European Jobs Vanish

In the latest breaking news it is clear that German Business giants like Seimens,Henkel and BMW are going to lay off more than 20000 employees between them.Nokia is shifting its production from Germany to Romania.The reason these companies give for this action is rising cost of procuring raw material.BMW ,after making huge profits is till laying off so many workers. They say they must improve their bottom line in order to be competent.
So ,is this globalization all about?
Capitalism says that that every person has the right to work! But this statement is a double edged sword! We only can feel what must be going thru the minds of these workers who are going to be fired. How are they going to earn their living? How are they going to pay their rent or bills. Is the government going to provide new jobs for so may unemployed workers.I doubt it! Everybody will blame India and china for it and very unjustly. European Union was suppose to work for the upliftment of its citizens, instead they are being fired!On the other hand Brussels pays hefty pay packets to the EU mandarins sitting in EU parliament(If we can call it that).
This brings me back to a basic question!Is capitalism and Globalisation failing us? Did they only work when socialism was also being practiced.In my opinion people of the world should come together on the internet to choose a system which will work.It should have a heavy dose of socialism because human life has to live in a system where it is harmony with nature.Capitalism will only lead to more greed and distruction of the world.We have done more harm to environment in last 60 years than was done in 2000 years.we cannot allow the thugs meeting in Davos every year to run our lives.

EU slaps Microsoft

EU slaps US$1,3 billion penalty on Microsoft.

The European union fined Microsoft a record 899 million Euros on 27th Feb.2008,for charging too much for software information.In an antitrust ruling in 2004,the European commission has fined the same company Euros 497 million and ordered it to open some key softwares to rivals.
In my opinion EU has taken a very sound judgement which is very good for small and medium software enterprises and startups.These SME’s(small and medium sized enterprises) will get a chance to put their products forward thus putting a severe blow to monopolies which these big cash rich companies have enjoyed for a long time.Whenever some enterpreuner comes out with a new product the big player buy them off thus stoping a budding startup from becoming another Bill Gates.On back of these monopolies it is rumoured that many of these cash rich MNC;s have become so arrogant that they fail to see beyond greed and filling up personal bank accounts.EU has shown that it will always favour fairplay.The recent yahoo-Microsoft-Google tussle is a good example of these corporate coups.
Reference:Metro now-dated:28th feb 2008

Clash of the Online titans

Clash of the Titans

Even as the verdict has to be taken on whether a Microsoft-Yahoo deal woll redo the online space,the story gets murkier.Yahoo has been tagged at US$44 billion by Microsoft
Pundits.yahoo wants to take its time and is welcoming bids from rival to push up the price.
Rumour is that Yahoo’s financial advisors,golman sachs and Lehman Brothers are looking for potential bidders who can outbid Microsoft .Research firm Gartner thinks if they get together it shall be mutually beneficial for both.However only few very cash rich companies can afford to play this bidding game in today’s world.Microsoft and Yahoo are eaders in their own domain, and if they come together can give tough competition to Google who has a monopoly in search engine technology.
Google has hit back thru its official blog stating that if this deal goes thru than the future of internet is at stake.Talking of monopoly many users of Google have felt lately that Google has become arrogant .Many users had complaint about gmail malfunctioning and Google did not pay any heed and was not interested in user feedback-this was rumoured.

Google has 5% stake in AOL Time Warner and may coax them to bid for yahoo as it is very careful about anti trust scrutiny.However before all this drama,yahoo has been negotiating with Google but the negotiations fell thru because of differences over online revenue sharing.If they would have agreed,than Yahoo most probably would have outsourced its searches and webservices to google meanwhile itself focusing on its strength eg:mobile application,social networking and content sharing.
Many other companies like AT&T,Comcast,Verizon have been interested in yahoo too but so far not was able to outbid Microsoft.
There are two options left for Yahoo,either to sell its stake in “Yahoo music unlimited” and “auctions” to boost revenue or chalk out a mutually beneficial deal with Google.
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European Revolution

Always expect something better from the finnish.The  finnish and their neighbour Estonia is producing revolutions in telecome sector.First It was nokia and now its Skype.com who have totaly revolutionised the way people talk with each other.No wonder both Finnish and the Estonian economies are considered the most liberal amongst the world economies.

Two years ago skype offered their softwere downloag free of any charge because of which people seperated with geographical boundries could talk to each other free of charge in a voice quality which is even much superior to any other provider.Off course now google has some up with googletalk but skype were the initiators.Even Linux was develped by a finnish gentelmen named Linius(i may have misppelled it).Even google had a European Touch to it as one of its founder Sergey Bin was born in Moscow.
SAP another IT giant is of German origin.They produced the first ERP softwere thereby adding value to administering data.
However I am still surprised that the web domain .eu is still not popular.There are the Amazon bookstore and Ebay auction house with some european hand in it.Finland,Estonia and small european countries accounts for maximum people online per 1000 people anytime.May be its the weather!

The Euro versus the Dollar

Euro which is the official currency of European union has replaced US$ as the most valuable convertible currency.With United States busy in a war and spending resources which are very limited in nature,there is no chance the US Dollar will recover for another 5 years.It will recover only if Hillary Clinton becomes a president for next 10 yrs.
However as the wall street pundits are predicting that with devalued $ the US exports will rise.This,I consider a very narrow minded view.For US exports to rise many factors are required,

1. Skilled Labour.
   
2. Quick project implementaion.
3. Raw materal resourcing.
4. Expensive real estate.
5. Lower bank lending rates.

If by chance these factors  can be overcome within 1 year,which is very unlikely seems the US policies have to undergo a long overhaul.US companies who have been outsourcing for last 15 years will find it very hard to start from scratch in united states.It will be tough to beat services outourcing to India.Secondly the US population which is fluent in management and higher skills is aging.You dont expect the afro-Americans or hispanics to replace them(no racial offence intended).Skill shortage shall be high because the highly skilled are finding ready market for themselves elsewhere in Europe and Asia.
There is no doubt that immigrant fromeurope after the world war-2 brought many skills includng languages to the benefit of US industry.the Germans brought technology,Jews brought media and Banking skills.
Dollar it seems is going for a freefall until a miracle happens.

Insurance is booming

Insurance

The insurance market is booming in countries of eastern europe and india.One needs an insurance while driving a car or slleping at home.Auto Insurance is becoming so expensive that one sometimes thinks of just returning to the good old days of horses or public transport.Every on our mobiles or on doorsteps we come across motivated youngsters barely out of schools selling insurance or mutual funds.

How the hell do we know which insurance to buy.I have tried and failed to understand the policies.All policies say that these policies stand annulled in case of situation like Force Majuer.now this means floods,fire,war etc.Now a person looses something during this circumstances.Thats when he needs he benefit and the insurance companies holds on defying till one ultimately gives up.

Auto inurance has become a norm and rightly so.