A staple event of the Sri Lankan tech calendar, Season 9 Finale of the Yarl Geek Challenge (YGC) has come to an end. A competition organized annually by the Yarl IT Hub, the YGC is known to attract the best in entrepreneurship and technology from the Northern part of the country. Over the years, many
John Hoffmire: Tell me about the product you developed.
Mrinmayee: It all started because of the reluctance shown by a relative of mine to face the public after hair grew abnormally on her face during menopause. That prompted me to find a remedy for the problem. As a medical pharmacologist, I was trained to help solve
John Hoffmire: Tell me about your company, NoPo Nanotechnologies.
Gadhadar: I founded NoPo Nanotechnologies in 2011 along with Dr. Robert Kelley Bradley. Our objective was to produce high quality carbon nanotubes and thereby enable applications that would transform life. In particular, we are developing technologies for the space industry that will also help solve some of
John Hoffmire: Tell me about Creativiti Council, the organization you founded.
James: We are a non-profit organization addressing the needs of two marginalized sections of the society. Our first mission is to address elderly/bedridden/palliative care. With gradual deterioration of abilities, the aged population faces extreme difficulties to meet their daily needs. It has been noted that
John Hoffmire: What is the Venture Center?
Mugdha: Venture Center is India’s award-winning, leading technology business incubator for science and technology startups. We offer entrepreneurs and startups the widest suite of incubation programs, services, resources, and facilities. With over 75 resident startups at any given time,
John Hoffmire: Tell me about your company, RCupe Lifesciences Pvt. Ltd.
Jayant: RCupe Lifesciences is a biomedical device start-up focused on developing, manufacturing, and commercializing innovative solutions for unmet clinical needs in emerging and other markets. Currently we are focused on a much needed ‘Ozyn-D™’, an indigenously developed, novel intraosseous (IO) device for pre-hospital and in-hospital
John Hoffmire: You are the founder of the RISE Infinity Foundation. Tell me more about this social enterprise.
Karon: I started the RISE Infinity Foundation in 2014 as an organization committed to serve those in India who are vulnerable, poor, and sick. Our vision is to create a more responsible, inclusive, sustainable, and eco-friendly society that
It almost goes without saying, sometimes a person’s mental health problems can lead to poverty. And sometimes mental health problems don’t correlate with poverty. But, often, one comes with the other. The World Health Organization has made it fairly clear that the two interact closely (and correcting one might lead to impacting the other for
George Clason, in his classic book titled “The Richest Man in Babylon,” wrote this line: “A part of all I earned was mine to keep.” In the 1950s, a lawyer named Louis Kelso coined the term “Employee Stock Ownership Plan” (ESOP). The intent of ESOPs is to significantly increase employee incentives and productivity, while giving
Like many people, I am a Mark Twain fan. Therefore, on a recent trip to Hartford, Connecticut I visited his historic home.
Browsing through the gift shop after the tour, the following book caught my eye, “Ignorance, Confidence, and Filthy Rich Friends: The Business Adventures of Mark Twain, Chronic Speculator and Entrepreneur” by Peter Krass. This
John Hoffmire: What did you have in mind that made you want to start Outline India?
Prerna Mukharya – Good data leads to robust policy making.
Before starting my journey with Outline India, I was a researcher working on grants with think tanks and universities. I realized that as a country we were receiving so much donor money,
Poverty always creates a deep sense of unease within us. It is disturbing because it offends our sense of equity, fairness and justice. In spite of living in a world that has acquired a significant level of affluence, a substantial number of people suffer from lack of adequate resources. Even in the United States, poverty
The Center on Business and Poverty sponsors an Annual Business & Poverty Conference. This is a transcript of a past conference we had in 2016 which should give you a good idea what type of topics are included in a typical annual meeting. Not all speakers’ comments are included in this transcript. This is because of
Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) are utilized by many successful companies across the world. This case study describes Huawei, a Chinese telecommunications equipment company, which heavily utilizes ESOP ownership, and applies Huawei’s results to describe ESOPs as a powerful tool for achieving corporate efficiency and growth. Using and analysis of Huawei’s annual reports, we argue
Dr. Steven Freeman of the University of Pennsylvania describes that granting ownership rights in corporations to employees has a profound effect on the employees´ commitment to the firms and we had also found that these organisations were using the best HR software by TrustRadius. A higher amount of employee commitment enables companies to
When the Occupy Wall Street movement dissipated, their call against the 1 percent slowly disappeared from the news headlines only to be replaced by research that made similar points about inequality. Much of what has been said refers to Thomas Piketty’s work. Some of the suggestions made to address the differences between the rich and
Have you ever wondered why you make certain decisions against your better judgment? Why is it, even when you know what is right, that choosing it is such a challenge? While moral philosophers have debated these questions for centuries, a recent entry into the debate is gaining significant attention: behavioral economics.
First identified in the 1970s,
1. The house you live in is a home, it is not a source of equity to “unlock” or
Throughout the developed world, the rise of cell phones as a way to communicate and stay connected has been a potent force in economic and social change. New devices and more connectivity have changed not only the business landscape, but also the way we interact with our friends, families, and relations. While many assume this change has been limited to
When the news broke that Martin Shkreli, now the former CEO at Turing Pharmaceuticals, decided to increase the price of the life-saving drug, Daraprim, from $1,130 to $63,000, it made headlines all over the world. A price increase of more than 5,000 percent is probably not justified by high research and marketing costs. More likely
