The history of a miraculous Hoodia Gordonii plant from the Kalahari Desert.

As discussed in the Overview of Hoodia, or shrub (or San) Hoodia plants have been used as a natural appetite which for thousands of years. But what's the secret of St. get out? Testified by the accident?

In 1996 the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in South Africa was doing a study of indigenous foods that ate shrubs. Part of this study was to test for toxic effects of the plants being consumed by the Bushmen. When they came to Hoodia Gordonii, not only was non-toxic helped animals lose weight!

They found hoodia when they feed on animals, the animals that have lost weight. Since 1997, the CSIR isolate bioactive compound in Hoodia responsible for the suppression of appetite, and the acquisition of patents. The patent was licensed to Phytopharm in the name of the molecule - P57 (because this was the 57 th product spent money).

What did the scrubs get to the discovery of the Hoodia Gordonii plant? At first - nothing! She takes the CSIR Phytopharm said that the tribe that it discovered Hoodia Gordonii plant had died and was therefore not due royalties. However, as they say that Mark Twain - "tales of Bushmen his death was greatly exaggerated". When the word did shrub Phytopharm stood to billions of dollars from their knowledge of the hoodia gordonii plant was not happy.

Roger Chennells, a lawyer in South Africa, which represents the thicket, quick to implement strong legal, moral and political pressure on both the CSIR and Phytopharm. Chennells said to whoever would listen that reception of traditional knowledge without compensation was "" bio-piracy and must stop.

In what is regarded as a landmark event, Chennells was able to convince the CSIR and Phytopharm compensating the thicket. Now each company rightfully harvests hoodia gordonii from the Kalahari Desert must pay fees for the return of shrubs. This is not only fair and just; it also provides an excellent way to check if the hoodia are buying is legal. If the company that makes the hoodia NOT for the royalty payment of shrubs, NOT having a legitimate oodia gordonii product.

In short, when Phytopharm released P57 based appetite? It may not. As mentioned in the overview, Pfizer Phytopharm originally paid for the rights to market a P57-based Hoodia diet pills. After a few years of unsuccessful attempts to make synthetic P57, Pfizer withdrew from the agreement. If a large part of the P57 will not be created in the laboratory, inexpensively, Pfizer was not interested.

While Phytopharm was disappointed by the decision of Pfizer, knowing that Hoodia Gordonii was very strong desire to leave we try to bring to the market. In December 2004, Unilever Phytopharm announced that it had concluded an agreement for the purchase hoodia gordonii in the diet food product line. Therefore, instead of a diet drug, seems Phytopharm and Unilever will foodstuff and food supplements with food hoodia. The first Unilever products will not be completed until 2008.

Does Phytopharm makes its own patent for the entire Hoodia Gordonii plant? This is an interesting question which we are sure will be decided in court one day. Here is our take on the situation - Phytopharm clearly holds the patent on the P57 molecule. If you want to try to make a diet of P57 drugs should work through Phytopharm.

The issue of factory Hoodia Gordonii own patented is much more complicated. It is our belief that you can not patent a plant, but you can use the patenting of plants in a process to extract the plants. Here is an exact quotation from Richard Dixey, Chief Executive of Phytopharm when they appeared for 60 minutes?

"The patent is on the application of plant material as losing weight and, of course, active substances within the plant. Not for the plant itself," says Dixey.

Thus, no one else can use Hoodia for weight loss? "As a weight management product without infringing the patent, and that is right," says Dixey.

The way we look at this (again, we are not lawyers and do not provide any legal advice) is as follows - you can sell a supplement Hoodia Gordonii can just say NOT for weight loss. That is why many of the best Hoodia supplements have only very simple labels that say "Hoodia Gordonii", but says nothing about using it as a weight loss or appetite they complete.

1:) HSBC Loan Availability
2:) London City Vs Fonty
3:) Smaller Batch Size Vs Factory Output
4:) No urgency to learn another language in a hotch potch manner
5:) Sep 06 intake of Insead being weak in banking recrutiment
6:) Terrific Alum network of LBS in London for ibanking
7:) Easier to effect a transition to ibanking
8:) Recruitment and career services far better at LBS.
9:) Easier for partner to work in London than in Paris/Fonty
10:)Longer duration with flex option rather than a hurried MBA at Insead, too short for learning assimilation

Downside :
Student Profiles at LBS seem weaker than at Insead which has some star profiles. However faculty/alum network/location etc. more than compensate for it.

