In August you find out that the service provider has been taken over for PTCL. Actually the transaction happened a few months ago which immediately explains why their service went down so dramatically.
Later that month you receive a bill from PTCL requiring you to pay for your disconnected service. You go over to the exchange and you are told that since you are now going to deal directly with PTCL there is no hope or chance of an appeal. They will keep on charging you for it. Plus you haven’t returned the modem. You return the modem and request them to kindly shut off the service since you are no longer using it and can no longer use it without the modem. PTCL tells you that No! since they are PTCL and they are a monopoly they can do whatever they want and they will keep on charging you for the service till you pay all past dues for service which was disconnected in July for which the modem was returned in August.
Calling Competition Commission of Pakistan and Pakistan Telecommunication Authority! Can you please drum since into these guys in Islamabad.
]]>There are many ways to approach and develop a national ICT policy framework. Over the last eleven years a number of initiatives have been undertaken in this area by individuals and groups sponsored by our technology industry association (P@SHA), Ministry of IT (MOIT), by the state (the Planning Commission), local and expatriate Pakistanis. Within the list of above initiative policy documents have been developed keeping in view long term national goals, vision and outlook; by initiating and documenting stakeholders conversations; by surveying industry groups and their customers; by comparing our efforts with regional initiatives and finally by reviewing where we are and where we need to be in the future.
While at a broad policy level we have information as well as recommendations on using ICT for growth, development and employment creation it was felt that an updated national policy document with actionable milestones and fundable projects, reflecting the point of views of primary stake holders and the technology industry association was required. We needed a document that would reflect our assessment of gaps in the state of national ICT and the role we can play in plugging those gaps. A document that was specific enough to build a case for recommendation to ICT Taskforces yet deep enough to stand on its own in the policy conversations and debates we initiate.
As part of our efforts to prepare this document we reviewed the work done by a number of our predecessors, engaged members of civil society, the technology industry, the telecommunication community, the services sector, media and socio-political activists. The document was then selectively presented for initial feedback and reactions and the feedback was incorporated after discussion. As a final step the document will be presented at three forums in Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad to key stakeholders for a final round of discussion before its release to the policy community in Pakistan.
Earlier policy initiatives were primarily industry centric. In its early stage the ICT and ITES industry was external focused with a large number of companies targeting the software export market. Given the industry focus and the government initiative to increase the pace of exports, the primary intervention theme was to do the needful required grow software exports. From building a pool of skilled and trained human resources to providing internet connectivity, from reviewing curriculum to exhibiting internationally, almost all core policy initiatives focused on the external market.
However one of the lessons that we have learnt from the last decade of policy implementation experience is that a national ICT policy has to be national in its focus and emphasis. While software exports have grown at an impressive rate over the last decade the domestic technology consumption figure is now just as significant and almost half as large, if not more, than our total international contribution. More importantly both contribution figures (exports, domestic consumption) ignore the enabler impact of technology on other related sectors such as banking, insurance, government, manufacturing, media, education, defence and agriculture.
But beyond technology, ICT and ITES play a significant role in national development and GDP growth. Two projects that support this point of view are the Tameer Bank/Telenor easy paisa project and the NADRA national identification card database. Besides documenting the economy, both projects have created the potential to add another 2% – 3% to the national GDP and will consistently do so over the next many decades.
Imagine the impact similar projects could create in the area of education, literacy, agriculture, trade, market development manufacturing and media.
Hence the need to create a national orientation within the ICT Policy making process. The objective is to not drive the process by a sense of patriotism or philanthropy but recognition of the economic opportunity unsolved problems represent in the domestic market.
The opportunity comes in two dimensions. The first is solving a problem through technology and getting paid for it. The second is the reference sites and domain expertise the solution creates for the collection of firms solving that problem which can then be used to pitch for work globally.
For example, we have recently seen freelance cell phone developers morph into specialized mobile application developers morph into mobile animation shops, morph into mobile gaming companies within a span of 3 to 4 years. With the right set of incentives and mentoring a similar roadmap could be repeated for companies working with financial services, health, telecommunications industry, manufacturing and agricultural technology.
Please read the P@SHA National ICT Policy draft recommendations document and view the youtube presentation below which was shared with the first Stakeholders Group presentation in Karachi this Saturday. We have similar presentations planned for Lahore and Islamabad later this month but feel free to share your comments and feedback on this document In this post we share the presentation and the draft recommendations document shared at the first stakeholders meeting held at the P@SHA Secretariat in Karachi on 15th October 2011.
