Industry Analysis – treasure hunt using Wikipedia

Though a good insightful industry analysis may not be easy to do,
but even a layman can leapfrog his knowledge in the industry pretty fast
(much like a steep learning curve).

To illustrate the point, imagine I am a layman (I really am) to the palm oil industry and
I know nothing about palm oil except the word "palm oil". :-)

You can try it out yourself to understand my point.
Let's start the "treasure hunt" using Wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palm_oil

From the Wikipedia’s external links only, we found:
1. Palm Oil HQ: (bingo, hourly updated palm oil industry news, CPO future prices, historical prices)
http://www.palmoilhq.com/

2. oil palm production, consumption, export, import: (bingo, can do supply/demand analysis, can know which are the big producers and users, industry concentration etc..)
http://www.indexmundi.com/en/commodities/agricultural/oil-palm/

3. Greenpeace report (bingo, we know one of the threats to palm oil industry)

From the Wikipedia’s references, we found industry associations like: MPOA, MPOB, MPOPC
search using Google:
1. MPOA (Malaysian Palm Oil Association)
http://www.mpoa.org.my/
which further leads us to RSPO (Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil)

2. MPOB (Malaysian Palm Oil Board)
http://mpob.gov.my/
which further leads us to more "links" from its links.

3. MPOPC (Malaysian Palm Oil Promotion Council)
which is showing dead link but found:
MPOC (Malaysian Palm Oil Council)
http://www.mpoc.org.my/main_ind.asp
This is a treasure of palm oil industry data.

Just wonder why the industry bodies are MPOA, MPOB, MPOC respectively, so funny :-)

Technopreneur’s presentation : Demo Fall 08 and TechCrunch50 Conference

Have a real feel on how technopreneurs presenting to VCs !

Demo Fall 08, San Diego.
website
(The Launchpad for Emerging Technology)
Date: September 7-9, 2008

• Click on "DEMOfall 08" for lists of videos showing technopreneurs presenting their products/ideas/companies.
• Click on "Demonstrator" to have a quick view of what are the new startup companies/products/competitions/industries etc.

TechCrunch50 Conference 2008, San Francisco
Date: September 8-10, 2008
website

• Click on "Companies" to see the shortlisted companies and their presentations.
• Click on "Experts" to see some examples of Venture Capitalists.

Financial Development Report by World Economic Forum

Came across this Financial Development Report by World Economic Forum.
Financial Development Report link

Financial Development Index 2008 ranking.

We can learn a great deal from the report:
components of financial development, weak and strong points of each country etc..

The Financial Development Index is divided into 3 categories, 7 pillars:
Categories are :
factors, policies, institution – pillars 1 to 3
financial intermediation – pillars 4 to 6
capital availability and access – pillar 7

1st pillar: institutional environment
2nd pillar: biz environment
3rd pillar: financial stability
4th pillar: bank
5th pillar: non-banks
6th pilllar: financial markets
7th pillar: size, depth and access

Singapore is at rank #10 . Malaysia is at rank #20.
Maybe we can see what our country is weak at and learn from the best in class.

From Table 2 (page 14):
Wow, Malaysia actually gets #2 position in "bank", what a surprise !
Singapore gets #1 position in pillars 1-3, all the pillars related to policymaker !

Malaysia detailed report is at page 156, Singapore at page 204.

Seems like Malaysia’s bank is good at "financial information disclosure" (rank #1).

Technical Notes and Sources (page 331 onwards) provides information of where to get data for all the indicators for the Financial Development Index. Great resources to do country analysis, economic analysis !

Manage your energy

Came across this concept of "manage your energy, not your time" from one of the Harvard Business Review (HBR) article.
article

In the website, there is a "test" to check whether how well you are managing your "energy".
energy test
It touches on aspects below:
physical energy (body): sustainability
emotional energy (emotions): self-worth
mental energy (mind): self-expression
spiritual energy (spirit): significance

After the test, you will be able to read 3 related HBR articles in brief with great insights:
1. extreme jobs: the dangerous allure of the 70-hour workweek
2. manage your energy, not your time
3. overloaded circuits: why smart people underperform

Good read ! Good to ponder whether your job is too "extreme" and whether you manage your "energy" well.

The concept is from this company called Energy Project.
Energy Project website