company earned 42 cents per share, in the first quarter, up from 41 cents a year earlier.

Net revenue rose to $13.70 billion from $12.78 billion.

Non-GAAP net revenue came in at $13.80 billion, compared with analysts’ average estimate of $13.83 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S. Adjusted earnings of 54 cents per share topped Wall Street forecasts of 48 cents.

Up to Tuesday’s close, Intel’s shares had fallen 8.4 percent this year, compared with a slight gain in the broader semiconductor index <.SOX>.

(Reporting by Narottam Medhora in Bengaluru and Peter Henderson in San Francisco; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila and Diane Craft)
Source: Reuters News Service – Retrieved 04-19-2016 from: https://www.yahoo.com/news/intel-cut-12-000-jobs-pc-industry-swoons-001010341–finance.html

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Title #2: Intel and Microsoft face different challenges in shifts to cloud
By: Sarah McBride
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Financial results from Microsoft Corp and Intel Corp this week brought into sharp relief the challenges the onetime PC partners face as they shift more of their emphasis to cloud computing.

Microsoft has seen strong long-term growth in parts of its cloud business, a combination of services and software catering to corporations moving computing functions to remote data centers run by outside providers.

While revenue for its flagship cloud services business Azure more than doubled last quarter, the company said in Thursday’s earning report, the “intelligent cloud” division that includes it saw just 3 percent revenue growth in the period. And operating profits for the division dropped by 14 percent, in part reflecting non-cloud products included under its umbrella, such as traditional server software.

Chipmaker Intel has a less clear path to growth for its cloud operations, and investors have remained skeptical.

The company’s share price is down about 1 percent over the last year, as software maker Microsoft’s stock rose about 30 percent. Microsoft’s market capitalization of around $440 billion is almost three times Intel’s at $151 billion, compared to about double five years ago.

“Wintel” computers running Windows on Intel chips dominated the personal-computing era, which is slowly ending as more people turn to mobile phones for computing needs and corporations deemphasize desktops. Both Intel and Microsoft, run by relatively new CEOs Brian Krzanich and Satya Nadella, are betting their businesses on the cloud.

Graphic on Intel and Microsoft market value: http://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/rngs/1/1368/2143/e2jq021kfn46.htm

At Intel, in a quarter where the company announced plans to cut 12,000 jobs as it shifts away from the PC, data-center business revenue rose 9 percent to $4 billion. That segment includes the chips powering cloud data centers, where the company says it is doing well.

“There’s this perception that Microsoft is more on the cusp and benefiting from this (cloud) trend,” said Dan Morgan, a fund manager at Synovus Trust Co who holds both companies in his portfolio. “Intel is still more drowned out,” meaning not as high-profile.

Microsoft’s best-known play in the cloud is Azure, a set of services for computing and storage as well as tools for software developers.

Azure is gaining ground on Amazon’s AWS unit, the industry heavyweight in cloud computing services. Azure commands about 10 percent of the $23 billion market, estimates Synergy Research, compared with AWS’ 31 percent.

Intel has done well in its category, dominating the market for processor chips that are the brains of data center computers, but the business faces major pressures.

Much of the difference in the companies’ fortunes boils down to Microsoft’s fundamental business as a software company versus Intel’s as a hardware company, said Nick Sturiale, a venture capitalist at Ignition Partners.

Clients are spending an ever-larger part of their technology budget on software, according to research firm Gartner. And Intel’s customer base for data-center chips is consolidating into a few big companies, including Facebook, Google, Amazon and Microsoft itself, from a much wider group.

“The cloud vendors are brutal price negotiators and have more power over Intel,” said Sturiale. Average prices of data center chips fell 3 percent in the last quarter, although Intel said that reflected the fact that cheaper chips were gaining ground the fastest.

Intel could suffer as big data-center builders like Facebook increasingly design their own data-center hardware. So far, Intel has held its own, but one day its customers could extend their cost-cutting to chips.

In a call this week with analysts, Krzanich said Intel’s “top to bottom” understanding of the cloud-based data center and keen eye on competitors would help it stay ahead.

“Always paranoid about the competition, always driving,” he said.

“And you know that we live or die by the performance of our product.”

Intel makes other promising products, including chips for Internet-connected devices known as the Internet of Things. If a blockbuster consumer or business product in that market comes along, those chips could take off.

And Microsoft may be overemphasizing how far it has come. Much of its “intelligent cloud” business comprises software for traditional on-premises servers and other businesses with little to do with the cloud. A spokeswoman said the segment’s name “is to align to the ambition” of building the cloud.

Microsoft also is good at playing up its cloud business. In its January earnings call with investors, the term “cloud” came up 59 times. In Intel’s call this week, it came up 11 times.

(Reporting by Sarah McBride,; additional reporting by Noel Randewich; editing by Andrew Hay)
Source: Posted April 22, 2016 from: https://www.yahoo.com/news/intel-microsoft-face-different-challenges-shifts-cloud-010342392–finance.html?ref=gs

See VIDEO‘s of both Intel and Microsoft’s “Cloud” offering in the Appendices below.

Considering the trends in the foregoing articles – tablets, mobile and web-enabled virtual devices (cloud computing) – the Go Lean book posits that there is a need for the Caribbean to be agile or lean to optimize to benefits from the ever-changing technology industry-space. This requires the stakeholders in the region to re-focus and re-boot the regional engines of commerce so as to benefit from these innovations – keep pace – and to create jobs. These two assignments are among the missions of the Go Lean book, blogs and movement.

The book Go Lean… Caribbean, serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) with the charter to facilitate jobs in the region. The book posits that ICT (Internet & Communications Technology) can be a great equalizer for the Caribbean to better compete with the rest of the world. The book thereafter details the prime directives (3) of the roadmap:

Optimization of economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support all these engines.

Early in the Go Lean book, the mission to create jobs and keep pace with technology was identified as important functions for the CU with these pronouncements in the Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 14):

xxvi. Whereas the Caribbean region must have new jobs to empower the engines of the economy and create the income sources for prosperity, and encourage the next generation to forge their dreams right at home, the Federation must therefore foster the development of new industries, like that of ship-building, automobile manufacturing, prefabricated housing, frozen foods, pipelines, call centers, and the prison industrial complex. In addition, the Federation must invigorate the enterprises related to existing industries tourism, fisheries and lotteries – impacting the region with more jobs.

xxvii. Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.

xxviii. Whereas intellectual property can easily traverse national borders, the rights and privileges of intellectual property must be respected at home and abroad. The Federation must install protections to ensure that no abuse of these rights go with impunity, and to ensure that foreign authorities enforce the rights of the intellectual property registered in our region.

xxx. Whereas the effects of globalization can be felt in every aspect of Caribbean life, from the acquisition of food and clothing, to the ubiquity of ICT, the region cannot only consume, it is imperative that our lands also produce and add to the international community, even if doing so requires some sacrifice and subsidy.

According to the foregoing articles, changes in computing trends are reshaping the global ICT industry; and the job market is being affected, for better and for worse. The Go Lean book identified that tablet devices must be part-and-parcel to any technology empowerment plan, it detailed the possibilities of deploying low-cost tablets ($35) throughout the Caribbean region.

The Aakash UbiSlate 7Ci is a super-cheap tablet that will attempt to connect every student in India to the Internet. Educators have long hoped that cheap computing devices could bridge the global information divide, but previous attempts have been dogged by disappointing performance, lack of Internet access, and financial barriers. The latest version of India’s $35 tablet comes equipped with WiFi and has an optional upgrade ($64) of a cellular Internet package of $2/month for 2 GB of data… – Go Lean … Caribbean (Page 296).

Likewise, the Go Lean book identified the emergence of cloud computing. The roadmap detailed a strategy of forging a Cyber Caribbean with many outsourcing/in-sourcing deployments, plus the assembly of the Caribbean Postal Union (CPU) to consolidate and integrate the region’s postal operations into a 21st Century model, including all the tenets of ICT: email, social media (www.myCaribbean.com), e-Government, etc.. The roadmap there-in describes the role of Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) as an alternative to expensive Personal Computer installations for corporate and institutional (government and NGO) applications. See a specific reference from the book here:

Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) is a desktop-centric service that hosts user desktop environments on remote servers and/or blade PCs, which are accessed over a network using a remote display protocol. A connection brokering service is used to connect users to their assigned desktop sessions. For users, this means they can access their desktop from any location, without being tied to a single client device. Since the resources are centralized, users moving between work locations can still access the same desktop environment with their applications and data. For IT administrators, this means a more centralized, efficient client environment that is easier to maintain and able to respond more quickly to the changing needs of the user and business… – Go Lean … Caribbean (Page 295).

The Go Lean book details how jobs are to be created in this new world of cyclical technology trends and in the new Caribbean. The book asserts that certain industries are better than others for generating multiple indirect jobs down the line for each direct job on a company’s payroll. Industries relating to STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) fields have demonstrated high job-multiplier rates of 3.0 to 4.1 factors (Page 260). In total, the book details the creation of 2.2 million new jobs for the Caribbean region, many embracing ICT skill-sets, by adopting certain community ethos, plus the executions of key strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies. The following is a sample from the book:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principle – Economic Systems Influence Choices & Incentives	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principle – Voluntary Trade Creates Wealth	Page 21
Community Ethos – Consequences of Choices Lie in the Future	Page 21
Community Ethos – Job Multiplier	Page 22
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Foster Genius	Page 27
Community Ethos – Ways to Help Entrepreneurship	Page 28
Community Ethos – Ways to Promote Intellectual Property	Page 29
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact Research & Development	Page 30
Community Ethos – Ways to Bridge the Digital Divide	Page 31
Strategy – Mission – Education Without Further Brain Drain	Page 46
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy	Page 64
Tactical – Tactics to Forge an $800 Billion Economy – High Multiplier Industries	Page 70
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Commerce Department – Postal Services/CPU	Page 78
Implementation – Trends in Implementing Data Centers	Page 106
Implementation – Ways to Improve Mail Service – Caribbean Postal Union	Page 108
Implementation – Ways to Impact ICT and Social Media	Page 111
Planning – Ways to Improve Trade – e-Commerce to Streamline a Bigger Regional Market	Page 128
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Education – e-Learning Options	Page 159
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Technology	Page 197
Advocacy – Ways to Foster e-Commerce	Page 198
Appendix – Growing 2.2 Million Jobs in 5 Years	Page 257
Appendix – Job Multipliers	Page 259
Appendix – Virtual Desktop Infrastructure	Page 295
Appendix – India’s $35 Tablet	Page 296

As depicted in the foregoing news articles, the current trending with ICT innovation nullifies location. The innovations need not come from Silicon Valley – a region just south of San Francisco, California, they can easily come from any beach in the Caribbean.

The Caribbean is arguably the best address on the planet – definitely the best beaches – but jobs are missing. We can fill the void the same way other communities are jockeying to fill the void: innovations for ICT. The Go Lean roadmap posits that we can get the needed innovation from our own people, rather that watching our prospective innovators “take their talents to South Beach”, or South Toronto, or South London or South of San Francisco (Silicon Valley).