1. P@SHA National ICT Policy draft recommendations for circulation – The draft recommendation policy document
2. P@SHA National ICT Policy draft recommendations presentation – The power point pitch
P@SHA National ICT Policy Recommendations Presentation – The mp3 video presentation (also see the Youtube edition)
]]>In the Pitching Case Studies course (55 minutes) we review common challenges faced by startup and venture teams in making an impression, including:
The Pitching your business plan course (3 hours and change) was the original pre-requisite that led to Pitching Case Studies. While case studies dissected actual pitches, Pitching your business plans presented the framework that was used for dissection. Starting from the voice of the customer, we quickly waltz through business models, competition, competitive advantage and pitching.
In early September we ran Cross Selling Treasury Products (90 minutes) in Dubai for an audience of Corporate and Private Bankers. A market oriented video edition of our Treasury risk series, the Treasury product course focuses on the client exposure estimation question. Designed for Corporate RM’s and account managers, the video helps walk through the process and tools required to structure a solution for a client using a case study. Cross Selling Treasury Products goes live for purchase on Monday, 17th October.
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]]>The market
There are 7 million expat Pakistanis outside Pakistan. This number does not include the second or third generation or extended families and is limited to current NICOP and Passport holders. If you include Pakistani origin individuals and families the number jumps to about 35 million individuals outside Pakistan who at some level are interested in staying in touch with their original identity. A large part of this identity is our mutual heritage including language. For kids the earliest introduction to language is through lullabies and nursery rhymes. One big challenge that our expats face is exposing their children to the Urdu language at an early age where the child is already speaking a different primary language such as English. In addition to the expat there are about four million English speaking households in Pakistan where the language spoken at home is not Urdu. Finally within our rural areas as well as urban centers there are many communities where we have a cell phone network but no access to schools.
By creating a portfolio of animated nursery rhymes and stories and making them available not just on the web but also through our smart phone applications we hope to reach out to these distinct groups using a phased approach. Phased because by the time we build up our content library, smart phone would become cheap enough to be affordable for a home or garage school in some of the poorest tehsils in Pakistan. Our hope is that by doing so we can help teach kids our language in a fun and interesting way and also contribute to preserving our heritage and identity.
The opportunity and the business model
While the website includes free content, our smart phone applications would use the common .99 cents per additional story purchased model. By focusing on expat customers to pay for a library of stories on a regular basis we expect to subsidize the same content for rural and low income urban communities. With an initial launch aimed at North America, Europe and Middle East we expect to ramp up product to about 10 new releases every month with an end state of over 500 hundred lullabies, nursery rhymes and stories that young children can use to teach themselves Urdu all across the world. Our revenue share from cell phone sales will range between 30% to 65% of gross receipts depending on the cell phone platform used. The expected growth for this model allows us to reach 5 – 10 million US$ a year in annual revenues within 18 months of the point where we start charging for new stories and content. Promotional packages have also been designed where parents can buy package of 10, 15 and 20 stories at steep discounts. Given our focus on young children and expat professionals and the absence of similar animated content in Urdu and the need for this community to stay in touch with their roots once we do a formal launch with the right marketing we expect to see a very reasonable rate of conversion. A large part of these proceeds can then be utilized to reach out to under privileged children and teach them how to read Urdu as well as English back home here in Pakistan.
Standards
Teaching children a new language and a new concept is both an art and a science. Making it playful and fun is a completely different story. We have looked at a range of similar projects in other languages and one common theme that we use is to work with translating the existing library of nursery rhymes in English so children outside Pakistan are already familiar with the context and the content and only have to identify and work with the right labels. Our attempt is to create content and build a platform that works equally well on the web and on Nokia, iPhone, iPad, Android and the Windows 7 platforms. We have an in-house animation, design and recording studio that tries to reuse our internal library of resources, frames and soundtrack so that the cost of content production is pushed as low as possible and the quality of the content is maintained at a level where the child can still be engaged.
User requirements and features
We study reactions to our content and future planned release in controlled story telling sessions with children and their parents on a regular basis. This helps us identify additional trick and approaches and give us feedback on what type of content works with young children and what doesn’t.
I am not the mighty Jawwad Farid, I am just the Jawwad who has failed a number of time starting up businesses and get annoyed when people pushing transparency as an agenda themselves are not transparent.
My only claim to judge this category is that I have been teaching kids since 1989, undergraduate students since 1995 and graduate students since 2003. I have started two e-learning companies (the first in 1999) and train bankers for a living. Since you have already written me off as biased I am not sure if this is going to go down well.
