Saturday, March 22, 2008

Skepticism Hits The Bottom Line

Find a niche and fill it. That's the axiom for success in business. Create a new product or service that tackles a problem. Or, invent something that no one needs at all, and convince them that they do need it. Result? Massive profits.

With that in mind, a group of entrepreneurs met in the British Virgin Islands for a brainstorming session that was meant to inject some fresh ideas into their myriad ventures.

How can a bunch of corporate types convince you, the general public, that man-made global warming not only exists, but that it's critical to act now. They have investments to protect, and if people don't start jumping more forcefully on the band wagon, the businessmen are going to lose.

Larry Page, of Google fame, has put his savings into the Green Power revolution. That means he has to get us all to use biofuels, even if they cost us more. We pay higher prices for green fuels and he makes money off of it. Can you not cooperate?

Richard Stromback, who heads Ecology Coatings, has been involved in organizing these discussion sessions. He's found his niche in clean technology, so he's determined to make us believe that there's a need for his products.

Richard Branson has sunk millions into biofueled planes. If he can't make you believe that you should pay a premium to his company, his bottom line takes a hit. The same goes for Vinod Khosla, who has invested heavily in ethanol production technology. There's big money riding on their ability to promote man-made global warming as a reality.

Tell people often enough that a computer-generated prognostication is as good as fact and they'll run to their governments and demand that Green Power be harnessed --- at a profit to Mr. Branson and his mates. Just don't tell people that computer generated predictions are a case of Garbage In, Garbage Out. Don't tell the folks at home about the variables that are left out of the calculations because the system is too complex. That's very bad for business.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

From what I have read about Khosla he is more interested in helping our country get away from foreign oil. And we won't have to pay extra for it. Khosla has been quoted as saying that oil will have to drop to $35 barrel to compete with future forms of ethanol...

O hAnnrachainn said...

He's interested in getting our country away from a product that doesn't pad his bottom line.

It costs a couple of dollars to produce a barrel of oil. That's the benchmark price for ethanol to be price competitive.

We're paying extra for ethanol production already. Unless you don't eat eggs, chicken or grain-fed beef.

Anonymous said...

Richard Stromback, Chairman of Ecology Coatings has been preaching green UV coatings for years now....and has only $41K in sales in 2007....what a joke...Richard continues to talk, talk, talk, but with absolutely no results whatsoever....in deliverying the technology to the marketplace...After 5 years, no customers....but he pays a lot of money for all the press....but his money can't buy him satisfied customers......

O hAnnrachainn said...

All new ventures involve risk. The wise entrepreneur will seek to minimize that risk, hence the current push to get governments to sign on to global warming amelioration.

It's all cost-benefit analysis. There will come a point when further investment is a non-starter if governments don't force their citizens to pay in.