The Go Lean/CU roadmap is designed to foster job-creating developments in the Caribbean region. This requires a full-vertical strategy: identifying human resources, developing the skill-sets, incentivizing high-tech start-ups and incubating viable companies. These points have been detailed in many previous Go Lean blog-commentaries; consider this sample:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7806	Skipping School to become Tech Giants
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6422	Microsoft Pledges $75 million for Kids in Computer Science
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6341	The new Tourism Stewardship: e-Commerce
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6151	3D Printing: Here Comes Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5840	Security Concerns: Computer Glitches Disrupt Business As Usual
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5435	China Internet Policing – Model for Caribbean
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4793	Truth in Commerce – Learning from Yelp
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4381	Net Neutrality: It Matters Here …in the Caribbean
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3974	Google and Mobile Phones – Here comes Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3915	Microsoft’s new Hologram systems – Changing the World View
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3881	Intelligence Agencies to Up Cyber Security Cooperation
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3187	Robots help Amazon tackle Cyber Monday
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2126	Computers Reshaping Global Job Market
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=689	‘eMerge’ Conference aims to jump-start Tech Hub
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=308	CARCIP – CariCom Initiative – Urges Greater Innovation

The primary ingredient for a Caribbean ICT strategy need only be Caribbean people, and the community “will” to engage. This is conceivable, believable and achievable. The Go Lean roadmap describes the need to reform and transform this community “will” as community ethos – national spirit – to spur achievement in this ICT industry space.

We can do this – here at home.

The roadmap goes further and provides the turn-by-turn directions to get “us” to the desired location: a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the book Go Lean…Caribbean now!

————

Appendix VIDEO – Why Intel Cloud Technology – https://youtu.be/P5h1KMk-8Qo

Published on Jan 10, 2014 – Customers want to know what is inside their cloud. This animation provides an overview of the Intel Cloud Technology program, which provides users assurances that their cloud service provider is running on the latest Intel Xeon Processor-based servers, which means taking advantage of technologies including Intel Turbo Boost Technology, Intel TXT, Intel AVX, and Intel AES-NI. Intel Cloud Technology helps increase performance, reduce completion time, and enhance security. Learn more at http://intel.ly/1gpFL5PSubscribe now to Intel on YouTube: http://bit.ly/1BZDtpf
About Intel:
Intel, the world leader in silicon innovation, develops technologies, products and initiatives to continually advance how people work and live. Founded in 1968 to build semiconductor memory products, Intel introduced the world’s first microprocessor in 1971. This decade, our mission is to create and extend computing technology to connect and enrich the lives of every person on earth.
Connect with Intel:

Visit Intel WEBSITE: http://intel.ly/1WXmVMe

————

Appendix VIDEO – Microsoft Cloud: Empowering Business – https://youtu.be/HZChlynmtgc

Published on Jan 18, 2016 – See how The Microsoft Cloud is helping businesses around the world scale, connect, transform and reinvent.

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Skipping School to become Tech Giants

Posted on April 12, 2016 in Economics, Ethos, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

How can we mold young minds for career success?

Apparently, there is more than one way; (notwithstanding starting early). Yes, there is college, but there is another way too: entrepreneurship. Think Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. These ones are notorious for their billionaire success, despite not finishing college.

Some people think that a 4-year college degree may NOT be entirely essential for career success; these ones say: “there is an alternate path” for success for an individual career and for their community; (some even claim that a 4-year degree may be a bad investments for students).

So there are parallel paths. Let’s consider: education -vs- entrepreneurship …

Many claim that the underlying goal for molding young minds should not be education, but rather competition … with the rest of the world. The question could therefore be codified as: “Is a 4-year college degree necessary for our community to better compete with the world?”

This is a tough one (question), in which there are no easy answers.

The book Go Lean…Caribbean embarks on the quest to elevate the Caribbean societal engines (economics, security and governance); it presents options with education and with entrepreneurship. The book immediately rails against the education status quo; it stakes the claim that Caribbean tertiary education eco-system needs to be reformed and transformed, asserting that the status quo has not served the region as well as expected. Truth is, traditional college education paths may be considered disastrous for the Caribbean region in whole, and for each specific country in particular. Why?

Students leave to study …

… and do not necessarily return. They are “gone and forgotten”^*; they run-off with their community investments with little chance for any “return”. (* = Many Caribbean graduates only return for family visits and festivals).

Normally, college education is great for the individual. The Go Lean book relates how economists have established that every additional year of schooling increases a student’s earning potential by about 10% (Page 258). Yet for our Caribbean communities as a whole, the end-result has been different – bad – ending in our incontrovertible brain drain.

How bad?

Previous blogs on this same subject matter have detailed the dysfunction; one example is the report that 70 percent of the tertiary-educated population in the Caribbean has fled. What’s worst in these reports, is the fact that these emigrants have taken their Caribbean-funded education and skill-sets with them; even taking any hope for collecting student loans, thereby imperiling future generations of scholars from their own benefits of a college education.

So education is not the champion – for nation-building – that we would expect. There is room for a challenger-contender. Consider this VIDEO here (and transcript in the Appendix), of young ones quitting college or never enrolling, to pursue entrepreneurial endeavors in the technology space. These ones are being fostered, prodded and nurtured; as related here:

VIDEO – Skipping School to become Tech Giants – http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/investing-in-college-dropouts-with-big-ideas

(VIDEO plays best in Internet Explorer).

The Go Lean movement – book and blogs – asserts that change must come to the region in response to the debilitating status quo in Caribbean life. The book refers to these change factors as Agents of Change, including technology and globalization. The best strategy for contending with both technology and globalization change is to not only consume; communities must develop, innovate and produce as well. The Go Lean book posits therefore that Caribbean regional shepherds should invest in (better) higher education and entrepreneurial options. The bottom-line motive should be the Greater Good.

This book Go Lean book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). This represents change for the region. The CU/Go Lean roadmap has 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines – including educational empowerments and entrepreneurial incubators – in order to grow the regional economy and create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The book relates that forging technology genius is a direct product of perspiration and inspiration. Perspiration as in the training and education needed to excel in this field; and inspiration as in the spark of innovation that is required to conceive, compose and construct competitive products pertaining to hardware, software and communication systems.

The Go Lean roadmap provides turn-by-turn directions on how to foster genius and how to reform the Caribbean tertiary education eco-systems. As a planning tool, the roadmap commences with a Declaration of Interdependence, pronouncing the approach of regional integration (Page 12 & 14) as a viable solution to elevate the opportunities in the region:

xix. Whereas our legacy in recent times is one of societal abandonment, it is imperative that incentives and encouragement be put in place to first dissuade the human flight, and then entice and welcome the return of our Diaspora back to our shores …

xxi.  Whereas the preparation of our labor force can foster opportunities and dictate economic progress for current and future generations, the Federation must ensure that educational and job training opportunities are fully optimized for all residents of all member-states, with no partiality towards any gender or ethnic group. The Federation must recognize and facilitate excellence in many different fields of endeavor, including sciences, languages, arts, music and sports. This responsibility should be executed without incurring the risks of further human flight, as has been the past history.

xxvii.  Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.

xxx.   Whereas the effects of globalization can be felt in every aspect of Caribbean life, from the acquisition of food and clothing, to the ubiquity of ICT, the region cannot only consume, it is imperative that our lands also produce and add to the international community, even if doing so requires some sacrifice and subsidy.

The Go Lean book focuses primarily on economic issues, and it recognizes that computer hardware, software and communications systems are the future direction for consumer, corporate and industrial developments. This is where the new jobs are to be found. If we want to arrest societal abandonment occurring in our communities, we must create jobs. The Go Lean roadmap describes the heavy-lifting for people, organizations and governments to foster genius and forge technological innovations here at home in the Caribbean; (i.e. start early).

This commentary is not advocating a practice of “skipping school to rush to try and become tech giants”. But rather, it is advocating education reform, abandoning failed practices, like study abroad and adopting new ones, like e-Learning solutions. After which there should be an effort to provide entrepreneurial incubators to foster more business start-ups.

The Go Lean book posits that education and entrepreneurism are vital advocacies for Caribbean economic empowerment. But there have been flawed decision-making in the past, both individually and community-wise, and so we are now playing catch-up with the rest of the world. Whether we want it or not, there is a competition; globalization features trade wars; wars feature battles; battles feature champions. The vision of the CU is a confederation of the 30 member-states of the Caribbean to do the heavy-lifting of championing better educational and entrepreneurial policies.

The book details those policies; and other ethos to adopt, plus the executions of the following strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to impact the Greater Good for the region:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification	Page 21
Community Ethos – People Respond to Incentives	Page 21
Community Ethos – Job Multiplier	Page 22
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Return on Investments – ROI	Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Foster Genius	Page 27
Community Ethos – Ways to Help Entrepreneurship	Page 28
Strategy – Agent of Change – Technology	Page 57
Strategy – Agent of Change – Globalization	Page 57
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Education Department	Page 85
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Labor Department	Page 89
Implementation – Ways to Impact Social Media	Page 111
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Education	Page 159
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Governance	Page 169
Advocacy – Ways to Better Manage the Social Contract	Page 171
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Cooperatives	Page 176
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Libraries	Page 187
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Technology	Page 197
Advocacy – Ways to Foster e-Commerce	Page 198
Appendix – Education and Economic Growth	Page 258

Now is the time for all of the Caribbean, the people and governing institutions, to lean-in for the changes described in the book Go Lean … Caribbean. We welcome entrepreneurism and we welcome education; these two activities can be concurrent and complementary. But we need to break from the old-bad practices (i.e. study abroad) and engage new-better practices (i.e. incubators).

So we encourage all young people to get advanced education, but to do it at home. And we encourage all with entrepreneurial dreams to pursue them … here at home.

The new jobs that our region need must come from these initiatives. Let’s get started! 🙂

Download the book Go Lean…Caribbean now!

————–

APPENDIX – Story Transcript: Skipping School to become Tech Giants

A select group of whiz kids seems to be thriving despite having dropped out of college. All any of them seems to need is a high-tech idea, a sofa to sleep on … plus a $100,000 grant. John Blackstone explains:

When brothers Kieran and Rory O’Reilly were both accepted to Harvard, their parents marked the accomplishment with new license plates: One read “2 N HRVD”; the other, “HARVRD 2.”

“They might change it to ‘2 DROPOUTS,'” said Rory.

They both quit Harvard as undergrads two years ago. They were just 18 and 19 when they moved to San Francisco with big hopes, and almost nothing else.

“Three bags of clothes — every day we would take it, move from hotel to hotel,” said Rory.

“I remember our bank account was always negative $66, because that’s the overdraft fee,” said Kieran.

They’re now living IN their office. “Every single day our mom tries to call us or send food,” Rory said.

They’ve created a website, gifs.com, a tool for re-editing online videos. Seventeen million people in the past month have used it.

The O’Reillys are on a path made famous by some of the tech industry’s biggest names: Jobs, Gates, Zuckerberg.

“People that drop out of Harvard, maybe the Bill Gateses of the world, the Zuckerbergs, they’re the people that are really changing the entire world, in my opinion,” said Rory. “And yeah, I’m glad to be a part of that.”

The O’Reillys are “part of that” partly because Peter Thiel, one of the billionaire founders of PayPal, gave them $100,000 each.

Thiel started his surprising giveaway five years ago, offering $100,000 to kids who quit college to “build new things.”

Jack Abraham is executive director of the Thiel Fellowship, which distributes the money to 20 new dropouts each year. And what is he encouraging? “If you have a great idea, the time to pursue it is now,” Abraham said. “We also hope to show society that this is an alternate path that people can and should consider and take.”

Abraham says the 105 current and former Thiel Fellows have created more than 1,000 jobs and raised $330 million from investors.

Only eight have returned to college.

PayPal billionaire funds college-aged kids’ ideas (“The Early Show,” 06/01/11)
Billionaire offers college alternative (“60 Minutes,” 05/17/12)
Dropping out: Is college worth the cost? (“60 Minutes,” 05/21/12)
Billionaire heads back to college (CBS Moneywatch, 03/13/12)

The selection committee is now sorting through 5,000 applications for this year’s 20 fellowships. Most of the applicants would have much better odds getting into the Ivy League.

