Author: Avishek Gupta

I help drive sustainable development by financing the growth of professionally managed entrepreneurial ventures that solve key social and environmental problems. Having financed and observed over 250 ventures from close quarters, I understand the challenges that such ventures face in scaling up. I have the knowledge of process, financing and technology solutions that can help overcome those challenges. Separately, I have the experience of building businesses that finance early/growth stage companies. Most recently, I was involved with growing Caspian Debt to a full-fledged operating company from an initial 3 member fund investments team.

Next…what?

 

Renewable Energy.

Water.

Medical Technologies. (Detection and treatment)

Agriculture.- Food production & Food preservation.

That is where breakthrough innovation is required. We will possibly see breakthrough innovations in these areas (in that order) in future. Something similar to what we have seen in case of communication technologies over the past decade.

While Renewable Energy and Medical Technologies have received venture investments, Agri-Tech and Water are still to see mainstream venture capital investments.

Reading List – 2nd Ferbruary, 2014

1.) Framework for non-profits to have clear fundraising conversations.

Article: 10 Non-profit Funding Models

2.) Interesting article on how Amazon.com manages to be a favourite in spite of not churning profits!

Article: Amazon & nil profits

3.)Why Nokia is one of the greatest companies of the world.

Article: Nokia Bridge Programme

Reading List 21st Nov, 2013

(Was out on a vacation and hence no edition of reading list came out during the last couple of weeks.)

1.) Why drinking hits women harder and why older you get alcohol hits you harder?

Some interesting facts:

  • Body composition starts to change as early as the 30s. As people age, they tend to lose muscle mass, while fat content increases. Alcohol isn’t distributed in fat. People also have less total body water as they get older. So if several people have the same amount to drink, those with more fat and less muscle and body water will have more alcohol circulating in their bloodstream.
  • The liver gets bigger as people get older, but the organ becomes less efficient.
  • Enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase breaks down alcohol. Women of all ages tend to have lower levels of this enzyme in the stomach.
  • Moderate/safe amount of drinking is defined as up to two drinks per day for men and up to one drink per day for women, according to the latest federal Dietary Guidelines for Americans. (A standard drink is about 12 ounces of beer, 5 ounces of wine or 1.5 ounces of liquor, according to the CDC.)

Article: Alcohol

(All said and done, alcohol is best avoided.)

2.) Naps clear our “Cache’” and so sleep helps us remember more!

Article: Sleep

3.) Why do we value gold?

What is the reason behind gold being accepted as currency and other details on gold.

Article: Gold 

4.) Money transfer systems: simple explanation of the story behind the curtains on how money is transferred.

Article: Money Transfer

Reading List- 23rd Nov, 2013

1.)What if your memory is fake?

Article: Fake memory

Those people who seem to have a photographic memory might just be having a fake memory!

2.) A brilliant innovation gets you fit for the Olympics!

Video: Subway tickets

3.) The story of Mike Tyson. Told again.

Article: Mike Tyson

4.) How Amazon became an everything store

Article: Amazon

5.) Why does airline food suck?

Article: Airline food

Boredom and Low humidity are two key reasons along with constraints in preparing food in the air. We lose sense of taste/flavour due to a blocked sinus and low humidity. This makes us less perceptive of the taste. Interestingly, Indian food is less affected by these conditions due to the fact that naturally permits humid sauces in its preparation.

Reading List – 16th Nov, 2013

1.) What happened during the US Government shutdown?

Article: US Shutdown

2.) How did “Volvo” become synonymous with luxury AC road travel in India.

Case Study: Volvo- India

3.) The secret world of cargo ships. A brilliant story of how cargo gets moved across the world, in most cases the people moving them having no clue as to what they are carrying.

Article: Secret Cargo

4.) The perfect home? How would you design a “connected” intelligent home?

Article: Perfect home

5.) An interesting list of countries ranked in order of the incarceration rates.

Wiki: List

Reading List – 9th November, 2013

1.) How does the pirates business model work? An interesting article on financing Somali Pirates.

Article: Somali Pirates

2.) Would you work harder if you were given a raise? A new Harvard study says yes, but only if it came as a surprise and you thought that you were already being paid the “going rate”.

Article: Pay and performance

3.) What happens if you don’t have telephone, internet? An interesting story about what happened when a US island went completely off grid and only a few locations had connectivity

Article: Disconnected

4.) Fabulous work on micro-franchising from Jibu. A drinking water company set up in Africa.

Article: Microfranchising- Jibu

Interesting perspectives on how concepts like risk sharing, skin in the game and ownership structures can have a major role in deciding the success of delivery channels in any market, especially so for the developing world.