Here is some sincere advice. You know everything there is to know about me, my views, my biases, my relationships and my failures. But I don’t know who you are. From the looks of it appears that you are pushing the case for the company that you work for that has no information at all about its founders and owners on its about us page. There is nothing wrong with being upset with me as a judge since you are going to miss out on that trip to Thailand. But then be fair to your cause and do full disclosure. Come out and tell us who you are and where you work and why do you care so much about the runner up. We will not hold it against you.
I don’t care about the event. This much should be obvious. I care because when you question the judges and their independence, you take away from all the hard work the winners put in over the years in getting where they are today. You take away from the recognition that they have received and the credibility of both the P@SHA Awards as well as the APICTA ICT Awards. And for what; generating cheap traffic through controversy? Yes you have a right to do that and I respect that right but then let’s do that with civility and poise.
]]>The Pitching for startups: Making winning business plan pitches course is now live. I went a step ahead and did a Business Plan Pitching Case Studies supplementary course. The Business Plan Pitching Case Studies course dissects 7 business plan pitches that I analyze for stuff that I like and dislike, for ideas that work and don’t. Combined with the pitching for Startup framework it tells you everything I have learnt about making and grading pitches over the last 11 years as an entrepreneur and business plan competition judge.
There is also background post where I review where the idea and inspiration for the two courses came from. Yup you guessed it; from the infamous Ken Morse elevator pitching session at MITEF BAP competition.
Here is an extract second post in the series reproduced here on the blog (Business Plan pitching Case Studies)
One big benefit of teaching the very bright and loving students at SP Jain has been this underground collection of pitches that I have built up since May 2007 when I first taught the course in Dubai. As we have all learned more about the art of pitching, about what works and what doesn’t we have gone out and made improvements every year in the materials we cover as well as the quality of pitches made by my students.
It was only natural that after doing the Pitching for startup course I would go back to some of my all time favorite pitches, pitched over the last four years and dissect them for the students who enrolled for the Pitching for Startup.
A very warm welcome then to the Pitching for Startup – Case Studies course. A supplementary course that picks up where we stopped with Pitching for Startups. In just under 30 minutes we walk through all the right notes hit by five different real life Exec. MBA and GMBA student pitches covering sectors ranging from Entertainment, Petrochemicals, Demographics, Fashion Accessories and Transportation.
I review the basic premise, product and service idea and the reason why the pitch remained memorable in my mind over the years and what the group got right and how does that fit in what entrepreneurs generally tend to get wrong. The examples that we highlight and dissect that we touch include:
Combined with the materials covered in the Pitching for startup course, the Pitching case study session allows you to actually see the concepts covered in the earlier course at work. My hope is that the combined lessons will allow you to deliver powerful, effective and moving pitches.
The buy now is up at Business Plan Pitching Case Studies.
Here are some of the core lessons that we highlight during our dissection and analysis of the seven selected business plan pitches:
1) Presenting a complex concepts and products with simplified visuals and graphics in your business plan pitch?
2) Presenting financial data in a pitch – Balance sheet and P&L in an easy to understand format?
3) How to make back of the envelope calculations easy for your investors?
4) Presenting Financials – What I need and want to see as an investor?
5) Simplifying and presenting your revenue model in your business plan pitch?
6) The best way to visualize customer pain in a pitch
7) Sequencing slides correctly to create much more impact and acceptance for your sales pitch
8. How to showcase the underlying magic and process behind your value chain in your business plan presentation?
9) How to get past the “I don’t think this is real” or “I don’t think these guys can do it” mindset of investors, clients and partners?
10) How to use target market surveys and incorporate them in your presentation and pitch? What questions to ask your target customers in your target surveys?
11) How to use more than 5 slides in under 30 seconds to create impact and introduce your idea to your audience without getting bogged down in the details
12) What is credibility? How do you go about building it in a business plan presentation or elevator pitch?
]]>Every year the P@SHA ICT Awards ceremony hosts 500 hundred plus souls for a night. We have now been doing this for 8 years and the show as well as the number of entries has grown many folds since 2005, the first year we ran as a participant at the awards. Every year we have a handful of individuals who are not happy, who hate the format, dislike the trophy, dismiss the function, write off the industry, spit on the sidewalk, clog the loo and walk away counting everything we missed and got wrong.
This year, despite the effort and the time spent in rehearsing the awards ceremony, was to be no different. But it is our job to listen and acknowledge the feedback and when it is reasonable and constructive we act on it and try to improve. Feedback is a gift and there are many friends who share it gently and nicely. They appreciate the effort, the energy and the commitment and suggest improvements that can make the award a better experience next year without gesturing away everything. (Thank you and a big hand for all of you who did that this year).