“It breaks my heart when some of the most promising students don’t fulfill their potential because they’re chasing rainbows,” said Vivek Wadhwa, a fellow at StanfordUniversity, who has been a critic of the Thiel Fellowship from the beginning.”

“It’s like what happens in Hollywood: You have tens of thousands of young people flocking to Hollywood thinking that they’re gonna become a Brad Pitt or an Angelina Jolie; they don’t,” said Wadhwa.

“They don’t become billionaires. There haven’t been many Mark Zuckerbergs after Mark Zuckerberg achieved success.”

And Wadhwa says there is little evidence the Thiel dropouts are doing much that isn’t already being done in Silicon Valley.”Everyone does the same thing: It’s social media, it’s photo sharing apps. Today it’s sharing economy,” Wadhwa said. “It’s ‘Me, too,’ ‘More of the same.'”

But 19-year-old Conrad Kramer and 21-year-old Ari Weinstein were convinced they had a new idea, so when they were awarded Thiel Fellowships in 2014, they both walked away from MIT to work full-time on their app, called Workflow.

“There are some opportunities that come up that you would regret turning down,” Kramer said. “Workflow was definitely one of those.”

“It’s kind of like making your own apps that save you time,” Weinstein said.

When Workflow launched, it was the number one bestseller on Apple’s App Store — and has since won several awards.

They’ve just hired their newest employee, Tim Hsia, a graduate of Stanford’s business and law schools and an Army vet. He’s 33-years-old and says he doesn’t mind taking orders from a teenage boss.

“I’m learning so much because they have such a wealth of experience despite their age,” Hsia said. “In Silicon Valley it’s about meritocracy of ideas. And so if you have a good idea, everyone’s always receptive to listen to it.”

Zach Latta found many people were willing to listen — leaving high school to move to San Francisco on his own, to start a non-profit called Hack Club.

He recalled that when he moved to the city at age 16, “I’d showed up at a gym one day with some friends, and they turned me away at the door because I had to be 18.”

Now he is 18 and works full-time helping high school students learn to code.

“I feel challenged in every single day,” Latta said. “And I think I’m learning as much as I’ve ever been while being happy.”

For now these wannabe tech titans live modestly in homes they share with several others, or in offices that also provide a place to sleep. Instead of meals, some drink Soylent — Silicon Valley’s version of fast food. It apparently contains all the nutrients necessary to stay alive, in a bottle.

“Yeah — breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner,” said Latta.

They are building their companies with money from investors who seem to care little whether they graduated from college.

“It’s actually kind of a badge of honor here, dropping out,” said 23-year-old Stacey Ferreira. She’s dropped out of NYU — twice! The first time she saw a tweet from Richard Branson, the founder of the Virgin Group, offering to meet anyone who gave $2,000 to his charity.

She borrowed the money and met him. She was 18 and starting her first business.

“And make a long story short, he and two of his buddies ended up investing $1.2 million in our business that summer,” Ferreira told Blackstone.

Two years later, she sold that company, MySocialCloud, for a hefty profit, and returned to NYU. But then she had another big idea that couldn’t wait.

“If you can create your own job, why wouldn’t you just do that and not get stuck paying student loans for the rest of your life?” Ferreira said.

Instead of student loans, she has $100,000 from Peter Thiel. She’s working on an app called Forrge that aims to create an on-demand marketplace for hourly workers.

She’s hoping that dropping out of NYU again will pay off again.

Blackstone asked, “Is there a lesson in your story for other young people?”

“Yeah, I think the biggest lesson to learn is just take risks,” Ferreira said.

“What’s the worst that can happen to you when you take the risk?”

“For me, the worst that can happen is I move home and sleep on my parent’s couch for a couple months, until I figure it out,” Ferreira replied.

For more info:

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Lessons from Regional Elections

Posted on April 6, 2016 in Ethos, Government, Implementation

Go Lean Commentary

Imagine spending $5.3 Billion dollars to buy a “service” and then the logistics fail in the final delivery.

Unfortunately, this can describe the election process in the United States. In 2008, according to the book Go Lean…Caribbean, that amount of money was spent on the Presidential campaign. Surely those spending that money, wanted to have their candidates win. It would be so unfortunate that when Election Day finally comes around that the delivery – balloting – is flawed:

hanging chads
long lines
computer glitches
incorrect registration
wrong polling stations
absentee ballots
provisional ballots
photo ID

These and many other issues persist…

… the biggest problem being voter apathy, especially among the young.

With this greatest threat – voter apathy – that $5.3 Billion investment (for 2008, even though more have been spent in 2012 and the current 2016 campaign) maybe in jeopardy. “Say it ain’t so”…

Here come the solutions. Perhaps technology offers some mitigation to these risks. Consider this:

Question: Will US citizens be able to cast their vote online during the 2016 presidential election?

Answer: Probably not on a mass scale. Currently, Alaska is the only state that allows any eligible voter to vote electronically.

It is unlikely that this will become commonplace across the country in the next two years.

However, perhaps this will change over time if online security measures improve and as popular opinion changes. Among all age groups, Millennials tend to be more interested in online voting.

By: Steve Johnston, (Worked on Political Campaigns and in Congress) Written 11 Feb 2015 ; retrieved April 4, 2016 from: https://www.quora.com/Will-US-citizens-be-able-to-cast-their-vote-online-during-the-2016-presidential-election

Online voting seems so logical. What are the obstacles? Why not now? Who is doing it? When will the US (as the world’s leading democracy) see this utility?

What?
Why?
Who?
When?

These are powerful questions; appropriate ones considering that “power” is the commodity at stake.

Consider this article here based on 2012, that answers a lot of these questions:

Article #1 Title: Why you can’t vote online yet
By: Julianne Pepitone

CNNMoney (New York) – Online voting is taking off in local elections, particularly overseas. But Americans shouldn’t expect to vote for the president on their laptop or iPad anytime soon.

The battle over whether to digitize the voting process has become a full-blown war in the United States, even as countries like Canada, Norway and Australia have increasingly adopted online systems. Proponents say going digital will boost voter turnout, while naysayers cite hacking and other security threats as risks too great to overcome in the near future.

“It’s such a different world than it was 20 years ago, and yet very little has changed in our voting process,” says Rob Weber, a former IT professional at IBM (IBM), who started the blog Cyber the Vote in 2010.

Like many supporters of online voting, Weber points out that many young Americans don’t vote. Bringing the voting process to a format they’re familiar with — a website on a PC, tablet, or even a mobile phone — would overcome the “enthusiasm gap,” he believes.

But that argument hasn’t been enough to bring online voting into the mainstream. For that, Weber places the blame squarely on election officials whom he says aren’t interested in changing the status quo.

“They find online voting culturally distasteful,” Weber says. “They bring up theoretical hacking situations in order to make people afraid of the concept of change. And unfortunately it works.”

Security researchers don’t think those concerns are merely theoretical. Michael Coates, chair of the Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) and director of security assurance at Firefox maker Mozilla, says hackers will attack anything worth hacking.

“It’s guaranteed that such a system [online voting] would be attacked, for sure,” Coates says. “All important systems, from financial to government, face skilled hackers. There are security flaws in every system; it’s a matter of how you detect and respond to them.”

Home PCs, in particular, are susceptible to a myriad of cyberattacks that could be used to alter a user’s vote.

“Until we can reliably foil malware and viruses — and who knows when that will be — it’s hard to consider a system in which we vote from our home computers,” Coates says.

Such issues have felled some past attempts at online voting in the United States.

In 2004, the military began testing the Secure Electronic Registration and Voting Experiment (SERVE), which would have let service members stationed overseas vote online in the general election. But Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz scrapped the plan after government-commissioned studies warned of extensive security flaws.

Another oft-cited failure came in 2010, when Washington, D.C., conducted a pilot project to allow overseas or military voters to download and return absentee ballots over the Internet. Before opening the system to real voters, D.C. invited the public to evaluate whether the system could be hacked.

It was. Within 36 hours of going live.

A University of Michigan team “found and exploited a vulnerability that gave us almost total control of the server software, including the ability to change votes and reveal voters’ secret ballots,” professor J. Alex Halderman later wrote in a blog post about the hack.

Halderman termed the system “brittle” and proclaimed online voting too dangerous to implement anytime soon.

“It may someday be possible to build a secure method for submitting ballots over the Internet, but in the meantime, such systems should be presumed to be vulnerable based on the limitations of today’s security technology,” he wrote.

Such high-profile debacles are a difficult obstacle for online voting companies like Everyone Counts, says CEO Lori Steele.

“The problem with the D.C. hacking is that it was a less-than-mediocre system run by people who had no experience,” Steele says. “When people use it as an example, it’s like, c’mon — those issues were all security 101.”

Bad PR for any online voting attempt undermines the entire cause, Steele says. Still, California-based Everyone Counts has run online elections for local and municipal contests in U.S. locations including West Virginia, Honolulu, El Paso, Chicago and Washington state, in addition to the United Kingdom and Australia.

Everyone Counts uses “military-grade encryption” for its ballots, and can also provide a paper trail for clients who want it, Steele says. A “transparent code” policy allows any client to inspect the company’s source code.

While Steele admits that online voting, like any system, is susceptible to attacks, she thinks the sheer number of devices in the wild would make it difficult for would-be hackers to hit their targets.

“They don’t know which PCs or tablets or phones will be used for voting,” Steele says. “Plus, people talk about paper being the Holy Grail of security, but that is so far from reality.”

The biggest limitation of paper ballots was on display last week, when Hurricane Sandy decimated parts of the northeastern United States. The storm’s destruction cut many voters off from their scheduled polling station.

On Saturday, New Jersey announced that displaced storm victims will qualify as “overseas voters,” meaning they are eligible to vote via e-mail or fax.

“The storm was awful, but it could serve as a wider reminder that we need to reform the system,” says Michelle Shafer, director of communications at Scytl USA.

Scytl’s Spanish parent company has conducted online voting in over 30 countries worldwide. In the U.S., it’s slowly gaining steam. The company has completed online “ballot delivery” — digitally delivering a paper-ballot-like form that voters can fill out and submit — in six U.S. states. Those digital ballots are typically used by military members and overseas residents. It has also run direct online voting for local elections in West Virginia, Florida and Alaska.

“I don’t think we’ll be voting online by [2016’s general election], but my hope is that we’ll continue to take slow and measured steps toward that eventuality,” she adds.

While the United States takes it slow, countries like Canada and Norway continue to expand online voting.

Dean Smith, president and founder of Canada’s leading online-voting firm, Intelivote, says the divide between his home country and the United States is vast. Popular Canadian labor unions have used online voting for years — which means users have grown accustomed to the process — and the country’s ballots tend to be far less complex than those in the United States.

“In general, people here see the benefits of online voting and there’s an acceptance,” Smith says of Canada. “The U.S. would be a great coup, but there are so many academics who made their name by being naysayers. There’s so much fighting about it. Right now, we don’t need the additional problems.”

Source: http://money.cnn.com/2012/11/06/technology/innovation/online-voting-election/ Posted November 6, 2012; retrieved April 4, 2016

VIDEO – How Your Vote Can Be Hacked – http://money.cnn.com/video/technology/2012/10/31/ts-voting-machine-hack.cnnmoney/

The experience in the US is that the politicians do not always represent the majority of the people, but rather the majority of the passionate. This country thusly provides good, bad and ugly examples as lessons for us in the Caribbean, where we do have our own challenges. Many times for Caribbean elections, there is the need for international monitors to observe and report on the fairness of our balloting. In the last few months, there have been elections in numerous Caribbean member-states, i.e. Jamaica and Haiti; (in fact every country must re-vote in 4 – 5 years). These have been fraught with contention and controversy.

