MyHIMAL

Visit of the fower carpet

2009-03-19T23:43:00.000-07:00

When i returned at around 15:00 hrs from the office, i didn’t have mood to go home. I do not know why. I was coming with a sub way train and suddenly I saw very beautiful place with endless blue flowers. I was excited to visit that place and got off from the subway. The place was on the bank of Rheine river located in Düsseldorf. Weather was warm, which is hard in these days in Germany. Temperature was around 15 degree and sunny. At first I thought there is a small garden with some flowers but to my surprise I can see the garden and flower as much as I can. I sat in one bench and started to write these words.
Unfortunately I forgot to take camera so I could not take any photos but I can take any time because I have to come in this place twice a week. Further now a days every sunday I am coming here. So next time I will take the photos..
The beauty of the place can not be expressed in words. A warm sunny day on the bank of Rheine river and beautiful garden with thousand of blue flowers. I do not know the name of flowers and I even do not want to know because I want to enjoy the beauty of the place without having any tension.
Many people are taking photos and enjoying the place but I am alone here. Being alone in such a place is not bad but better when you have somebody to express your feeling regarding the beauty of this place. I lacked this opportunity today. I can see two huge and long bridges over the Rheine river and a TV tower standing like Dharahara tower in Katmandu. The trees are having no leaves seems little bit disappointing. But now summer has started and we will see greenery in some days here. The environment will be much more beautiful in summer. Düsseldorf being the capital of the North Rheine Westphalia, a lot of vehicles are running. So this noice is making me angry which is hindering me to enjoy the scene. But to avoid this noise I have used my MP3 player and listening to some nice music. Three small kids are playing with their dog and their parents are little bit concerned. Some are enjoying jogging and cycling. In my right side there is one huge building looks like a palace. Such buildings are very common here in Germany.
The place is so neat and clean that perople can sit anywhere without any hesitation. Now I am comparing such parks in Nepal and in Germany. People also prefer having such place here and care themselves as well. They do not throw waste anywhere like in Nepal. In Nepal I had many experience that people through waste and garbage from window just like that. And they yale to the government to clean that garbage. What a irresponsible behavior.
Oh, I moved from one topic to another. I am enjoying the place. Ok lets stop writing and enjoy the place more.

Suvas
17th March 17, 2009
Düsseldorf
North Rheine Westphalia
Germany

Merger and Acquisition

2009-03-01T11:13:00.000-08:00

Buying and selling goods are the most common phenomenon of business. But many companies are involved in buying and selling of companies. In business terms it is called merger and acquisition. Merger are of three kinds: Horizontal, Vertical and conglomerate.
Horizontal merger means buying the same kind of company or two companies with same kind of business come together under one umbrella. For example Vodafone acquired German telecommunication giant Mannesmann, J P Morgan acquired Chase Manhattan bank.
Another type is vertical acquisition. In this type a company acquires another direction of business. Either it goes to raw material side of goes to forward direction of customer. For example walt Disney acquired ABC television to reach to large size of customer.
Finally, conglomerate merger includes random acquisition of companies. There is no direct link between the parent company and subsidiary or acquired company. For example AT&T acquired NCR .
However most acquisitions are failed like an abnormal marriage . Daimler had to divorce with Chrysler after many years of merger. Other big companies were also in trouble because of unusual merger and acquisition.

Management conferences

2009-01-31T04:10:00.000-08:00

Being a business management student,i am always curious about management conferences. Currently, a huge conference is going on in Davos, Switzerland. This conference is more important because of global recession. People are hoping that it can recommend some solution to get rid of the recession.
Many economists, business tycoons are there to propose new insight and thought so that their long experience and expertise can make this planet better in terms of wealth. So lets hope this conference will be corner stone to save our economy.

Global recession

2009-01-30T15:15:00.000-08:00

Business has never been such competitive. Big corporate houses are falling down. Legendary Lehman Brother, Merill Lynch, submerged and other are underway. It seems that there is no measure to get out of this recession.
Countries are introducing bail out plan with billions of dollar. These countries are moving towards capitalism to socialism. It has proved that market can not be fully independent. Government intervention is mandatory for smooth operation of economy. Many economist like Milton Fried man sought for free market economy but ultimately Keynesian theory is getting one more approval that government should play vital role to save the economy.