It has been a long walk in time, flashback to 2003 when i was envious of a friend's Insead admit and persuaded him to give me access to the portal for 30min to have a look at the profiles of indian students and the common factors. International experience being the single thread running through them all. Now i look at the portal with my own login and the same observation still stands. This when now i shall be giving up on an Insead admit. If you are an Indian, under 30 without international work ex, you can pretty much forget Insead.
The same thread runs through London Business School as well but to a lesser degree for US schools. I could supply proof here but would ask you to trust me instead.

Franky was in switzerland for a business visit. An interesting incident happened as i came in. First the passport control. The mature lady asks me all sorts of questions, why i am there etc. the regular questions and then about the nature of my job. Thereafter she asked me if my business involved dealing in contraband goods, fake medicines or drugs. Upon getting a terse No, i was told that she was very surprised. Then she wanted to know details on the kinds of equipment. I told her she could refuse me entry if she so wanted and i would go back and i had no issue, as i was not exactly eager about these one day visits, but i see no purpose to explain her something beyond her understanding. Aghast she said something in swiss german and waved me to go.
Pissed off already i go across the green line at the customs where the security asks me to come over for a check. Just then my colleagues, 2 europeans in the true sense stop to wait for me. The guard asks them if i was with them and then asks me to move on. So that was really crude.
Why do i write something that i face on a routine basis. Well i wonder sometimes if these people just are doing their job or have something darker in mind. I do not expect them to question as to why they get many times more the wage for the same function in their country as someone in Romania. I do not expect them to understand that there are somethings they do in their country which are done scarcely in other countries and these revenue grossers help maintain those standards, quality of life etc. Yet i feel puzzled at their brash arrogance on something they did not do or achieve, puzzled cuz when yu don't know why yu have what yu have, it does not remain with yu for long. Globalization is sweeping in changes which allows people to be classified according to their functions in the global economy. Governments posing a barrier can not stem this development. I used to feel sad at the unabashed greed of the caitalists, but somehow the side effect of this greed is a welcome development. Should i cry out aloud a la Michael Douglas " GREED IS GOOD". Probably this guy thinks living in switzerland and working for the government as an inspector gives him 4000 chf and he can smirk at the next phillipino who comes across dressed in rags. It may be possible that this phil guy is earning around 150 USD a day just turning some valves in Africa. That is the beauty of globalization. You meet different people, learn about diverse cultures, work through it all and make money by leveraging the best the world has to offer. To top it all no government can stop it try they may as much, those which do keep on trying like Germany learn the lessons very quickly.
The world belongs to the individual, and the smartest ones shall roost, irritants like the governments only make me smile, i just upped the sales price by 3 per cent on the negotiated price, just as i would in Ghana, for bureacratic hurdles.
This is one reason why i so hate 50 percent taxation regimes. Tax the smart ones so that they may leave for US, and in the end all you have left is the lower layer. And then the ponderance over why the US companies are more competitive and innovative.
I so wish things could change, precisely cuz there are some things i hold very dear to my heart and it i see them as a facet of public life in EU. Environment being an example. It is vital that this model survives and thrives, cuz there must be an alternative to thoughtless consumption. Switzerland with over 50 per cent hydel, renewable power and over 70 per cent recycling is a glorious example.
I dont feel crossed or anguished at the incident, cuz foreigners in india get treated worse and i have nothing to say, yet the dumb sections in all societies make me really anguished and i hope that socialism dies tommorrow when i wake up.

Ok guys,
Just got an email informing me that i have been offered admission to Insead.
LBS : Scholarship , Loan should be easy
Insead : No Scholarship, No Loan Total costs manageable through self funding.

Hmmm... that's a tough decision now. What do i wanna do? Get into I banking and make tonnes of money after 10-15 years.

I am veering towards LBS. Guide me fellow bloggers.
Regards & Thanks for reading my blog.