We need to be better and do better. Facilitating an efficient election need not be “rocket science”.

The book Go Lean … Caribbean asserts that the current system for Federal campaigns and elections in the US is not the model that the Caribbean would want to emulate – we must do even better than our American counterparts. This book relates that $5.3 Billion was spent for the 2008 US Federal Elections (Page 116), a lot of it contributed by corporations and Political Action Committees (PACs) so as to peddle influence. Then when the voter turn-out is discouraged or suppressed because of any lack of efficiency, this results in even more influence, as now only the passionate will participate in the election process, as most other people cannot tolerate the dysfunction. Consider the example in the Appendix below of long voting lines in Arizona, suppressing the vote – people cannot wait around for 5 hours – especially in the minority communities.

The model sought for the Caribbean is to facilitate the polling of every vote for everyone wanting to participate in the political process, no matter who they are, where they are, what they are voting for or when they vote. Yes, this means local polling stations in convenient places (private/public) – like the shopping mall example in these photos.

The Go Lean book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). It advocates learning lessons from other societies so as to optimize the societal engines of economics, security and governance. Elections are an expression of all three of these branches of society. It should be about the people and their will, not about the power and retaining it. This book, roadmap and movement therefore advocates the CU being deputized/in-sourced to facilitate elections, including online, electronic systems in physical polling and absentee balloting – i.e. Diaspora.

The lesson from regional elections, like Arizona in the Appendix and Florida in the photos, is that the election process must submit to a higher oversight. For the member-states in the US, that oversight is wielded by the US federal government (Executive Branch – Department of Justice – and the Courts). We need similar oversight in the Caribbean; this is embedded in the roadmap for the CU Federation, our regional federal government. Despite our region’s size (only 42 million people in 30 member-states), we can do better than our American neighbors in the election-campaign process. We can be a protégé, not just an American parasite.

The CU’s prime directive, elevating the Caribbean’s economic-security-governing engines, recognizes that the changes the region needs must start first with the adoption of new community ethos and controls: the people need to feel empowered, that their voice and votes count, no matter their ethnicity, language or minority status. Early in the book, this need was pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Page 12) with these statements:

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xii. Whereas the legacy in recent times in individual states may be that of ineffectual governance with no redress to higher authority, the accedence of this Federation will ensure accountability and escalation of the human and civil rights of the people for good governance, justice assurances, due process and the rule of law. As such, any threats of a “failed state” status for any member state must enact emergency measures on behalf of the Federation to protect the human, civil and property rights of the citizens, residents, allies, trading partners, and visitors of the affected member state and the Federation as a whole.

The Go Lean book, and previous blog/commentaries, stressed the key community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementation and advocacies necessary to effect change in the region, to improve the oversight of the governing process. They are detailed as follows:

Community Ethos – Economic Principles	Page 21
Community Ethos – Security Principles – Private Interest –vs- Public Protection	Page 23
Community Ethos – Security Principles – “Light Up Dark Place”	Page 23
Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future – Give the Youth a Voice & Vote	Page 26
Community Ethos – Impact Research and Development – Develop Technology	Page 30
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact Turn-around	Page 33
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good	Page 37
Strategy – Mission – Embrace the advances of technology	Page 47
Strategy – CU Stakeholders to Protect – Diaspora	Page 47
Tactical – Separation-of-Powers – Secretary of State – Elections Bureau	Page 80
Anecdote – Turning Around CARICOM – Deputized for election oversight	Page 92
Implementation – Assemble Caribbean Election Oversight as Cooperative	Page 96
Implementation – Assemble Constitutional Convention – Start of federal elections	Page 97
Implementation – Ways to Impact Elections	Page 116
Planning – 10 Big Ideas – Cyber Caribbean	Page 127
Planning – Ways to Improve Failed-State Indices – Election Outsourcing	Page 134
Planning – Lessons Learned from US Constitution	Page 145
Planning – Ways to Measure Progress	Page 147
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Technology – Heavy focus on systems	Page 197
Advocacy – Ways to Foster e-Commerce	Page 198
Advocacy – Ways to Promote Contact Centers – Big Data Analysis	Page 212

The points of effective, technocratic regional oversight and stewardship were further elaborated upon in these previous blog/commentaries:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7646	Going from ‘Good to Great’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7528	Sample Vision of 1 City, Freeport, as a Self-Governing Entity
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7204	‘The Covenant with Black America’ – Ten Years Later
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6965	Secrecy, corruption and conflicts of interest pervade state governments
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6937	Women in Politics – Yes, They Can!
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5353	POTUS and the Internet
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4935	A Lesson in History – the ‘Grand Old Party’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3397	Bankers Campaign Contributions-Lobbying End Game
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=356	The Use & Abuse of Statistics in Politics

If we want to make our homeland a better place to live, work and play then we must learn/apply lessons from other communities and societies. We can protect the right to vote and give all people a voice by implementing technologically advanced electoral solutions. We can learn from Arizona and do better. Let’s not be blinded to the truth:

Opinion: “In the US, there are 2 main political parties: one with the population (Democrats), and one with the passion (Republicans)”. The Republicans depend on vote suppression tactics (i.e. Voter ID requirements) to win elections – it is not how much support one have, it is how many turn up to vote. Online voting would scare these stakeholders. So the other lesson we can learn and apply from places like Canada, Norway and Australia, is to deploy the online voting, and let the “chips fall where they may”; parties will simply adjust, the people’s voices will be heard and the leaders – survival of the fittest – will respond in kind.

We must look beyond the US for protégé models. We must do better; we must be better!

The Go Lean movement advocates being a protégé, not parasite, of our North American and European trading partners. These places are “frienemies” of the Caribbean now; we get our tourism from these source countries, yes, but we also lose our emigrants to them as well – the Caribbean brain drain is estimated at 70 percent. We must now seek out solutions that encourage participation in the nation-building process. We have no other choice, the alternative is more abandonment of our society.

This is the purpose of the Go Lean roadmap, to provide a turn-by-turn direction to accomplish the needed turn-round. The Go Lean roadmap does not seek to change America and their voting strategies and systems; our only focus is to change the Caribbean. Yes, we can! 🙂

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

————-

Appendix -Article (#2): The DOJ Is Investigating Arizona’s Election Mess
By: Samantha Lachman, Staff Reporter and Ryan J Reilly, Senior Justice Reporter

WASHINGTON — The federal government is investigating Arizona’s most populous county after its dramatic decrease in voting sites led to long lines during the state’s primary last month.

Elizabeth Bartholomew, communications manager for the the Recorder’s Office in MaricopaCounty, said the office received a letter from the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division on Friday. Bartholomew said the feds want specific data about the office’s reason for cutting the number of polling places. She said the office “absolutely” plans to cooperate with the investigation and to provide federal officials with the requested information in the coming weeks.

“We have no problem cooperating with them, so we should have that over to them over the next couple of weeks,” she told The Huffington Post on Monday.

The county cut its voting sites from 200 during the 2012 presidential primary to just 60 for this year’s March 22 primary. Some Arizona voters reported waiting in line for five hours to cast their ballot, long after the GOP race was called for reality television star Donald Trump and the Democratic primary was called for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Maricopa County Recorder Helen Purcell (R), who is in charge of the county’s elections, partially blamed “the voters, for getting in line,” but later admitted that the county made “bad decisions” and “miscalculated” how many voting sites it would need.

County officials argued earlier this year that having fewer sites would save money. Purcell recommended that the county’s Board of Supervisors reduce the number of polling sites because her office suspected more people would vote early by mail. However, fewer people voted by mail than the office had predicted.

The county probably wouldn’t have been able to cut as many polling places as it did if the full force of the Voting Rights Act was still in effect; the Supreme Court gutted the landmark civil rights legislation in a controversial 5-4 decision in 2013. Before that ruling, states with a long history of racial discrimination, such as Arizona, were required to get permission from the DOJ or in federal court to change their election procedures or laws. States asking for approval of their proposed election changes had to show that such measures wouldn’t leave voters of color worse off.

But, as Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton (D) pointed out in a letter asking the DOJ to investigate the county, Maricopa “distributed fewer polling locations to parts of the county with higher minority populations.”

Stanton wrote that Phoenix, a majority-minority city, had one polling place for every 108,000 residents, while predominantly white communities hosted more polling sites for significantly smaller populations.

Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey (R) said in a statement after the primary that he wanted election officials to investigate why lines outside polling places were so long. He called for making the state’s primaries open, rather than closed, so independent voters could participate, without mentioning that the state should allocate more funds to open more polling sites.

Lines weren’t the only problem in Maricopa, however. Some voters reported that the county had switched their party registration, possibly due to a computer glitch. Thousands of voters were forced to cast provisional ballots as a result.
Source: Huffington Post Online News; posted and retrieved 04/04/2016 from: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/justice-department-arizona_us_5702b720e4b083f5c6085933
Aligning VIDEO: https://youtu.be/y_6kaWYjwCk

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2008, ICT, Model, Transform

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The Future of Money

Posted on December 9, 2015 in Economics, Industries, Social, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

Surely the Caribbean can offer more than the African country of Kenya does. Surely?!

… and yet Kenya is providing a role model for the Caribbean to emulate, that of mobile money payment systems.

Let’s play catch-up.

Benefits await the Caribbean, more so than just playing catch-up. We can empower and elevate our economy and society. Notice here how this elevation benefits Kenya – an iconic and typical Third World country – in these news VIDEOs here:

VIDEO 1 – CBS 60 Minutes Story: The Future of Money – http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/the-future-of-money

… requires CBS All Access Subscription…

VIDEO 2 – Financial Times: Mobile money keeps Kenya economy moving – https://youtu.be/ayo-rgayDJE

Published on Mar 11, 2013 – Kenya has led Africa’s innovative and revolutionary embrace of mobile telephones, and the country’s technology sector has grown faster than all others in east Africa’s regional economic hub. Bob Collymore, chief executive of Safaricom, parent company of the mobile payment system M-Pesa, talks to Katrina Manson, east Africa correspondent.

This is a familiar advocacy for these Go Lean commentaries. The full width and breadth of electronic payments schemes have been examined, dissected and debated. The benefits are undeniable:

Instant access
Safer transactions
Expanded networks
Mitigating fees
Expanded money supply
Availing credit

Previous blog-commentaries have promoted the following as advocacies integrating technology and money:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6635	New Security Chip in Credit Cards Unveiled
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5668	Move over Mastercard/Visa… here comes a Caribbean Solution
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4425	Cash, Credit or iPhone …
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3889	Caribbean regional banks are ready to accept electronic payments transactions
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2074	MetroCard – Model for the Caribbean Dollar
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1350	PayPal expands payment services to 10 markets
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=906	Bitcoin needs regulatory framework to change ‘risky’ image of payments
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=528	Facebook plans to provide mobile payment services

The world is moving forward with electronic payment systems; the standard of cash registers with cash drawers have passed. Many times, establishments do not even want to accept “cash”. They want the money, but only want it electronically. Consider this photo here, it demonstrates how United Airlines – the 3^rd largest airline in the world – will not even accept “cash” for travelling passengers to pay for baggage when they check-in for their flights. They want electronic money only (credit and debit cards). This photo depicts a cash-accepting kiosk to load the cash onto a pre-paid credit card … on the spot at the terminal … at the Metropolitan Detroit International Airport (DTW) in November 2015.

Those involved in tourism commerce must now adapt or perish.

