Annie Hall

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Absolutely agreed! During my interview with Bianca Nassif, she mentioned that the company was very much focused on taking the project out of the realm of ideas and kicking it off as soon as possible. As such, they are going through a learn-by-doing process in which they are, together with the initial start-ups, continuously improving this innovation hub and its offerings.

According to interviews with employees, and given the early stages of the program, the threat of conflict between the start-ups and the company is currently quite small. This is due to the selection criteria used to elect the ideas/companies to be incubated: they should try and tackle a particular issue related to agriculture technology (even though the “function” with which they associate can vary, eg. ops, finance, supply chain, etc.). As such, the expected solutions emerging from the incubated companies should influence Raízen’s (and/or its competitors’) processes rather than compete with Raízen’s final products/services.

On November 15, 2018, Annie Hall commented on Made In Space. Literally. :

Thank you for introducing such an interesting topic. I strongly agree with both your strategic recommendations for Made in Space, particularly with the first one (prioritizing smaller scale projects to reach quick-wins and financial returns). These recommendations are fundamental to enable Made in Space to break into the private sector’s zone of interest, as I truly believe that some sort of POC would be required to attract PPP opportunities or, rather, full private funding of the project in the foreseeable future.

Zume sounds quite bold and exciting. However, I cannot help but think that the asset-intensiveness of this model is a major obstacle to the scalability of their business. In addition, I am interested in understanding what is the required degree of accuracy on the demand predictability to realize the impact on inventory management and, consequently, meal prices describe by the author – especially if they enter the territory of more complex foods. The flipside of this is increased food waste and inefficient operating expense management.

Personally, I would recommend senior management to stick to simpler food types in the medium-term until POC and economic feasibility is achieved.

Thank you for this very interesting article! One aspect that has particularly caught my attention is the fit of ModiFace’s business model within the broader L’Óreal conglomerate. Going forward, I would be curious to see whether the acquisition rationale revolved exclusively around the technology, in order to “supplement” L’Óreal’s brands, or whether they will be pursuing a path of service offering across the entire beauty industry, in a way to create multiple revenue streams.

I am inclined to think that L’Óreal will be better off leveraging this recently acquired technology in a way to booster the online experience offered by its existing brands, unlocking the e-commerce revenue portion associated to more conservative buyers (those who were not willing to buy the wrong product due to inability to try it on first). In this situation, however, I am afraid that this can hinder open innovation in the sector and perpetuate the beauty industry’s profile as a technology laggard.

On November 15, 2018, Annie Hall commented on Open innovation in the Public Sector: The Argentinean case :

I am very pleased to read such great initiatives from the Argentinian government. It is also worth highlighting that the questions posed by you are very adequate and address challenges that are particularly difficult in Latin American countries due to the vastly inefficient government institutions.

I would dare to propose that designing the right fiscal incentives to private companies to co-invest (PPP) in the start-ups/innovative projects emerging from the Secretary for Public Innovation & Open Government may be a feasible short-term solution to guarantee the sustainability of the selected initiatives.

On November 15, 2018, Annie Hall commented on AI on the Frontline: The Future of Warfare :

Thank you for the essay on this fascinating topic. The most unsettling part of it, in my opinion, is understanding whether there is such a confidence interval to endanger people’s lives at all.

As we discussed in class, humans seem to be less tolerant with machine-led mistakes than to human error so I wonder whether AI could ever supersede human-made decision-making in warfare due to public opinion & human rights considerations.

iFLY’s example seems really fascinating. However, as pointed out in other comments, I am a bit skeptical about the sustainability of using VR to simply simulate the actual skydiving sensation since a – presumably – fundamental component is missing: the complete sensorial adrenaline triggered by being sky high.

On that sense, I wonder whether it would make sense to using VR with a different approach: to provide experiences that may be impossible to execute in real life (so far). VR skydiving in impossibly high peaks or even in outer-space may make this attractive to enthusiast sky divers who are more likely to spend the time and money on this luxurious experience [of indoor skydiving].