When it’s not we just pray that our hecklers find peace and move on with their lives and find meaning in something more meaningful than spending the night watching the Express Tribune and Pro-Pakistani blogs to bat the next entry out to hell. Heck you can’t keep all 500 (575 this year) guests happy. Yes, yes I know we are the technology industry association but we would rather bring down the trade deficit then get into empty arguments.
So lets the record straight. Yes we missed on a few notes – as always the Awards night wasn’t perfect. We tried but we missed a few spots.
Fair enough. Let’s do some more feedback. Now let’s talk about all the things that you got wrong but we got right.
The awards criteria has been on the P@SHA ICT Awards site from day one. How much more transparent do you want us to be?
Why do we use the Asia Pacific ICT Award Judging Criteria? To begin with one key objective of the P@SHA ICT Awards is to help open up the Far Eastern market by helping showcase our companies at the APICTA Awards(our third largest export market btw after US and UK and before Middle East and Western Europe). You can’t showcase a company without winning. You can’t win without following the APICTA Criteria. Are we the only one who do it? No, most countries in the region use the same criteria to give a head start to their teams. We do the same.
And while we are at, the criteria for the awards get reviewed and revised each year by the technology industry associations of 22 countries. We participate in that exchange and respect the individuals who sit on the criteria committees. There is a lot of hard work that has gone into developing this framework over the last eight years.
Yes we love our friends and family and sponsors. But we don’t love them enough for us to throw away something that we love even more. Something we have built over 8 years of hard work and sacrifices. Companies that win, win because they score well on the Awards criteria. The sponsors that you speak about have been sponsoring the event for the last three years. How come they have only won this once?
Yes you have a right to better understand the judging criteria. We review the applications, do an initial shortlist and then ask you to submit a youtube video. If you take time out to do everything, we review it, it if you don’t we review what you have done to see if you have a shot at the first two slots. There are many instances where judges also discreetly check for industry and client references. We ask around (unfortunately we are a little too well connected so we have to be very quiet). Whether you are on the list or not on is completely up to you. If you have done something that has created impact and you have done a great job of showing us how that impact has changed lives and will keep on changing lives, we love you. Do a good job with your application and your product and you will be recognized. You win. Do a lousy one and you won’t. That is all there is to it.
And now finally the big debate in the e-learning category. I was the judge. I picked toffeetv.com. It was my call. Yes Rabia is a friend but does that mean she should be penalized for the choice. It is a small industry we all know each other. I was also the judge for the Tertiary student category and I voted for the IST project, a school and a team that I have never met in my entire life. Looked at their product and their demo and liked what they had done. Didn’t vote for the group that I knew but unfortunately they still won. Look at the Awards criteria and tell me I was wrong. And when you do remember the Asia Pacific ICT Awards are rated on the following criteria:
Better yet, come out ahead of toffeetv.com at the Asia Pacific ICT Awards and win something. Prove us wrong, we would be more than happy to have two winners. In a world where quality and unique content is king you can’t compare a directory portal with a concept with global appeal that is themed, focused and content rich. Listen to her history and be honest enough to admit the appeal of the idea and the business model. You are not rated and graded on Alexa ranking and traffic stats, you are not rated how abusive and immature you get on public blogs; you are rated on your ability to stand apart and win in Thailand. Unfortunately when the time came to test you, you were found lacking. Toffeetv.com wasn’t. Let’s just leave it at that. Don’t second guess us, look inside yourself and you will find the reason why you weren’t good enough.
In the end if the event was as biased and unfair as you want to portray it, why would more than hundred entries find their way to the awards committee every year. Why would we pick our share of winners at the APICTA Awards every year if our judgment was so flawed? Why would hundreds of volunteers and organizers waste their time and effort without any compensation on an unreal event, every year?
Enough said.
]]>Alchemy Technologies has a client who needs transcription services for a number of English videos. This is an ongoing assignment that will carry well into the next year. In its first phase about 12 hours of videos need to be transcribed in English. If you are interested and feel that you have the right fit, please drop us a copy of your resume and writing samples from prior work.
You will be asked to transcribe a sample video of 15 minutes and will be informed within a day about your eligibility for the role.
Who are you?
You love writing, reading and learning about new topics.
You don’t hate finance. In fact you have always been curious about the subject
You took English in your Ordinary and Advance levels and read about 4 books a week from all sort of diverse subjects.
You are reliable, diligent and extremely hardworking but for personal reasons want to work from home. You have a computer or a laptop and a high-speed internet connection at home and know how to type.