What’s more, even the standard of magnetic stripe credit cards and debit cards have passed. As depicted in the foregoing VIDEO and previously Go Lean blog-commentaries, those involved in retail commerce – in general – must now adapt (or perish) to credit and debit cards … without the card!

This means you, Caribbean merchants (hotels, restaurants, tour operators, retailers, and business establishments). The environment must now change for tourism commerce and ordinary domestic commerce. The stewardship of Caribbean economics must improve to adapt to this changing world. This is a consistent advocacy of these Go Lean blogs: to “lean-in” to better economic stewardship as detailed in the book Go Lean … Caribbean.

The book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) and the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB). This Go Lean roadmap depicts that these entities will drive change in payment systems, to includes options depicted in the foregoing VIDEO and beyond. Their role will include facilitating and settling transactions for new payment systems: new cards and telephony apps. The Go Lean roadmap calls for a regional currency for the Caribbean Single Market, the Caribbean Dollar (C$), to be used primarily as an electronic currency. These schemes will impact the growth of the regional economy in both the domestic and tourist markets. Consider the real scenario of Cruise Ship passenger-commerce; the solutions must be delivered here and now.

The CU/CCB roadmap anticipates these electronic payment systems from the outset of the Go Lean book; covering more than commerce, but the security and governing issues as well. In fact, the Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improvement of Caribbean governance to support these engines.

As depicted in the foregoing VIDEO, there abound many security benefits with electronic payment schemes, mobile money in this case. In the field of Economics, the “cash currency” is referred to as M0. No doubt, changes for electronic payment system will reduce M0. The greatest benefit though of deploying these electronic payment scheme is the acceleration of M1 in the regional economy. While M0 refers to “cash: paper & coins”, M1 refers to the measurement of “cash” in circulation (the M0) plus overnight bank deposits. As depicted in the Go Lean book, and subsequent blog-commentaries, M1 increases allow central banks – in this case, the CCB – to create money “from thin-air”; referring to the money multiplier principle.

A final feature of M1 is that it normally does not include any Black Market activities. But with electronic payment systems, M0 reduces and M1 increases, thusly nullifying the Black Markets.

The Go Lean book posits that to adapt and thrive in the new global marketplace there must be more strenuous management and technocratic oversight of the region’s currencies. This is the quest of the Go Lean roadmap; it opened with these pronouncements in the Declaration of Interdependence (Page 13 and 14):

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

xxv. Whereas the legacy of international democracies had been imperiled due to a global financial crisis, the structure of the Federation must allow for financial stability and assurance of the Federation’s institutions. To mandate the economic vibrancy of the region, monetary and fiscal controls and policies must be incorporated as proactive and reactive measures. These measures must address threats against the financial integrity of the Federation and of the member-states.

xxvii. Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.

The Go Lean book details a series of community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to foster the proper controls for electronic/mobile payments in the Caribbean region:

Community Ethos – Economic Principles	Page 21
Community Ethos – Money Multiplier Principle	Page 22
Community Ethos – Security Principles – Privacy versus Public Protection	Page 23
Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Cooperatives	Page 25
Community Ethos – Promote Intellectual Property	Page 29
Community Ethos – Ways to Bridge the Digital Divide	Page 31
Community Ethos – Ways to Improve Sharing	Page 35
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good	Page 37
Strategy – Mission – Fortify the monetary needs through a Currency Union	Page 45
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Central Banking	Page 73
Implementation – Assemble Central Bank Cooperative	Page 96
Implementation – Assemble Caribbean Regional Organs	Page 96
Implementation – Ways to Deliver	Page 109
Planning – 10 Big Ideas – #2: Currency Union / Single Currency	Page 127
Anecdote – Caribbean Currencies	Page 149
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Mitigate Black Markets	Page 165
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Cooperatives	Page 176
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Cruise Tourism – Smartcard scheme	Page 193
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Technology	Page 197
Advocacy – Ways to Foster e-Commerce	Page 198
Advocacy – Reforms for Banking Regulations – Central Banking Efficiencies	Page 199
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Main Street – Downtown Wi-Fi – Time and Place	Page 201
Appendix – Assembling the Caribbean Telecommunications Union	Page 256

The world of electronic payment systems now includes smart cards, mobile payments (like “M-Pesa” in the foregoing VIDEO and apps on Google’s Android and Apple’s iPhone devices). To those in the Caribbean, we admonish you:

Try and keep up!

The benefits of this new “regime” are too enticing to ignore: fostering more e-Commerce, increasing regional M1, mitigation of Black Markets, more cruise tourism spending, growing the economy, creating jobs, enhancing security and optimizing governance.

Now is the time for all stakeholders of the Caribbean, (residents, visitors, merchants, vendors, bankers, and governing institutions), to lean-in for the empowerments described in the book Go Lean … Caribbean. These empowerments can help to make the Caribbean a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the free e-Book for Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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Banks, e-Commerce, ICT, Model, Tourism, Trade

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ENCORE: Thanksgiving and American Commerce – Past, Present and Amazon

Posted on November 26, 2015 in Economics, Industries, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

This commentary – from December 3, 2014 – was re-distributed on the occasion of the American Holiday Thanksgiving for 2015, as it is applicable for any Thanksgiving any year. Be thankful people; be festive and most important, be safe!

———

To understand American commerce, one must learn the BIG shopping “days of the week” – Friday, Saturday, Monday, Tuesday, as follows:

Black Friday – This is the Friday following the Thanksgiving Day holiday in the US (the fourth Thursday of November). Since the early 2000’s, it has been regarded as the beginning of the Christmas shopping season, and most major retailers open very early and offer promotional sales. Black Friday is not a public holiday, but some states observe “The Day After Thanksgiving” as a holiday for state government employees, sometimes in lieu of another federal holiday such as Columbus Day.^[5] Many non-retail employees and schools have both Thanksgiving and the day after off, followed by a weekend, thereby increasing the number of potential shoppers. In 2014, $50.9 billion was spent during the 4-day Black Friday weekend. While approximately 133 million U.S. consumers shopped during the same period.^[6]
Small Business Saturday – This refers to the Saturday after Thanksgiving during one of the busiest shopping periods of the year. First observed in 2010, it is a counterpart to Black Friday and Cyber Monday, which feature big box retail and e-commerce stores respectively. By contrast, Small Business Saturday encourages holiday shoppers to patronize brick-and-mortar businesses that are small and local. Small Business Saturday is a registered trademark of American Express Corporation. Small Business Saturday UK began in the UK in 2013 after the success of Small Business Saturday in America.^[7]
Cyber Monday – This is a marketing term for the Monday after the Thanksgiving holiday. The term was created by marketing companies to persuade people to shop online. The term made its debut on November 28, 2005, in a Shop.org press release entitled “‘Cyber Monday Quickly Becoming One of the Biggest Online Shopping Days of the Year”.^[2] According to the Shop.org/Bizrate Research 2005 eHoliday Mood Study, “77 percent of online retailers said that their sales increased substantially on the Monday after Thanksgiving, a trend that is driving serious online discounts and promotions on Cyber Monday this year (2005)”. In 2014, Cyber Monday online sales grew to a record $2.68 billion, compared with last year’s $2.29 billion. However, the average order value was $124, down slightly from 2013’s $128.^[3] The deals on Cyber Monday are online-only and generally offered by smaller retailers that cannot compete with the big retailers. Black Friday generally offers better deals on technology; with nearly 85% more data storage deals than Cyber Monday. The past Black Fridays saw far more deals for small appliances, cutlery, and kitchen gadgets on average than Cyber Monday. Cyber Monday is larger for fashion retail. On the past two Cyber Mondays, there was an average of 45% more clothing deals than on Black Friday. There were also 50% more shoe deals on Cyber Monday than on Black Friday.^[4] Cyber Monday has become an international marketing term used by online retailers in Argentina, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Uganda, Japan, Portugal, Sweden and the United Kingdom.
Giving Tuesday – refers to the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. It is a movement to create a national day of giving at the beginning of the Christmas and holiday season. Giving Tuesday was started in 2012 by the “92nd Street Y” (Young Men’s and Young Women’s Hebrew Association in New York, NY) and the United Nations Foundation as a response to commercialization and consumerism in the post-Thanksgiving season (Black Friday and Cyber Monday).^[8][9] This occasion is often stylized as #GivingTuesday for purposes of hashtag activism.

That’s a lot of commerce … and philanthropy too!

This encyclopedic discussion is necessary for the Caribbean to model the best-practices of American commerce. The focus of this commentary is the role of one company in the pantheon of Cyber Monday, Amazon. This firm has previously been featured in a Go Lean blog, and is identified as a model for Caribbean logistics, our means for delivering the mail; this is the vision for the Caribbean Postal Union (CPU).

The focus of the book Go Lean…Caribbean and the CPU is not just postal mail, but rather logistics. Mail requires logistics, but logistics encompasses so much more than just mail. So we would want to model a successful enterprise in this industry space, like Amazon, not just another postal operation, like the US Postal Service (Page 99).

Amazon provides a good example of lean technocratic efficiency. So Amazon is a good model, not just for the CPU but the entire Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). The Go Lean book, serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic CU.

One reason why Amazon is modeled for their lean stature is their use of automation. This following VIDEO depicts the creative solution of using robots to facilitate logistics in a warehouse environment:

VIDEO: Robots help Amazon tackle Cyber Monday – http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/robots-help-amazon-tackle-cyber-monday/

December 1, 2014 – Cyber Monday is the biggest sales day of the year for online retail giant, Amazon. Last year, Amazon customers ordered 426 items every second on Cyber Monday, and this year that number is expected to grow. In addition to the 80-thousand seasonal workers they employ to fulfill orders, thousands of robots also crawl the warehouse floors. CNET.com’s KaraTsuboi takes us inside an Amazon fulfillment center to watch the robots in action. (VIDEO plays best in Internet Explorer).

Lean, automation, robotics, technocratic …

… welcome to the new Caribbean.

This is the mission of Go Lean roadmap, to elevate the economic engines of Caribbean society; industrial policy plays a key role in this roadmap. The region needs the jobs, so we need job creators: companies. These companies, or better stated, Direct Foreign Investors, need a pro-innovation environment to deploy their automated solutions. The Go Lean roadmap allows the structure of Self-Governing Entities (SGE) to incentivize industrial developments in the region. It is the expectation that robots and automated systems will flourish. The independence of the SGE structure neutralizes conflicts with “labor”.

Related issues have previously been detailed in these Go Lean commentaries listed here:

Disney World – Successful Role Model of a SGE

Using SGE’s to Welcome the Dreaded ‘Plutocracy’

Where the Jobs Are – Ship-breaking under SGE Structure

Fairgrounds as SGE and Landlords for Sports Leagues

Puerto Rico’s Comprehensive Cancer Center Project Breaks Ground – Model of Medical SGE

In addition to the roadmap encouraging robotic automation, the CU will directly employ such technologically innovative products and services to impact its own prime directives; the CPU is such a reflection; more automation and less labor. The CU’s prime directives are identified with the following 3 statements:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The CPU features economic, security and governing concerns.

The Go Lean roadmap seeks to change the entire eco-system of Caribbean logistics and resulting commerce – the interaction with postal operations. This vision is defined early in the book (Page 12 & 14) in the following pronouncements in the Declaration of Interdependence:

xv. Whereas the business of the Federation and the commercial interest in the region cannot prosper without an efficient facilitation of postal services, the Caribbean Union must allow for the integration of the existing mail operations of the governments of the member-states into a consolidated Caribbean Postal Union, allowing for the adoption of best practices and technical advances to deliver foreign/domestic mail in the region.

xxvii. Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.

