India and the Formula 1 circus

    India staged it's first ever formula 1 race with customary fanfare. As is the norm world over, there were plenty of celebrities on hand to witness the circus. Apart from the odd electricity blackout and an occasional dog on the circuit, the entire race weekend passed off without too many embarrassing mishaps. Judging by the live footage, there seemed to be a large audience,presumably most of them from the upper middle classes.

    A reported $400 million that was spent on the circuit came in for some criticism. Allegations of wrongdoing in granting tax breaks for the race provided more ammunition to the critics. There was also the inevitable focus on extreme wealth inequality in the country. Jenson Button and Sebastian Vettel, two of the more perceptive drivers in the field also to noticed it.

Britain's Jenson Button said coming to India was "difficult" for the drivers, who have been stunned at the living conditions glimpsed outside their luxury hotels. "You can't forget the poverty in India. It's difficult coming here for the first time, you realise there's a big divide between the wealthy people and the poor people," he said. ....

German champion Sebastian Vettel caught his first glimpse of Indian life on the 200-kilometre (125-mile) drive from New Delhi to the Taj Mahal, and he said it was a humbling experience. "It definitely brings your feet back on the ground in many ways and makes you understand a lot of things," Vettel said. "It's an inspiration and makes you appreciate things you take for granted."

    If you look past claims that staging a big event like this would elevate India's image, there are some benefits that could be extracted out of hosting an F1 race. Formula 1 is a combination of business,sport,hospitality and high tech engineering. The high tech engineering part should be of particular interest to India. Tata consultancy Services(TCS), India's leading software company already provides IT services to Ferrari.
 
    Most global car makers are planning new factories in India to corner a share of the fast growing market.Gujarat's fast rise as a new auto hub is a case in point.There are several areas of technology in F1 that are relevant to road cars.After a late start, F1 has fully embraced Kinetic Energy Recovery System (KERS), the energy capture technique used in today's hybrid cars. F1 teams allocate vast resources for research on vehicle aerodynamics, transmission systems, driver safety aids and many other areas.Under the new FIA president Jean Todt , fuel efficient engines are also getting increased impetus.

    If appropriate industrial policy is put in place, the huge interest shown in F1 can be harnessed to get young engineers to develop competencies in these areas. All those car makers who are trying to design India-specific models would be happy to dip into a pool of homegrown talent.

    In the greater scheme of things $400 million is not a lot of money, especially when the entire investment was made by a private enterprise. As for any irregularities in the acquisition of land and special treatment by the government, there is a state election scheduled for 2012 in Uttar Pradesh. Going by recent trends of voters punishing corrupt incumbents, there is a decreasing likelihood of such deeds going unnoticed.

Has high inflation become intractable?

    As high inflation continues for an extended period, interest rates are expected to be raised further. The central bank's attempt at tamping down inflation through tighter monetary policy is understandable.

   Reform efforts at bringing in foreign direct investment into food and multi-brand retail have gone nowhere. If sweeping reforms were enacted swiftly, multinationals would be willing to invest heavily in the retail sector.If that happens,is the underlying infrastructure prepared to take advantage of fresh investments that may stream in? The answer is mostly, no. Apart from shortcomings with the road and rail network, stories about severe electricity shortages like this are not hard to find across India. Steps to enhance the road network are announced every once in a while. The actual progress however, has been frustratingly slow.

   Then there are factors beyond the control of India's government. Crude oil prices after reaching a high of more than $110 earlier this year have moderated. If the world economy returns to trend rates of growth, prices of commodities could spike again. This would make life harder for policy makers in India.

    In the absence of adequate steps to address India's chronic supply side bottlenecks, this may be a lost cause for the foreseeable future. Meanwhile,shocking levels of food wastage and malnutrition among millions of underprivileged will continue to blight the country. Not to mention other side effects,namely higher wages and slowing growth driven by higher inflation.

From Smartphone to Superphone

    As announcements of newer versions of Apple and Android smart phones roll in, you have to wonder what would the next big evolution of smart phones look like. Larger screens, niftier cameras, diverse set of applications and games have already ensured that the current set of phones are the most powerful portable devices a regular user has ever known. Yet, this may just be the tip of the proverbial 'iceberg'.
 
    When we step out of the house to go to work on a regular day, there are a few items we must carry with us. A cell phone aka smart phone is only one of them. We need a wallet with debit/credit cards, car keys and driver's license(if you drive to work), home keys, possibly an identity/access card to enter our place of work. Many of the cards and forms of identity are pieces of plastic with a magnetic tape with some data on it.

    The next generation of phones ought to have the ability to merge all these items into one device. They should have face recognition software(rumored to be in the yet to be unveiled nexus prime) as well as a finger print reader. If a device can reliably read these two key biometric attributes of a person, verification of identity becomes reasonably secure.
   
    Biometric authentication of identity should enable payment for all our purchases using the device.Google wallet already does this. But what if we completely eliminate the need for having separate credit and debit cards? Your phone is your card.

    The Driver's license would be a digital document on the phone. A signal from the phone will allow you to open and start your car(this is already out there). Use biometric identification and commands from the phone to open doors to our homes and offices.

    Obviously, all data would be stored remotely so that if a phone is lost, the data would not be. And if the phone is stolen, the device is unusable without biometric(fingerprint and face recognition) authentication. Yes, there would be privacy and security issues. They definitely do not sound unsolvable.

    I did not mention voice recognition, because it has been around for a while. The iphone 4S seems to have taken it a step further. Not sure it is advanced enough to recognize my name, especially my full south Indian name, which is so long, i am too lazy to type.

   It is realistic to expect a smart phone to have all of these features and more in the near future. I look forward to the day when i just have to carry a phone around and nothing else. May be we should call it the 'superphone', for it would be much more than a smartphone.