Health insurence facilities

2009-01-24T13:32:00.000-08:00

When i cam to Germany, i did not know that i need a health insurance during the entire stay here. When i joined the University and they asked me a health insurance, i was surprised because i already had one from Nepal but they said that it does not work. They need a insurance from government insurance company.
Out of many AOK and TK are the major health insurence companies who provide better facilities in Germany. Others are Allianz, Barmer etc. Health insurence is a burden even for German students who have less chance of working during the student life. And what about foreign students who have limited budget? It is a disaster for them. Though facilities provided are ok but not enough because one has to pay Euro 5 for each medicine recommended by the doctor. Every quarter one has to pay Euro 10 as practice fee for doctor.
So before comming to Germany, one has to bear in mind that he/she has to cover all health insurence which is huge amount.

Dispute over birth place of Lord Buddha

2009-01-23T15:23:00.001-08:00

Last week one bollywood film called chandani chowk to china mislead the people by showing some clips that Lord Buddha was born somewhere in India. Whole world know that he was born in Nepal and UNESCO has also certified this fact by listing Buddha's birth place in world cultural heritage.
This was not single offence that India about Buddha. Since many years India has been attracting and misguiding the tourist by saysing and showing some fake places as birth place of lord Budhha.
We Nepalese should always try to inform the world the real fact about Buddha and his birth place and should always try to protect all misleading information in calm way.
Who ever see this blog, please be informed that Buddha was born in Western part of Nepal. The place is called Kapilvastu which lies in Lumbini zone. Hell Buddha and thumb down for Indian authorities who tried to mislead people.

Credit card facility from Deutsche bank Germany

2009-01-13T10:28:00.000-08:00

Last time when i was in immense need of credit card to buy a flight ticket to Spain, i heard about the credit card facility to the students by Deutsche Bank in Germany. When i went there i found it very interesting but later knew that the interest charge was unimaginably high. Further when i bought ticket they charged six euro for using this credit card. I did not know that i have to pay extra fee for using this facility except charge by bank.
Any way i am not frequent user of credit card and when ever i need i already have ne. But i am thinking to go for citi bank credit card because it is more student friendly and credit limit is also high.

Ground breaking Economists

2009-01-08T13:23:00.000-08:00

Again big word. I was reading a book named inside the economist's mind, a book which includes the interviews of prominent economists of the century. Most of them are noble prize laurate e.g. Paul Samuelson, Milton Friedman, Franco Modigliani, Stanley Fisher and many more to name. When i was reading the book i came to know that almost all of them are the product of so called elite universities such as Harvard University, Stanford, University of Chicago, MIT, Yale University, Columbia and many more to name.
There are lot of business schools like Insead in France, HHL in Germany, Technical University of Munich in Germany, HEC in France, IMD in Switzerland, Oxford in UK, etc. But most of the economists are from US universities not from other universities. All breakthrough ideas and theories are from US economist and many are Nobel laurates. Other developed countries also have money, capable universities, research institutes but less breakthrough ideas in economics.
I think it is because of research freedom and money. But major reason is the brand name of these universities where all people want to go and only brilliant have access. If you teach brilliant people then ofcourse you will get innovative ideas and theories.

Some more in project management

2009-01-07T14:32:00.000-08:00

While working at Ericsson Germany, i was talking to some project managers about project management and project performance analysis for my term project report. My idea of writing term project was to evaluate some project in terms of corporate goals and strategies. For example general goal of Ericsson in Germany are profitability, growth and operational excellence. However during talk one senior project manager of Ericsson told me that project managers there have no influence on project profitability and growth. These are strategic part of the company and only key account managers, contract finalizing responsible and customer satisfaction responsible are player in these strategic management game. However i asked them, so why are you here if you can not contribute to the corporate objecti´ves and strategies? Then he replied that we are functiong as operational team ´we have influence in operational excellence and we are doing that.
In their term operational excellence means efficient use of budget, human resources and ofcourse time. Normally there at Ericsson project manager will have hard times if project runs over budget. Key account managers and other executives do not want to approve change request and finally landing up with project failure most of the time. So project managers there are working as operational team who even do not have any influence in sales. They have to do what the key account managers want them to do. For example if key account manager asked them to develop new testing system for Deutsche telekom or Vodafon or other operator then they will have some budget to start the project but they do not care about the revenue from that project.
Finally i thought that project manager should have full authority to operate project and should have influence in overall project not only in operational part.