Amazon is not our only example. A previous blog/commentary identified Chinese company Alibaba as a fitting role model for Caribbean consideration. There are so many best-practices around the world for the region to study and glean insights and wisdom from. The successful application of this roadmap will foster such best-practices for the delivery of the CPU logistics in the Caribbean. The wisdom the Go Lean book gleans are presented as a series of community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies; a detailed sample is listed as follows:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification	Page 21
Community Ethos – People Respond to Incentives	Page 21
Community Ethos – Job Multiplier	Page 22
Community Ethos – Intelligence Gathering	Page 23
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Foster Genius	Page 27
Community Ethos – Ways to Help Entrepreneurship	Page 28
Community Ethos – Promote Intellectual Property	Page 29
Community Ethos – Ways to Bridge the Digital Divide	Page 31
Community Ethos – Ways to Improve Sharing	Page 35
Strategy – Customers – Citizens and Member-states Governmental	Page 47
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Postal Services	Page 78
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Interstate Commerce Administration	Page 79
Implementation – Year 1 / Assemble Phase – Establish CPU	Page 96
Anecdote – Implementation Plan – Mail Services – US Dilemma	Page 99
Implementation – Steps to Implement Self-Governing Entities	Page 105
Implementation – Improve Mail Services – Electronic Supplements	Page 108
Implementation – Ways to Deliver	Page 109
Planning – 10 Big Ideas for the Caribbean Region	Page 127
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Interstate Commerce	Page 129
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy –Ways to Improve Governance	Page 168
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Technology	Page 197
Advocacy – Ways to Foster e-Commerce	Page 198
Advocacy – Ways to Promote Call Centers	Page 212
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Urban Living	Page 234

Following the Amazon’s example (and Alibaba’s example) will spur the Caribbean to embrace more robotic technologies. This field is new, fresh and ready for innovation. There is a level-playing-field for any innovator to earn market share. The underlying company in the foregoing VIDEO is Kiva Systems – a Massachusetts based company that manufactures mobile robotic fulfillment systems.^[10][11] They rolled out a great product, then “Lo-and-behold”, they were acquired by a major e-Commerce company. Today, they are a subsidiary of Amazon, yet their material-handling systems are currently used by many other retailers including: The Gap, Walgreens, Staples, Gilt Groupe, Office Depot, Crate & Barrel, Saks 5th Avenue, and more.^[12]

This commentary therefore features the subjects of commerce, logistics and entrepreneurship. The Caribbean can emulate this model from Amazon. The biggest ingredient missing in the region is the ‘will’. But the ‘will’ can be fostered anew in the Caribbean. This is the heavy-lifting for the CU, instituting such new community ethos.

Now is the time for all of the Caribbean, the people and governing institutions, to lean-in for the empowerments in the book Go Lean … Caribbean. This is a Big Idea for the region; that of a Cyber Caribbean, in which Cyber Mondays may become a big deal for our region – not only as consumers, but producers as well. Therefore, this roadmap is not just a plan for delivering the mail/packages, but rather a plan for delivering the future.

We must employ whatever tools and techniques, robotics included, to make the region a better homeland to live, work and play.

Does “play“include Robots? Yes, indeed. Consider this fun VIDEO here. 🙂

Supplemental VIDEO – The “Nutcracker” performed by Dancing Kiva Order Fulfillment Robots: http://youtu.be/Vdmtya8emMw

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

————

Appendix – Source References:

2. “‘Cyber Monday’ Quickly Becoming One of the Biggest Online Shopping Days of the Year”. Shop.org.
3. “Fundivo – Cyber Monday Statistics”. Fundivo.
4. “What’s the difference between Black Friday and Cyber Monday?”. Mirror.co.uk. Mirror.co.uk. Nov 28, 2013. Retrieved 2014-11-25.
5. “Pima County in Arizona Replaces Columbus Day with Black Friday”. BestBlackFriday.com. 2013-08-07.
6. “”Fundivo – Black Friday Statistics””. Fundivo.
7. Small Business Saturday Hailed as Success. The Telegraph. 8 December 2013″. Telegraph.co.uk. 8 December 2013. Retrieved 2 December 2014.
8. Fox, Zoe (October 23, 2012). “6 Inspiring Organizations Joining in #GivingTuesday”. Retrieved February 15, 2014.
9. “#GivingTuesday: About”. Giving Tuesday. Retrieved February 15, 2014.
10. http://www.kivasystems.com/about-us-the-kiva-approach/
11. http://www.boston.com/business/technology/innoeco/2012/03/amazon_buys_warehouse_robotics.html
12. http://www.kivasystems.com/about-us-the-kiva-approach/history/

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Live. Work. Play. Repeat.

Posted on November 12, 2015 in Economics, Industries, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

It’s time to go back to school, advanced Business School that is, and glean some wisdom from the structured marketing strategy called Loyalty programs. These are designed to encourage customers to continue to shop at or use the services of establishments associated with each program.^[1]

There are large numbers of such programs in existence covering most types of business, (airlines: frequent flyer, hotels: frequent guest, car rental: frequent renters, restaurants: frequent diners, etc.), each one having varying features, and reward schemes. See Appendix B for details on airlines’ frequent-flyer programs.

Taking a page from this retail marketing eco-system …

… there is a need for a frequent-flyer-style loyalty program in the Caribbean to incentivize repeat business-activity in almost all regional economic engines.

This commentary asserts that a frequent-flyer-miles-style program can be structured in the Caribbean to “spread the wealth” from peak to non-peak seasons. More points can be accumulated by consuming hospitality in the slow season and less points are accumulated for consuming hospitality in the peak/high season. (See Appendix C for Spirit Airlines Model).

This strategy can also be applied with locations …

… more points can be accumulated for hospitality in the lessor-known, lesser-frequented destinations. (See Appendix D for a glimpse of the Hotwire / HotDollars program).

The book Go Lean…Caribbean calls for the elevation of Caribbean society; to re-focus, re-boot, and optimize all the engines of commerce so as to make the Caribbean a better place for these categories of vital activities: live, work and play. Loyalty programs can be used to incentivize all of these aspects of this roadmap. The tourism industry is categorized as “play”. The book posits that the region can experience even more growth than the estimated 80 million people that visit our shores annually. This can also apply to more spending from the visitors as well.

The Go Lean book is written to employ the best-practices of economic principles. Therefore, these fundamental principles – as related in the book (Page 21) are paramount:

People Respond to Incentives in Predictable Ways: Incentives are actions, awards, or rewards that determine the choices people make. Incentives can be positive or negative. When incentives change, people change their behaviors in predictable ways.

Economic Systems Influence Individual Choices and Incentives: People cooperate and govern their actions through both written and unwritten rules that determine methods of allocating scarce resources. These rules determine what is produced, how it is produced, and for whom it is produced. As the rules change, so do individual choices, incentives, and behavior.

The Go Lean book considers the Agent of Change (Page 57) of technology and its effect on the Caribbean’s biggest economic driver “tourism”. The end-results of loyalty program will have far-reaching effects on this travel/tourism industry.

Technology, the Internet-Communications-Technology (ICT), social media account management & marketing …

… the stewardship of Caribbean tourism must truly adapt, evolve and transform to lead and keep pace with this dynamic world; see sample VIDEO in Appendix A.

This commentary relates to more than just tourism and the visiting tourists. Considering applications for “live”, “work”, and “play”, we see that there are also many opportunities to apply incentives for Caribbean citizens who live in the homeland.

The Go Lean book identifies an Agent of Change in the vast field of technology. The technological advances with cutting-edge financial products allow loyalty programs to be forged to incentivize a lot of good behavior and to dissuade bad behavior. Consider these “live” and “work” examples:

“Live” – Tax Payments – This is not a welcome activity for anyone, thusly taxing authorities provide range of dates for tax obligations to be paid; (in the US, the Federal Income Tax deadline is April 15; payments/refunds can start on February 1^st). A loyalty scheme can easily be introduced to award miles-points for early payers and refund recipients that purposefully claim their refunds later in the time window. This practice will maximize cash flow for the authorities while commending good behavior with preferable things they may want after completing obligation they must endure.

“Live” – Energy Efficiency – Positive activities like installing Green Energy alternatives (solar panels/water heaters, hybrid/electric automobiles, etc.) can be incentivized by awarding “double miles” or “eco-points”. Rather than acquiring some chattel goods, the rewards in this case could simply be privileges, like riding in carpool lanes alone.

“Live” – Education – e-Learning enrollment can result in immediate and deferred mileage credit for Caribbean students. (Thus discouraging further brain drain consequences).

“Work” – Taking jobs in rural/desolate communities or working from home is positive behavior that can be further incentivized with “double miles”-like promotions.

“Work” – Working or volunteering for Not-for-Profit agencies should also be encouraged, incentivized and rewarded.

“Work” – Take-Your-Daughter-To-Work Day is a good practice to instill career goals in young girls. Rewards should follow.

There are a lot of opportunities where loyalty program rules can transform society. Consider the practice of “gifting” miles. One person can earn the miles, but then share them with another party and even gift them to a charitable organization or a person directly. This strategy allows for a nimble, technocratic administration of loyalty programs to incentivize good behavior and dissuade bad practices.

Loyalty programs embedded in societal engines are transforming …

Could the current tourism administrations in the Caribbean master the complexities of this technology-bred strategy for elevating the region’s “play” economic engines? Hardly!

How about for regional administrators for the other activities, “live” and “work”? Again, hardly!

This “new-fangled” world requires “new-fangled” leaders. Visionaries. Technocrats.

The book Go Lean…Caribbean and the underlying movement seeks to re-boot the strategies and tactics of tourism marketing for the entire Caribbean region. The book asserts Caribbean member-states must expand and optimize their tourism outreach and use innovative products like excess inventory and loyalty rewards. However the requisite investment of the resources (time, talent, treasuries) for this goal may be too big for any one Caribbean member-state alone. So the Go Lean book campaigns to shift the responsibility to a region-wide, professionally-managed, deputized technocracy, the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). The book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the CU.

The goal of the CU is to bring the proper tools and techniques – electronic commerce, Internet Communications Technologies (ICT), visionary marketing, agile management – to the Caribbean region to optimize the stewardship of the economic, security and governing engines. The book posits that the economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, with technocratic management and stewardship of a Single Market. This would be better than the status quo. As conveyed here in this commentary, and in previous commentaries, the publishers of the book Go Lean…Caribbean convene the talents and skill-sets of movers-and-shakers in electronic commerce so as to forge the best tools and techniques for advanced product marketing like loyalty program.

Change has come to the region. This book Go Lean… Caribbean provides the needed details. Early in the book, the optimization and best-practices was highlighted as a reason the Caribbean region needed to unite, integrate and confederate to a Single Market. These pronouncements were included in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 11 – 14):

iv. Whereas the natural formation of the landmass is in a tropical region, the flora and fauna allows for an inherent beauty that is enviable to peoples near and far. The structures must be strenuously guarded to protect and promote sustainable systems of commerce paramount to this reality.

vi. Whereas the finite nature of the landmass of our lands limits the populations and markets of commerce, by extending the bonds of brotherhood to our geographic neighbors allows for extended opportunities and better execution of the kinetics of our economies through trade. This regional focus must foster and promote diverse economic stimuli.

xiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

xxvii. Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.

