Search for the Apple

I know most of the people would by now have read or heard about the rumors of Apple developing a Search Engine in competition to Google. I did not put much thought into it before. Now, the more I think about it, the more it makes sense. I would give my justification very soon.

Jumping into selling mobile phones was something everyone was betting big a few 4 or 5 years ago. But at that time, there was no company to whom we could stand up and say "Hey. Look what those guys are doing. Didn't I predict that ?". Apple gave a big bolt to the Mobile industry by coming up with its iPhone. The reason why it shook the industry was the fact that someone, at last someone thought of the Mobile Phone as a computer albeit with limited capabilities. The whole "Mobile Phones are going to be the next wave of Information Technology Revolution" thing was born. People were predicting this for a long time (at least since 2003 I guess), but there was no clear direction before. As I write this, Mobile Phones are going to become the number one device for accessing the Internet. This is what drew Google into the mobile handset software/OS industry. And as they say, rest is history although not old at all. Google's Android Mobile OS based devices have outsold most other devices in US for the last quarter. The entry of first Apple and then Google into the mobile handset industry (hardware & software) is what is giving sleepless nights to Nokia, a company which relies on Symbian OS for most of its devices. Palm was almost dead before HP bought it. Motorola, Sony, LG and Samsung are adopting Android at a frantic pace.

Consider the enterprise software industry. Oracle has been gobbling companies by the dozens. What is that they want to achieve ? Obviously, they want to become the number 1 Application Software Company in the world. Apart from that, the biggest reason is the integrated offering that they would be able to offer customers. IBM has also been buying more companies in the last 2 or 3 years. Same with HP. SAP just joined the bandwagon by buying Sybase. Every company wants to offer integrated systems. They realize that the marriage of hardware and software is very essential for the survival of the Computer World.

What do we get from the above 2 examples ? Consolidation, Integration and sometimes Area Overlap. This is what is happening in the Cloud world or Web Apps world. Google with its enormous amount of cash from advertising is increasingly entering into other companies' territories. Although, they are doing everything differently. They believe in the concept of the Web becoming the soul of a computer. And they seem to be right. They are offering everything on the cloud. Using their ubiquitous brand name and their innovation prowess, they are blasting their way into every aspect of our life that can be improved through technology. How and why are they doing it ? They are doing it using the billions of dollars they earn through advertising. The reason is they can do it. Its because they have so much information in this world that if they sell it (which is not possible off course), I think they can afford to buy another Planet. They are going to integrate every such thing with their Search engine, their cloud based apps, their highly optimized data centers and most importantly the WEB. They are developing the infrastructure for the next Information Technology revolution. Although, more than 80 % of their revenues come from advertising, I am sure this will change in the next 10 years.

Integrating with the WEB is one thing that most companies are already thinking about. And some like Microsoft are investing huge sums of money to get some head start in the next technology revolution. I admire them for sticking onto their beliefs. And what better example than Bing. Bing is still very small, but it is something that has the potential especially with a company like Microsoft behind it. In this next information technology revolution, where is Apple? Apple, just 2 days ago, became the biggest technology company by market share. But, the WEB is the place where they are a little behind. That is the reason why they have to enter the Search Engine business. I hope they enter it one day and will do it by "thinking different". Someone has to stop Google from making humans overly reliant on it. Its not only about the money, but also about the infrastructure, the devices and the applications for the next wave. Although, entering the Search business just for money is also justifiable given the huge market. Apple has to take some steps. Although it will take a good 6 to 8 years for Google to achieve its long term goals, companies have time. And I am not saying companies are not doing anything. Its just that we do not know. I am hopeful of Apple innovating endlessly. Its going to be an interesting battle.

Stick a fork in me, I am done.

My B school application journey 2009-2010 has come to an end. Finally. It is not like I got an admit into my dream school. But it is more of an achievement to stick for so long facing numerous hurdles and learning a lot. I am the old-fashioned type who believes that you always learn out of what you do sincerely and honestly. It was tough to manage work life, social life and to apply to B-Schools. One thing it has surely taught me is to become restless. Not that I was laid-back, but I now have learnt to make good utilization of my free time. Time Management is the cliche here. Another thing that I learnt is to handle failures. I got rejects from 3 major schools after coming so close. I would not call them failures but disappointments. There were a few other things that I learnt but I do not want to bore you all with that.