Business is all about creating value and delivering the same to the society. At least in an ideal world this is what it is supposed to be. Functions of business therefore could not alienate themselves from the singular and most important performance indicator, that of value generated. I am very sceptical about most MBA's particularly because in a lot of functions their delivery is devoid of Value.
Pitch back to a few years and Siemens was being advised to exit the low profit arenas of Power, Infrastructure, etc and to venture wholehog into IT. The CEO resisted and kept the funding alive for traditional sectors. These days the major revenue grossers are precisely the old economy sectors which these MBA's were asking the company to exit. Little knowledge of business, textbook arrogance and the lack of intellectual calibre to work out the future and its uncertainty. What else could you expect these shallow heads to come up with.
I am hence very sceptical of MBA's. Don't get me wrong here, cuz i am not sceptical of the value of an MBA education. What is important to note is that in all the colleges, including places like Harvard, there are so many medicre, stunted brained type that get in, there is little you can ever expect these midgets to absorb and internalize. Their lives are later spent as a toast to the good times of the B Schools and basking in the aura of their successful classmates.
Why am i writing all this? As you know i gained admission to LBS, and have access to their portal whereby i could see a list of all my prospective classmates from Round 1. I am not inspired and i am not impressed. They seem to be a bunch of mediocre guys n girls who could charm their way into the MBA but whose real calibre has little to account for. My perception may be illformed yet coming from India where midset tends to dwell more as those of a collective of bozos, the pedigree can give a pretty good idea of the individual calibre. I am seriously contemplating not joining London Business School and to try next year in the USA. Agree that there would be such guys everywhere. I am really sad this morning, i don't know what i should do. I don't feel any enthusiasm for the school.
Probably i should work in the industry another year and reapply this year again. My relationship is sort of restricting me but may be we would work out something that we could later come back to europe. Sorry guys, for all those admitted to LBS, nothing personal here.

As you guys are well aware of, i could not join US schools because my partner is from EU. Well basically that meant i withdraw apps from H/W. For Kellogg i did not send in the TOEFL.
Basically i had only 3 options in EU. LBS, Insead & IMD. IMD first deadline is in february and there is little i could do about them. As for Insead i got the interview invites. And as for LBS i am in.

Now the question arises as to whether to ask for deferral or not and how to keep the lovebirds together.

This morning my boss called me to let me know that i am vacillating and that i should stay in the company. That point was hammered for well over 40 minutes. Why does everyone so badly seek a commitment from me. No one is committed to me so why should i be committed to anyone ??
On another note i had my school X interview. I went into the guy's house in the morning and what a house it was. It looked so regal. He works for a well know mgmt consultancy firm and did his mba from a top european mba school. His wife went to the top US B school, no confusion there guys..its HBS. Proponents of Darden, Kellogg, Wharton etc etc..kindly shut up. Now this guy was asking me many questions about my company and i was very generic with answers, trying not to bother him with details. Thereafter i got to know that he worked for the same company prior to his MBA and was now a consultant to this company. Yikess !!!!. The interview turned out to be a discussion on why school X, how will i communicate my decision to the company etc. rather than pointed questions on CV. In the end it seemed more like a breakfast chat than anything else.
Now back to the title of this post. This interviewer told me that the allurements i was being offered to stay in the company, like talent pipeline blah blah were offered to him as well and that i should not flinch for a moment if i was offered an admit to the school. Furthermore, that i would become even more valuable once i went to the school and that these offers will keep on coming. Now interestingly our global HR manager had a different opinion, he said that i am too early in my career for a broadening of perspective and that i will have to start all over again if i went for an mba.
My opinion is that these "Talent Pipelines" "fast track" etc etc that the HR feeds you is all bullshit, at least most of it. There are no talent pipelines per se, progression is based on a combination of competence, luck and networking, that's all. Why is my boss at 55, his boss at 50, and 50 all the way to director level if eveything is so talent pipeline based. There is an inner circle and there is an outer circle, if you wish to beat the middle management saturation you need an elite MBA (for such a company). All this progression based on blah blah is just that..BS.
Even though i understand it well i am straddled with the consequences of introducing an instability into the professional life as well as personal. Financial wilderness stares me in my face. God help me !!. If i was not in love it would gave been so much easier.