The electric vehicle (EV) was first created en-mass for the consumer market in 1996. Of course, due to many reasons (and some interesting conspiracy theories) it failed by 1999. Nowadays, we want electric cars, but we don’t like the hassle that comes with them.

The EV1

The biggest problem in owning an electric car is you can’t just “fill up” wherever you go. Shai Agassi is going to change that.

Shai Agassi, founder and CEO of Better Place

Shai Agassi is the founder and CEO of the company Better Place. Better Place does not just create and sell electric cars, but it creates and sells electric car infrastructure to countries. The first customer was Shai Agassi’s home-country of Israel, and now better place is in Denmark, and beginning its expansion into Australia, and even has an office in Ontario, Canada.

Shai Agassi does not only plan on selling electric cars, or electric infrastructure. He plans on selling the batteries to the electric cars, effectively giving him a monopoly on this new “gas” equivalent. He has taken the “razor, razor-blade” business model to the extreme, and hopes to make billions from it. Who can blame him?

I do not think I am alone when I say state this mathematical equation:

Midterms = Stress.

This is a pretty fair assumption. And assuming this, one could state:

2*Miterms = 2*Stress

Therefore, the more Midterms you have, the more stress you have. Seems simple enough. What if I told you the more stress you have, the more likely you are to contract diseases? That would mean…

Stress = Chance of Illness increase.

It has been proven that certain illnesses are caused by stress. Some of these include Asthma, Colds, and the Flu. Some studies go so far as the state Stress can lead to activities that increase the chance of lung cancer, heart disease, or stroke! Though this may seem far fetched, most people smoke when they are feeling stressed. People also use alcohol, and hard drugs to escape their “stressed out reality”

So if you’re like me, and you get stressed over midterms, you have (at the least) an increased chance of catching a cold.

To go back to my math analogy, if Stress = Chance of Illness increase, then…

Midterms = Chance of Illness increase

And the more midterms you have, the higher your odds of catching a cold.

Cue theme music!

Star Wars! for all of you who have not yet seen the movies, spoiler alert… it has the best theme music ever!

But Star Wars has something else few other movies have – Longevity. Calling Star Wars a cult classic does not do it justice. Star Wars is THE cult classic. The first Star Wars movie was released in… wait for it… 1977!!!!!!! The latest movie came out in 2005. that is a 28 year spread of pure profit.

Not only does Star Wars make movies, but they now have a cartoon television show, they sell action figures, memorabilia (such as fake lightsabers) and they even had their own trading cards!

Great movie… and arguably an even better business. It is estimated that George Lucas, the founder of Star Wars, is worth over 3.2 billion dollars. Not too shabby for a movie writer.

As you all know, a few classes ago we discussed Netflix’s decision to split its company up into a mail-in service company, and a streaming company (still called Netflix).

I now invite you to take a look at the Netflix stock…

As you can see, it has been hit QUITE hard in the past year or so. Someone not in Sauder would look at this and think “falling stock = bad company”, but a Sauderite may think differently…

I personally see a buying opportunity. The stock market is not solely based on fact – it is also based on emotion. If the market “thinks” a decision is bad, then the market reacts, and generally overreacts. In this case, Netflix’s loss of customers gave the market the impression Netflix was going to lose money, and therefore become less valuable. Of course, in class we all decided this risky decision may actually make Netflix more profitable.

I am going to look into this company a bit more, but unless I find something dramatic, I will be investing. The Market is moody, and overreacted. I plan on cashing in on its apology.