Coming to the point, here is the list of all the schools that I applied to during my journey and their results:

1. ISB (First round) - Interviewed, Dinged.
2. Duke (First round) - No Interview, Dinged.
3. Haas (First round) - No Interview, Dinged.
4. Foster (First round) - Interviewed, Admitted.
5. McCombs (Second round) - Interviewed, Dinged.
6. Kenan-Flagler (Last round) - Interviewed, Dinged.

So, that is my story in short.
To be honest, I really did not have high hopes from Duke and Haas. McCombs was the most disappointing after a fantastic interview. Kenan-Flagler was dicey since I applied very late but it still gave me hopes after a decent interview. ISB was not that disappointing since, to be honest, I never found ISB that attractive. May be it is their one-year course (which is actually good in a lot of ways) or their large engineer student base (I am an engineer myself). I will write more about that later.

I really missed out on Kelley and Goizueta this time. I would have loved to apply to both of them as well as McCombs and Kenan-Flagler a little earlier. But, I simply could not. In fact, I was so beaten and bruised after my initial 4 (before Foster came out with its results), that I did not have the courage to get up. Some amount of motivation from friends and mentor prepped me up and I finally applied to McCombs and Kenan-Flagler.

Foster is a relatively low profile school (at least in India) that is particularly good at entrepreneurship. Its Accounting and Marketing are also very well known. So, I am excited about Foster and about entering the business world.

Interesting analogy

I just came across an interesting piece of analogy between pleasing a B-School and pleasing a girl. One of the many bloggers in the MBA Blogosphere (whom I follow in my Google Reader) has written a hilarious account of how wooing a B-School is similar to wooing a girl.

You can read it here.

Well, to some extent, the writeup explains why I have not been that successful in wooing a (cough-cough-uhu-uhu) girl till now. Strange glances. I know. I know. Not that I have been successful in wooing a top B-School, but that is a different story.

Housefool, Housebull et al....

There are awesome movies. There are good movies. There are watchable movies. There are avoidable movies. There are bad movies. And there are worse movies. Having watched Chandni Chowk to China (which by the way was my last Akshay Kumar movie) in a multiplex, I can safely say that Housefull falls somewhere between the avoidable and bad ones. I was inclined more towards the gap between the bad ones and the worse ones, but I did laugh at times while watching the movie. And mind you, these were not pity laughs. I fondly remember watching CC2C (Chandi Chowk to China) since I can definitely consider it the worst movie I have ever seen in a movie hall. But Housefull does not stoop that low to levels that were achieved by CC2C. Thank God for that.

To be honest, Housefull could, I repeat, could have been a better movie had there been some originality into it. Everything in the movie seemed to be taken from some other movie or well known jokes except a few scenes. There were glimpses of Hey Baby, Om Shanti Om, Dostana, All the Best, Namaste London, CC2C, Singh is King etc. And most of those were our own Akshay Kumar's movies. How many more movies will you (Akshay Kumar) have to do before you realize that you are doing the same mistakes again and again ? To be a little lenient, no bollywood hero except Akshay can depict the Loser in common man better than anyone else. Huh, did I say loser ? I should have said "Panauti" (Pronounced as Pa Naughty, meaning a person who carries nothing but bad luck). A loser who does not know how to switch off a vacuum cleaner. A loser who does not know the difference between a tiger and a parrot. A loser who comes right in the middle of a couple about to kiss each other. A loser who fights for a phone with a Monkey. Am I being sarcastic ? You bet I am. I did not understand why Aarush (Akshay's character) was a Panauti. A man who wears decent enough clothes, has origins in London, had a girlfriend like Malaika Arora, has Jiah Khan as first wife, has a fake wife like Lara and a girlfriend-wife-to-be like Deepika cannot be really a Panauti. Isn't it ? Well, I am all confused if I am asked to choose.

Some scenes were so irrelevant that I forgot whether I had come to watch Housefools or HouseBulls. A talent like Boman Irani is wasted, an over actor like Chunky Pandey is shown as irritating as he can be and a decent actor like Lillete Dubey has very little to do. The only good thing about the movie are the ladies. Two of bollywood's most ravishing ladies definitely add glamor to the movie. If you like Lara or Deepika, you will not be disappointed. Trust me. As far as the review is concerned, I am not jjjjoooookkkkkking (heard in Chunky's irritating style).