Independent Analysis: AI, SaaS, and Revenue Growth Strategy

I love NPR and Marketplace and have been a listener for a long time. It was bucket list moment when I was interviewed on the December 29th episode by Matt Levin. What are your resolutions? Listen and tell me how I did (end of the 4-minute mark)

I got my 2 vaccinations and the booster shot of Pfizer plus the flu vaccine. Son went to school and I went to the office 4 days a week. We masked when going indoors to shops and only recently started going a few times to a restaurant. Other than close trusted friends and relatives we did not socialize much. In December my pleasure activity was 2 restaurant visits and a holiday party. Well after these activities, I got a sore throat on Christmas day. Since I was expecting my niece and family, I wanted to make sure that this was not anything more than a common cold. I drove to the 3 sites listed on the county website along with 100's of others only to find that they were not open after 5 hours of waiting and driving. When I came back home, I took an in-home test and that showed that I was #covidpositive. I immediately messaged my doctor's office and arranged to have a tele-consult the next day. Tip: Keep stock of in-home tests handy even if you are not sick and test if you come ...

Written in 2017 for a Indian new site and was not accepted This week I joined the 369,000 Uber users from the US who use Uber in India annually ( Source:NDTV ). In 2010 I was in a conversation with Travis Kalanick then CEO of Uber at the Woolly Mammoth Theatre in DC where I had mentioned being impressed by the GPRS tech-enabled radio taxis in Hyderabad. He was curious about how taxis were used in India and little did I know that Uber would launch in India 4 years later. What did Uber disrupt for visiting NRIs? Usual ways to travel on visits to India Request to be picked up at the airport by relatives Hitched a ride with relatives while going from place to place Used auto-rickshaws Hire cars for trips out of town from independent operators These methods had their own issues. Flights arrived at an ungodly hour and that meant whoever received you at the airport had to be sleepless as well. Autos were dusty and you never knew what was the right fare. Hired cars had the baggage of driver ba...

Languages are fascinating. I was thinking about my own mastery of English and here are my thoughts. Growing up in India, you could be either one of these 3 groups Government schools  Private schools  Convent schools If you spoke English you were higher up in the hierarchy ( Ranked by convent first, Private second, and government third)  In some states like New Delhi, government officials asked you to talk to them in Hindi, and in Tamil Nadu, English was more acceptable than Hindi (This is my experience) Luckily I spoke 6 Indian languages. Now I am in the US and I have my own version of English which depending on the area of the US people may understand I think people who come to the US and learn English are better off as they learn the accent here quicker than English speakers who migrate here. Sometimes depending on the audience, you may need to change your accent  There will be people who will insist they do not understand you despite your efforts only because you ...

Serena Singh Flips the Script by Sonya Lalli My rating: 5 of 5 stars Entering the library after the pandemic for the first time, I headed to the new book section, chanced upon this book, and read it over the July 4th holiday. The book is funny, joyful, emotional and gives you an insight into realistic fiction and the lives of families of South Asian origin in the Washington DC area. The main character Serena while being highly successful still has self-doubts about her achievements. Some of the exploits in seeking new companionship are hilarious. Immigrant families, parents working hard and children trying to navigate two cultures, office politics, mixed racial couples, bonding between colleagues - you find all that in this book. One of the few books that I read without putting the book down. I am going to check out the other books by @Sonya Lalli View all my reviews

In life I have learnt to always be thankful. Every morning, I am thankful to be alive, the fresh crisp air,family, a place to live and food to eat. I am originally from India and have lived in the Washington DC area for about 24 years.  The positive side about the past year has been my calls to my parents using my Amazon Echo Show every morning. I could do this during the time I could save  the absence of the daily commute. They live in Hyderabad, India and have a Amazon Echo Show as well that has the ability to “Drop in”  The experience is almost like being in the same room together without having to hold a phone in your hand. This was especially useful since after the pandemic lockdown started they were alone and could not have visitors. My father is also losing his memory so being able to see him and spend time with them has been a blessing. I look forward to seeing them in person hopefully at the end of the year when things settle down. Another wonderful a...

When things are normal, the distribution system of the pharmaceutical drug supply chain in the US has been robust. According to the CDC over 48% of the US population receives one prescription drug in a month. Combine this stat with the fact that the US Pharma industry provides 2.9 Billion drugs in a year, we have an already existing supply chain that can more than adequately take care of the vaccine distribution for everyone who wants one in the US. (source: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/drug-use-therapeutic.htm) Judging by the pain that local communities have been feeling especially in Montgomery County where I live, where there is fragmented information on where, when, and how people will receive the vaccine. We need to think differently which actually means to think traditionally and put the vaccines into the Pharmaceutical system that exists today instead of reinventing or standing up a new distribution system. Pharmacies already have our data. They can determine age, eligibilit...

How are you doing with your cable and TV subscriptions? If you are a baby boomer and in some cases a Gen Xer, you may remember a world without the internet, and cable TV was the technology that seemed so advanced.  This is more the late 90's and the competition was cable or over the air TV. Next came the internet which was through your phone providers which was dial-up. Think AOL and the CDs that they distributed all over the world and I got one in India and did not own a computer then. An advance from dial-up was DSL again provided by the phone company Till the late 90's cable companies did not pay attention to the internet providers. They were comfortable that this "internet" was not a threat to the programming of the cable TV providers 2007; All of this changed when Netflix entered the market with streaming We moved from live cable TV (or Over-the-air TV)  and borrowing videotapes or DVDs to streaming.  Netflix did not wait for the providers to get their act toget...