The Go Lean… Caribbean book wisely details the community ethos to adopt to proactively facilitate digital campaigns for the changed landscape; plus the executions of the following strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principle – People Respond to Incentives	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principle – Economic Systems Influence Individual Choices & Incentives	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principle – Consequences of Choices Lie in the Future	Page 21
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Return on Investments (ROI)	Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Foster Genius – Literary, Art and Music in Graphic Design	Page 27
Community Ethos – Impact Research & Development – Including ICT	Page 30
Community Ethos – Ways to Improve Sharing – Data / Social Network	Page 35
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good	Page 37
Strategy – Vision – Integrate Region in a Single Market	Page 45
Strategy – Mission – Build and Foster Local Economic Engines	Page 45
Strategy – Mission – Exploit the Benefits of Globalization in Trade-Tourism	Page 46
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy	Page 64
Tactical – Growing the Economy to $800 Billion – Trade and Globalization	Page 70
Tactical – Website *www.myCaribbean.gov* for Caribbean stakeholders – Tourists	Page 74
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Tourism Promotions and Administration	Page 78
Implementation – Integrate All Caribbean Websites to *www.myCaribbean.gov* Portal	Page 97
Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change	Page 101
Implementation – Ways to Deliver	Page 109
Implementation – Ways to Impact Social Media – *www.myCaribbean.gov* Portal	Page 111
Planning – 10 Big Ideas – Cyber Caribbean	Page 127
Planning – Ways to Make the Caribbean Better	Page 131
Planning – Ways to Better Manage Image – Digital Media Presence	Page 133
Planning – Lessons Learned from 2008 – Tourism & Economy Went Bust	Page 136
Planning – Lessons Learned from Egypt – Lack of Tourism Stewardship	Page 143
Advocacy – Ways to Measure Progress – Mining *www.myCaribbean.gov* Portal Data	Page 147
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Cooperatives	Page 176
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Communications – Internet & Social Media Marketing	Page 186
Advocacy – Ways to Enhance Tourism – Excess Inventory Marketing	Page 190
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Events – Sharing Economy	Page 191
Advocacy – Ways to Market Southern California	Page 194
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Technology	Page 197
Advocacy – Ways to Foster e-Commerce	Page 198
Advocacy – Ways to Preserve Caribbean Heritage – Cyber-Caribbean Image/Media	Page 218
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Urban Living	Page 234
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Rural Living	Page 235

The CU seeks to foster internet-communications-technologies (ICT) to aid-and-abet tourism and other economic activities. This includes all supporting functions before, during and after visitors come to our shores – accumulating reward miles-points creates an account-holder status – see Appendix D – with the need for monthly e-statements. This is a forceful example of how a technocratic effort by regional administrators can enhance the Caribbean product offerings online. This is heavy-lifting; but this hard-work is worth the effort. The Returns-on-Investment is assured!

In previous Go Lean blogs, related points of the Technology Agents of Change affecting the tourism product offering have been detailed; see sample here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6385	Wi-Fi Hot Spots Run By Hackers Are Targeting Tourists
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6341	Tourism Stewardship — What’s Next?
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6016	Hotter than July – Mitigating Excessive Heat with Systems
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5840	Computer Glitches Disrupt Business For United Airlines & Others
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5210	Cruise Ship Commerce – Getting Ready for Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4793	Truth in Electronic Commerce – Learning from Yelp
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4639	Tobago: A Model for Cruise Tourism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3225	The need to optimize Caribbean aviation policies
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2571	Internet Commerce meets Sharing Economy: Airbnb
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1364	Uber’s Emergence Transforming Cities
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=273	10 Things We Want from the US – # 2: Tourists
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=235	Tourism’s changing profile

The Caribbean must lean-in to these new business models to incentivize good behavior, for tourism and other aspects of Caribbean affairs. People will respond with the proper inducements. So imagine the universe of 130 million people all tuned-in – to the www.myCaribbean.gov portal – and responding to the appropriate prodding.

This is referred to as “Unified Command-and-Control”. Caribbean benevolent stewards can “push a few buttons” and millions of people respond, for the Greater Good. This is an exciting perspective. Let’s do it!

This is the charge of the Go Lean roadmap: incentivize the people to do more of the right thing. With the empowerments and elevations portrayed in the roadmap we can succeed in making Caribbean region a better place for citizens and tourists alike to live, work, play and repeat. 🙂

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

———–

Appendix A – VIDEO – Capital One Venture® – Jennifer Garner – Ticked Off Traveler – https://youtu.be/7uwYGXqPguU

Published on Sep 15, 2015 – Trying to use your airline credit card miles shouldn’t be frustrating! With the Capital One Venture card, you can fly on any airline any time, then use your miles to cover the cost. Learn more: http://www.capitalone.com/credit-card

————

Appendix B – Frequent-Flyer Programs

A Frequent-Flyer Program (FFP) is a loyalty program offered by an airline. Many airlines have frequent-flyer programs designed to encourage airline customers enrolled in the program to accumulate points (also called miles, kilometers or segments) which may then be redeemed for air travel or other rewards. Points earned under FFPs may be based on the class of fare, distance flown on that airline or its partners, or the amount paid. There are other ways to earn points. For example, in recent years, more points have been earned by using co-branded credit and debit cards than by air travel. Another way to earn points is spending money at associated retail outlets, car hire companies, hotels or other associated businesses. Points can be redeemed for air travel, other goods or services, or for increased benefits, such as travel class upgrades, airport lounge access, or priority bookings.

Frequent-flyer programs can be seen as a certain type of virtual currency, one with unidirectional flow of money to purchase points, but no exchange back into money.^[1]

The very first modern frequent-flyer program was created in 1972 by Western Direct Marketing, for United Airlines. It gave plaques and promotional materials to members. In 1979, Texas International Airlines created the first frequent-flyer program that used mileage tracking to give ‘rewards’ to its passengers, while in 1980 Western Airlines created its Travel Bank, which ultimately became part of Delta Air Lines’ program upon their merger in 1987.^[2][3] American Airlines’ AAdvantage program launched in 1981 as a modification of a never-realized concept from 1979 that would have given special fares to frequent customers. It was quickly followed later that year by programs from United Airlines (Mileage Plus) and Delta Air Lines (SkyMiles), and in 1982 from British Airways (Executive Club).^[4]

Credit card purchases
Many credit card companies partner with airlines to offer a co-branded credit card or the ability to transfer points in their loyalty program to an airline’s program. Large sign-up bonuses and other incentives have been common. Accruing points via credit cards bonuses and spending allows infrequent travelers to benefit from the frequent flyer program.

With a non-affiliated travel rewards credit card a card-member can buy a positive-space ticket considered “revenue” class, which can earn the passenger points with the airline flown.^[11]

Redemption
After accumulating a certain number of points, members then use these points to obtain airline tickets. However, points only pay for the base fare, with the member still responsible for the payment of mandatory taxes and fees.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frequent-flyer_program retrieved November 11, 2015.

———–

Appendix C – Spirit Airlines

———–

Appendix D – Hotwire / HotDollars

What are HotDollars?
HotDollars can be used for any hotel, flight, or Hotwire Hot Rate rental car booking on Hotwire. Each HotDollar is equivalent to one U.S. dollar and is available for one year from the date of issuance. For more information, please see the HotDollars section of our Hotwire Travel Products Rules and Restrictions.

To use your HotDollars, simply sign in by clicking, “My Account.” Then, during checkout, choose HotDollars as your payment method.

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Cuba to Expand Internet Access

Posted on October 12, 2015 in Ethos, Government, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

News Flash: The Caribbean member-states are not as advanced as other North American locations (US & Canada) or many Western European countries.

Duh! Obvious, right?!

We (the Caribbean) have not all fully embraced all that is modern, like the internet in its many modes … broadband, Wi-Fi, satellite and mobile utilities. Some countries are worse than others in this regards. In some places, there may be no internet access at all.

The assertion in the book Go Lean…Caribbean, is that any plan to reboot Caribbean economics, security and governance must include promotion and regulation of Internet and Communications Technologies (ICT) as well. This Go Lean book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) to facilitate the growth, stewardship and oversight of ICT and electronic commerce in a regional Single Market.

This ad-supported news VIDEO here reports on one of our worst cases, Cuba:

VIDEO – https://screen.yahoo.com/cuba-expand-internet-access-112000709.html

Posted on October 12, 2015 – Cuba has announced plans to expand internet access by adding Wi-Fi capacity to dozens of state-run internet centers and more than halving the cost that users pay for an hour online.

(Press || PAUSE || to STOP the continuous VIDEO).

Cuba’s lack of ICT infrastructure is understandable, considering the historicity of that island nation. (Though change is imminent!)

What’s frightening though is that ALL of the Caribbean is just a natural disaster away from also “going dark” on the internet. Imagine a hurricane, or an earthquake, or even a volcano! And yet different Caribbean member-states have been affected by these disasters … just recently.

This commentary is therefore a melding of ICT, economics, security and governance. This is a big deal for the Caribbean, as the internet is being pitched in the Go Lean roadmap as an equalizing element for the Caribbean region in competition with the rest of the world. So the internet is slated to deliver more than just email messages, but rather, to deliver the Caribbean’s future.

With the internet as the delivery vehicle, there must now be oversight and promotion for this information super-highway. Too much – as in the future for our children – is at stake.

This Go Lean roadmap calls for the heavy-lifting of building Caribbean communities, of shepherding important aspects of Caribbean life, including telecommunication policies across member-state borders. In fact, the roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus – including an emergency management apparatus – to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improvement of Caribbean governance to support these engines, utilizing a separation-of-powers with member-states.

These prime directives will elevate Caribbean society, above and beyond what any one member-state can do alone. This is the prospect of a unified effort, a leveraged Single Market. This reality was identified early in the Go Lean book (Pages 13 & 14) in the in the following pronouncements in the Declaration of Interdependence:

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. … [The] accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxvii. Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.

So what exactly can be promoted here and now to elevate the Caribbean region’s ICT infrastructure above and beyond what the member-states can do themselves, independently? Or more so, what can be accomplished for ICT infrastructure during times of distress?

This following news article identifies an effort by the social media giant Facebook, to employ internet access by satellite when land-lines are unavailable, or not even installed. See the story here, considering that this solution would be perfect for the Caribbean:

Title: Facebook to launch satellite to expand Internet access in Africa

(Source retrieved October 12, 2015 from: http://news.yahoo.com/facebook-launch-satellite-expand-internet-access-africa-224718015–finance.html)

(Reuters) – Facebook Inc said it would launch a satellite in partnership with France’s Eutelsat Communications to bring Internet access to large parts of sub-Saharan Africa.

The satellite, part of Facebook’s Internet.org platform to expand internet access mainly via mobile phones, is under construction and will be launched in 2016, the companies said on Monday. (http://on.fb.me/1JPiTZC)

The satellite, called AMOS-6, will cover large parts of West, East and Southern Africa, Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post.

“To connect people living in remote regions, traditional connectivity infrastructure is often difficult and inefficient, so we need to invent new technologies,” Zuckerberg said.

The Internet.org platform offers free access to pared-down web services, focused on job listings, agricultural information, healthcare and education, as well as Facebook’s own social network and messaging services.

Growth in the number of people with access to the Internet is slowing, and more than half the world’s population is still offline, the United Nations Broadband Commission said last month.

Facebook has nearly 20 million users in major African markets Nigeria and Kenya, statistics released by it showed last month, with a majority using mobile devices to access their profiles.

The company opened its first African office in Johannesburg in June.

