The Insider: Creating Better Entrepreneurs

In Tony Wanless’s Blog, he talks about his company, RedwardLoop, and the art of entrepreneurship. His company deals with mobile devices and won  $70,000 for its second place award at the BCIC-New Ventures Competition. Although Tony’s company  is doing great, he talks about his worry that not every company can say the same. This worry stems from the point that entrepreneurs now a days do not know the skills that are required in order to become successful. Along with running his business, Tony blogs on a regular basis for the Dragons’ Den. The problems that Tony has been seeing are such that people do not know how to detach their emotions from their product, which in turn does no good for themselves. The education about successful entrepreneurship is something that is lacking, which can only be solved by “real world training” as Tony says.

Article: BC Business

Author: Tony Wanless

Published: September 26, 2011

Ethics: Family of Winnipeg man who died in hospital waiting room seek justice

Brian Sinclair, a 45 year old man, was reported dead after waiting in a Winnipeg hospital for 34 hours. Brian Sinclair was a double-amputee with a speech impediment, anxiously waiting to be treated for a simple bladder infection. Because he was neglected of this treatment, which consisded of merely antibiotics and a catheter change , Brian consequently, passed away while in the HSC ER area. Brian’s family is eagerly waiting to see that legal consequences will be handed to the part of the hospital that is responsible for this. I completely agree with the family as it was a treatment that was simple, but could have saved a man’s life. Because the hospital as a whole can not be sentenced to jail, the hospital is potentially looking at charges of hundreds of thousands of dollars.

http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Family+Winnipeg+died+hospital+waiting+room+seek+justice/5404434/story.html

Article: The Vancouver Sun

Author: Mike McIntyre

Published: September 15, 2011

A Softdrink In Disguise

In Hayley Palmer’s blog about Vitamin Water, she discusses whether or not Vitamin Water is in fact, as healthy as it claims to be. Vitamin Water, not only sounds health beneficial, but on its nutrition label, it claims to make you feel better, stronger, and faster due to the vitamins it contains. This claim groups Vitamin Water with other sports drinks, except it appears above and beyond them because it is so much “healthier”. However, the real comparison should be with Coca-Cola. Vitamin Water is actually proven to have as much sugar comparable to Coke! One would never expect this because of the visage of how healthy it is. Because this is slowly being discovered, the brand name is being damaged by being legally attacked for false claims, as it should be. I do not agree with the fact that Vitamin Water has been misleading its customers this whole time, and I think they should pay for that.

Entrepreneurship: Wine Lovers Design a Lid to Keep Out Bugs

Renee and Greg Plumee, the creators of Thirsty Bug Enterprises, came up with a unique idea that caters to a specific niche, wine drinkers. This idea, although creative, was also quite risky. Renee and Greg contemplated about the idea of the “BetHat” for over a year, until they finally decided to trust their instincts, and create a company. The BetHat is a mesh- cover lid, designed specifically for wine glasses to keep insects out of one’s drink. In 2009. they invested $25,000 of their savings, which led to an opening of their own store just recently, in February 2011. I think that Renee and Greg will be successful if they stay passionate about their idea. They discovered a problem that was bothering them, which had no solution, and solved this problem by creating a solution. Although it is not determined whether or not their business will be successful, Renee and Greg are great examples of Entrepreneurs.

http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/220379

Article: Entrepreneur

Published: October 21, 2011

Written By : Michelle Juergen

Time for Turkey to Face Reality!

In Aanshu Kapoor’s blog post, he talks about Turkey’s growing economic troubles related to its citizens paying off their credit card bills. The majority of Turkey’s citizens’ method of payment is by credit cards. For a long period of time, banks have practically been freely handing out credit cards to the majority of citizens, regardless of their past credit history. In result to this, approximately 3.7 million cardholders are unable to pay off their balance. This is based on the new rules enforced in which cardholders must pay off 50% of their balance during a year. Turkish regulators have increased their interest rate to 29% and as a result, many citizens’ financial status’s in Turkey are going down the drain.

