Give the Gift of Time – Link here – very interesting take on charity/donation
Perfect is the Enemy of Good – Link here
Hundreds of students and faculty at Harvard were once asked to choose one of the following:
A: Your current yearly income is $50,000; others earn $25,000.
B: Your current yearly income is $100,000; others earn $200,000. (purchasing power is the same in each choice).
Half of the respondents choose A, which is lower than you could make on an absolute basis in the second choice but relatively higher than what others would make in that scenario
The Weight-Loss-Drug Revolution Is a Miracle—And a Menace – Link here
In the early 2010s, the Danish pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk developed a medication called semaglutide for the treatment of type 2 diabetes. It was approved by the FDA as an injectable called Ozempic. The company soon realized that patients on Ozempic reported significant weight loss as a side effect. Novo Nordisk ran further trials on the drug and discovered that it was, in fact, “associated with less hunger and food cravings.” They rereleased the drug for weight loss under a new name: Wegovy.
Morgan Stanley model projected that semaglutide and similar weight-loss drugs could be a $30 billion market by 2030. That’s about 10 percent of all U.S. drug spending.
These drugs will also scramble our relationship with the basic concept of willpower in ways that aren’t cleanly good or bad.
The ‘Dungeons & Dragons’ debacle, explained – Link here – never under estimate Power of fans
Recently Vallum Capital hosted Louis – Vincent Gave, founding partner and CEO of Gavekal Research, for an insightful conversation on global developments – Link here
The Secret to EV Success Is the Software – Link here
Volkswagen’s Cariad has hired 6,600 software engineers in the past two years and wants to add 1,700 more this year.
Auto companies fear the fate of the original cellphone makers that sacrificed much of the value in the smartphone market to Google and Apple Inc.—companies that mastered the user experience with superior software. Those tech giants are now making moves on autos, and not just with their self-driving car projects.
If it manages to become the default vehicular interface, then carmakers risk ceding a large slice of that $700 billion in revenue, because Apple could become the gateway for over-the-air updates and in-vehicle content. Think the App Store, where the company gets a 30% cut of all transactions, but for cars. It’s the worst-case scenario, and one of which carmakers are cognizant. But many still need to up their game.
Wall Street Is Losing Out to Amateur Buyers in the Housing Slump – Big money spent a fortune snapping up homes. Now, regular folk are outsmarting the pros – Link here
The Mystery of the World’s Oldest Billboard – Link here