It will take you no more than 120 minutes to transcribe a 60 minute video and you will be able to turnaround most transcription request within 24 hours of receipt of the assignment.
Payment Terms:
Payments will be processed within 15 days of completion of the engagement and on completion of an employment and non-disclosure contract.
If you are a good fit and are interested, please drop a cover letter, a resume and writing samples to jawwad@alchemya.com
Continuing Profession Education (CPE) online learning solutions for actuaries
Stress testing crash course for Board of Directors and Board Risk Committee members
Cross selling treasury products
Two new online video based courses – The Stress Testing, ALM and Capital Adequacy Crash Course and the shorter and more cost effective ALM and Capital Adequacy Crash Course are live and available for purchase.
In over six hours of video based instruction the two courses cover the following topics
The Stress Testing, ALM and Capital Adequacy Crash Course
Annexure and related topics
The ALM and Capital Adequacy Crash Course
Annexure and related topics
Monday morning Jehan reminded me of my two commitments to judge the P@SHA Launch Pad event as well as stumble my way through 2 feet (yup that is how high they stack) of applications received for the P@SHA Social Innovation Fund.
As I dressed and rushed to leave home on our daily 18 kilometer trek to drop our kids to school at 7:30 am, I saw Fawzia waving to me while talking to someone on the phone. “There has been a bomb blast near the school, Kaleem is saying we should take the kids back home”.
For a mad second I thought, it will take more than a blast for CAS to get shut down and kids can’t miss school because of a stupid bomb. Back inside it was TV, Twitter, Face book and cell phones. One look at the breaking news and any thought of making an anti-terror statement by sending our kids to school was dead in the water. An hour later I had given up on TV since the quality of news coverage started eroding immediately after the news broke. We have to figure out how to fix this – a country of 180 million creative people and the best we can do rating wise is Geo and Express News? Big F to the PBA and the twenty odd news channels that are really all doing Ctrl C and Ctrl V with the same content. Twitter and Facebook took over where the media industry failed.
By Monday evening after sitting through a full day of news coverage, I was in a state of rage and drafting my own ten step plan for fixing this country involving politicians, the Arabian Sea, our many so called well wishers, friends, partners, advisors and nuclear weapons. I had to shut down my trusted laptop and disconnect the internet before I wrote something that I would regret later which would get me banned on Facebook and bring a Seal team through my front door, not necessarily in that order. Maroof suggested we should all come out into the streets and bring the government down but I wondered if that was really a solution (coming out in the street, not bringing the government down…)
Tuesday was P@SHA Launchpad and for the first time in my life as a mentor, teacher and trainer I was surprised by the quality of pitches presented at the event. More so since because of the blast and the lives we have started leading there wasn’t any preliminary prep session. While violence still resonated at the back of my mind, the fresh promise and potential of young, itsy, bitsy, teeny, weenie companies and teams that we had been working with gave me hope and direction. Imagine with so much destruction and devastation around us if we could still inspire kids to change the world, where would we be if we could only put Monday behind us. And maybe that is the solution we need: jobs, prosperity and ownership – if we all had jobs, money in our wallets, food in our stomach and a reasonable civil society that would respect our claim to speak, interact and not kill each other, would we still apply for that suicide bombing position on Craiglist.
Wednesday was my newly discovered, slightly used dentist’s appointment. While I dreaded heading towards Awab’s clinic, once I landed at its entrance, all such misgivings disappeared. It felt as if I had left Pakistan and moved to an exotic Far Eastern location. Moss covered brick walls, old green trees with shade and rather than white antiseptic window less walls, wide open spaces and filtered natural light. Unlike many of the faceless, featureless hospitals I have suffered in my life, this one had 60 years of history and character draped around it. If it wasn’t for the drills and the x-ray machine one could easily confuse it with a herbal wrap spa (how is that for a suggestion Awab). This was obviously before Awab started playing with the cavity in my left incisor, took a look at my x-ray and started laughing. I wasn’t sure if it was dry dental humor or sophisticated civil activism at work.
Thursday my wading through two feet of P@SHA Social Innovation fund applications yielded some results. There were some really crazy kids with really crazy ideas that just might work (and they don’t involve nuclear weapons, Facebook or Seal teams). I sent over my inch thick selection (so about 1/24 selection rate) over to Jehan, went back to pick up a filing at the Alvi Dental Hospital while listening to piped U2 and Springsteen tracks and then headed straight to Sama – the last one of my baby sisters, who tonight will leave this country to settle in Canada.
Is there any other place in the world where you could get such rich and conflicting blend of hope and violence, promise and despair in a given week? And it is not even Friday afternoon.
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