NATURAL RESOURCES

Sinopec bids $2.2-billion for Alberta energy company

Sinopec, the name of the Chinese company that just bought out the Canadian energy company, Daylight. Sinopec bought the Daylight Energy Company for $2.2 billion. Although this may seem like a nice addition to the company as they attain a lot of oil and gas, there is a lot more that the company has to think about before following through with the transaction. They have to see whether their gain will out way what they are buying for the company. One way they could do this is to create a Time Value Line! Daylight has access to land to drill up to 100 wells for the next two decades. With the perchance by Sinopec, the company will finally be able to fully maximize the resources that are available to them. Once the deal if finalized, Canada will be shipping out gas to Asia. This will be the first case in which Canada exports any energy sources into Asia. After Sinopec assessed the deal thoroughly, it came to the conclusion that this deal would not only benefit them for a short term period, but instead, would be a long term success.

Article: The Globe and Mail

NATHAN VANDERKLIPPE

CALGARY— Globe and Mail Update

Published Sunday, Oct. 09, 2011 1:59PM EDT

Last updated Sunday, Oct. 09, 2011 11:52PM EDT

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/industry-news/energy-and-resources/sinopec-bids-22-billion-for-alberta-energy-company/article2196041/

Threat of civil war unites Syrian opposition

The threat of a civil war in a country puts an immense amount of stress on the country’s government, and its people. Worrying about a war takes time away from improving a country, and rather weakens the country and its economy. Currently, this is what is going on in Syria. For more than two months, representatives from different religious groups have been meeting to discuss their plan of action. They had agreed on some underlying issues such as not wanting any foreign military support and not wanting a Libyan-styled armed revolution. The rebellion has attracted 10,000 ex-soldiers that are ready to encourage more to join.

Article: The Globe and Mail

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/threat-of-civil-war-unites-syrian-opposition/article2188300/

Syria has some serious planning to do, and fast. The leaders need to need to come up with a way to get a hold of their country. If not, the war will not only result in thousands of deaths, but it will also ruin the economy in Syria and set them back further than they already are.

The Government in South Africa has decided that it is time to make some drastic changes; it has to start enforcing serious laws against the theft of cables. To most people, stealing cables would not sound like a serious problem. Instead, one would typically think of a teenage kid that is looking for trouble, and consequently, a small fine. However, in South Africa, the theft of railway cable has become a serious problem to the point where whole neighborhoods in Johannesburg are left in the dark. The government is developing fines that will land the cable thieves a sentence to jail anywhere from 15 years, to life.

Earlier this summer, a new high-speed train was built in South Africa to connect the country’s international airport to the cities of Johannesburg and Pretoria. This train connected the two cities in less than 26 minutes, and in turn, was a huge success. Unfortunately, due to the thieves, the train has had to be shut down twice. The reason why there is an increase of thieves is because the legal system in South Africa is so weak. It is hard for the government to put a halt to the theft because of the lack of influence it has in the public. In August alone, the total amount lost from the theft of the cables was close to 2 million dollars. It is time for things to turn around, and for the thieves to be stopped.

GLOBAL EXCHANGE

South Africa’s ignominious new statistic: the theft index

GEOFFREY YORK

JOHANNESBURG— Globe and Mail Blog

Posted on Friday, October 7, 2011 9:18AM EDT

Executive pay for women, Hundred years war?

Gender inequalities have gotten better over the years. Although women have come a long way from not being able to vote, not everything is as equal as it could be. In Britain, this is shown as male executives are being paid more than female executives to do the exact same work.  On top of this, more men are being appointed to higher positions than women. There is about a 10, 500 pound difference in the salary men are being paid compared to women. At this rate, it has been calculated that in order for women to catch up to men, it would take about 98 years.

Because this has been going on for so long, it is difficult for the women to change the system. Men are used to appointing other men and it is hard to try and break the cycle. Although it seems as though this should be changed, nothing is being put in place to change it. Firms are continuing with what has been going on for decades and if that continues, I guess it will have to be 100 years until there is any change.

Aug 31st 2011, 13:27 by B.R.

Article: The Economist

http://www.economist.com/blogs/schumpeter/2011/08/executive-pay-women

Welcome to UBC Blogs. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!