Tech news website The Information reported in June that Facebook had abandoned plans to build a satellite to provide Internet service to continents such as Africa. (http://bit.ly/1JPiVkn)

(Reporting by Sai Sachin R in Bengaluru; Editing by Don Sebastian)

Related: Facebook Will Help To Bring Internet Access To U.N. Refugee Camps, Mark Zuckerberg Says

This issue of internet deployment and governance has been a frequent topic for Go Lean commentaries. Other blog-commentaries on this subject have detailed the full width-and-breath of preparing Caribbean society for the diverse economic, security and governing issues of managing ICT as a utility in this new century. See sample blogs here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6385	Wi-Fi Hot Spots Run By Hackers Are Targeting Tourists
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6341	The Need for Online Tourism Marketing Stewardship
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5435	China Internet Policing – Model for Caribbean
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5353	US Presidential Politics and the Internet
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4793	Online reviews – like Yelp and Angie’s List – can wield great power for services marketed, solicited and contracted online.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4381	Net Neutrality – The need for Caribbean Administration of the Issue.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4337	Crony-Capitalism Among the Online Real Estate Industry
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3881	European and North American Intelligence Agencies to Ramp-up Cyber Security Cooperation
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=906	Bitcoin e-Payments needs regulatory framework to manage ‘risky’ image
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=308	Caribbean Communications Infrastructure Program (CARCIP) and the Caribbean Telecommunications Union (CTU) urges greater innovation and protection.

These commentaries demonstrate that there is the need for a technocratic governing body to better facilitate and promote the internet in the Caribbean, for commerce, security and government applications. The CU is designed to provide that governance and promotion. Successful execution of the CU/Go Lean roadmap will result a surge in internet/online activity and transactions; as there is the plan to deploy schemes for e-Commerce (Central Bank adoption of Electronic Payment systems) and a Facebook-style social media network www.myCaribbean.gov; (administered by the regional Caribbean Postal Union).

The Go Lean book details the community ethos, plus the execution of related strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to facilitate this ICT vision. The following is a sample of these specific details from the book:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – People Choose	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – People Respond to Incentives in Predictable Ways	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – The Consequences of Choices Lie in the Future	Page 21
Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Return on Investments	Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Foster Genius	Page 27
Community Ethos – Ways to Promote Intellectual Property	Page 29
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact Research & Development	Page 30
Community Ethos – Ways to Bridge the Digital Divide	Page 31
Community Ethos – Ways to Improve Sharing	Page 35
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good	Page 37
Strategy – Vision – Confederate 30 Member-States into a Single Market	Page 45
Strategy – Mission – Embrace the Advances of Technology	Page 46
Strategy – Agents of Change – Technology	Page 57
Strategy – Agents of Change – Climate Change	Page 57
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy	Page 64
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Caribbean Central Bank	Page 73
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Caribbean Postal Union	Page 78
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Communications and Media Authority	Page 79
Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change	Page 101
Implementation – Ways to Deliver	Page 109
Implementation – Reasons to Repatriate to the Caribbean	Page 118
Planning – 10 Big Ideas for the Caribbean Region – Cyber-Caribbean	Page 127
Planning – Ways to Make the Caribbean Better	Page 136
Planning – Reasons Why the CU Will Succeed	Page 137
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Education – Promotion of e-Learning	Page 159
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Governance – e-Government & e-Delivery Deployments	Page 168
Advocacy – Ways to Better Manage the Social Contract – Technology/Efficiencies	Page 170
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Communications – Regulate Cross-Border Broadband and WiFi Modes	Page 186
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Technology – Intellectual Property Protections	Page 197
Advocacy – Ways to Foster e-Commerce – e-Payments & Wifi Facilitations	Page 198
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Main Street – Wifi & Mobile Apps: Time and Place	Page 201
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Monopolies – Utilities to Oversee ICT/New Media	Page 202
Advocacy – Ways to Impact the Youth – Foster Work Ethic for ICT	Page 227
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Urban Living – Broadband for Work-at-Home	Page 234
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Rural Living – Ideal for Satellite Deployment	Page 235

While the Go Lean book focuses primarily on economic issues, it also recognizes that technology is paramount.

We must nurture growth in this industry space – Cyber Space – for the Caribbean’s present and future dispositions.

The returns on our investments will be garnered by our children.

For example:

Imagine no need to go abroad to college because access is enabled for any college/university of choice by logging on to the internet.

We must welcome this change!

The Go Lean book describes the effort to create this reality as heavy-lifting, and then urges all to lean-in to this roadmap.

This urging is repeated here again. All Caribbean stakeholders (people, organizations and governments) are urged to lean-in to this roadmap. This is conceivable, believable and achievable. We can do this … and make the region a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the book Go Lean…Caribbean now!

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New Security Chip in Credit Cards Unveiled

Posted on October 1, 2015 in Economics, Industries, Tactical

Go Lean Commentary

Big changes are coming to credit cards, as of today, Thursday, October 1, 2015.

The credit card industry is advancing, moving forward. The Caribbean should likewise be advancing, moving forward.

A previous blog-commentary demonstrated that the region’s banks are ready to accept electronic payment transactions, that their deployment of credit card terminals allow the introduction of the Caribbean Dollar (C$) as a regional currency. Well now, those terminals need to be upgraded …

… or the merchants will suffer the resultant risks.

The world has already moved forward from the standard of magnetic stripe cards. The present is now smart cards…or no card at all; (payment apps on Google’s Android and Apple’s iPhone devices proliferate). The future of the credit, debit and payment card is more than a card, it’s a “computer science laboratory” in a pocket or purse!

Yes, payment systems in the Caribbean region must be ready for this new world of electronic commerce.

Getting the region ready was the mission of the book Go Lean … Caribbean, a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) and the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB). This Go Lean roadmap depicts these entities as hallmarks of technocratic efficiency; agile to not just keep pace of technology and market changes but also to drive change as well. This ability is necessary for new payment systems, new cards and new settlement schemes. The Go Lean roadmap calls for a regional currency for the Caribbean Single Market, the Caribbean Dollar (C$), to be used primarily as an electronic currency. These schemes will impact the growth of the regional economy in both the domestic and tourist markets. Consider this one CU scheme to incentivize more spending among cruise line passengers:

The cruise industry needs the Caribbean more than the Caribbean needs the industry. But the cruise lines have embedded rules/regulations designed to maximize their revenues at the expense of the port-side establishments. The CU solution is to deploy a scheme for smartcards (or smart-phone applications) that function on the ships and at the port cities. This scheme will also employ NFC technology – (Near Field Communications; defined fully at Page 192 – so as to glean the additional security benefits of shielding private financial data of the guest and passengers.

This is an example of an electronic payment system facilitating more commerce (e-Commerce). So the CCB will settle all C$ electronic transactions – cashless or accounting currency – in a MasterCard-Visa-style interchange / clearinghouse system.

As of October 1, 2015 bankcards must possess a smartchip, or assume the risk of fraud transactions; see VIDEO below. The CU/CCB roadmap anticipated smartchips from the outset of the Go Lean book, as this covers more than just commerce, but addresses security as well. Commerce, security and (bank) governance – these are all societal engines that must be optimized for societal progress. In fact, the Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improvement of Caribbean governance to support these engines.

So the electronic payments schemes being considered by the rest of the world in the following article, are already envisioned for deployment in the Caribbean region:

VIDEO – New Security Chip in Credit Cards Unveiled – http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/video/security-chip-credit-cards-unveiled-34114798

Posted September 28, 2015 – New law required each card to be outfitted with a credit card chip that makes it harder to steal personal information.

The benefits of these technologies, as related in the foregoing VIDEO, cannot be ignored for their security features. Previously this commentary explored the issues associate with cyber-security and data breaches. With tourism as the primary economic driver, the Caribbean region cannot invite millions of visitors to our homeland and then ignore their need for protection; the kind of protection that has become standard in this new world of heightened information security.

The Go Lean roadmap calls for the CU to regulate the region’s Communications and Media affairs – federal Department of Commerce – under a separation-of-power mandate with the member-states. This authority must be super-national and have purview for cross-border environments.

With the CCB taking the lead for this deployment, the effort is not meant to be technical, but rather economic. The greatest benefit of deploying these electronic payment scheme is the acceleration of M1 in the regional economy; this is the measurement of currency/money in circulation (M0) plus overnight bank deposits. As depicted in the Go Lean book, and subsequent blog-commentaries, M1 increases allow central banks to create money “from thin-air”; referring to the money multiplier.

The Caribbean region needs this benefit. The more money in the system, the more liquidity for investment and industrial expansion opportunities. Plus, the nullifying effects on Black Market spurns more benefits.

The Go Lean book posits that to adapt and thrive in the new global marketplace there must be more strenuous management and technocratic oversight of the region’s currencies, guests-tourists-ship-passenger payment cards and cyber security. This is the charge – economics, security and governance – of the Go Lean roadmap, opening with these pronouncements; Declaration of Interdependence (Page 13 and 14):

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

xxv. Whereas the legacy of international democracies had been imperiled due to a global financial crisis, the structure of the Federation must allow for financial stability and assurance of the Federation’s institutions. To mandate the economic vibrancy of the region, monetary and fiscal controls and policies must be incorporated as proactive and reactive measures. These measures must address threats against the financial integrity of the Federation and of the member-states.

xxvii. Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.

The Go Lean book details a series of community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to foster the proper controls for electronic/mobile payments in the Caribbean region:

Community Ethos – Economic Principles	Page 21
Community Ethos – Money Multiplier Principle	Page 22
Community Ethos – Security Principles – Privacy versus Public Protection	Page 23
Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Cooperatives	Page 25
Community Ethos – Promote Intellectual Property	Page 29
Community Ethos – Ways to Bridge the Digital Divide	Page 31
Community Ethos – Ways to Improve Sharing	Page 25
Strategy – Mission – Fortify the monetary needs through a Currency Union	Page 45
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Central Banking	Page 73
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Department of Commerce – Communications and Media Authority	Page 79
Implementation – Assemble Central Bank Cooperative	Page 96
Implementation – Assemble Caribbean Regional Regulatory Organs – like CTU	Page 96
Implementation – Ways to Deliver	Page 109
Planning – 10 Big Ideas – #2: Currency Union / Single Currency	Page 127
Anecdote – Caribbean Currencies	Page 149
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Mitigate Black Markets	Page 165
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Cooperatives	Page 176
Advocacy – Ways to Enhance Tourism	Page 190
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Cruise Tourism – Smartcard scheme	Page 193
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Technology	Page 197
Advocacy – Ways to Foster e-Commerce	Page 198
Advocacy – Reforms for Banking Regulations – Central Banking Efficiencies	Page 199
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Main Street – Facilitating e-Commerce	Page 201
Appendix – Assembling the Caribbean Telecommunications Union (CTU)	Page 256

The points of effective, technocratic banking/currency stewardship and dynamic change in the mobile communications space were further elaborated upon in these previous blog/commentaries:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5668	Move over Mastercard/Visa
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4425	Cash, Credit or iPhone …
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3889	RBC EZPay – Ready for Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3881	The Need for Regional Cooperation to Up Cyber-Security
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3617	Bahamas roll-out of VAT leading more to Black Markets
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2074	MetroCard – Model for the Caribbean Dollar
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1350	PayPal expands payment services to 10 markets
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=906	Bitcoin virtual currency needs regulatory framework to change image
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=476	CARICOM urged on ICT, e-Commerce and e-Payments

The Caribbean need to not play catch-up with this new smartchip/smartcard requirement. We need to adjust and adapt to the changing world.

This is no longer the future. This is here and now.

This is good! The benefits of this new requirements are too enticing to resist this change: incentivizing more cruise-tourism spending, fostering more e-Commerce, enhancing security, increasing regional M1, mitigating Black Markets, regional oversight of this technology, growing the economy, creating jobs and optimizing governance.

Now is the time for all stakeholders of the Caribbean, (residents, visitors, merchants, vendors, bankers, and governing institutions), to lean-in for the empowerments described in the book Go Lean … Caribbean. This change can help to make the Caribbean a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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