My ebay experience

2009-01-06T15:32:00.000-08:00

Yesterday one of my fríend bought a mp4 player with touchscreen in ebay at around 15 euro. When i heard that i also wanted to have one and started bidding in ebay. Everytime i bid, i was defeated by line margin. I tried 5 times but landed with nothing. Finally i wanted to sleep but took last chance for a 4 GB machine. Quoted price was 18,50 euro and i bid at 19 euro thinking that i will be downed and i do not need to buy a 4GB machine but to my dismay nobody offered more than that and i was compelled to take that machine.
Then i thought it was written and i can not change the fate. I wanted a 8GB machine but landed with 4 GB at 19 euro. If i compare with market price then it is quite cheap but still i could have got 8 GB machine. My bad luck................

Suffering from cold

2009-01-03T09:22:00.000-08:00

After such a long time, i am suffering from cold and fever. I am almost sleeping since three days and drinking soup and only hot drinks.
I have to write and finish my project work but have no mood to write. I have to go to work and i do not feel of going. Today i cam eout of room to buy some soup and drinks, i mean hot dreanks to recover from cold.
Main reason is i drank little bit cold wine and beer on the eve of new year and the side effect is i am suffering. Any way lets see how much this cold can make me feel sick.

Business/Management and project consulting in Nepal

2008-12-29T13:34:00.000-08:00

Today when i was returning from office, i was thinking about my career. What should i do when i go bak to nepal after compleeting my higher study? People harldly think our of their work and experience. Si i was also thinking about the management and project consulting business in nepal.
Possibility of management consultancy and project consultancy is very high now a days as far as i think. After restoration of demoracy government has plan to spent a lot of money in infrastructure development which can be one potential area of project consulting and private sector is also very motivated to invest in new sectors. Further many companies and industries are facing many business and management problem which is one potential area of management consultany.
Competition is minimum in this field if we concentrate on market however some big name such as KPMG and Price Waterhouse Coopers are present with agency. But these agencies are more concentrating in auditing not in project and management consulting. So business potential is very high and competition is relatively low.
Human resource for this business is little bit problem. But now a days many students are returning from good business schools and we can also hire some experienced person in management and project. Engineers are not a problem in Nepal but some good MBA's should be hired.
Finally i see management/project consulting business can be one potential area where we young people can enter and thrive. We can put out knowledge and effort learnt in foreign universities and companies for the development of our nation.

Management consulting in Nepal

2008-12-27T15:41:00.001-08:00

Business success is ultimate goal of any business person and without proper management it is not possible. Management consulting is considered as one of the key factor of successful business.
Basically management consulting companies provide services to the large corporation as well as small and medium to solve their management problem thereby increasing the efficiency within the company. Many ground breaking management concepts are developed by management consulting companies and among those Boston Consulting group, GE consulting, Mckensy and lot more to name.
Nepal being a under developed country may take such advantages of consulting services of those consulting companies. Some companies had tried to enter in nepalese market. For example Delloite, KPMG etc. But those were concentrating in financial consulting not management consulting. Therefore major companies such as BCG, Mckensy, Bearing point, Accenture should try to enter in this tiny country not only to expand there market but also to strethen the development and industrialization of this country.

Business Process Optimization

2008-12-18T07:48:00.000-08:00

Doing business is a continious process. Remain in the market, the business process of the company should be optimized. Optimization ofprocess means analyzing the existing business process and finding the deviations, problems and constraints. Then providing recommendations and finalyy implementing these recommendations in the process. In short identify the problems in existing process and removing them using various tools and techniques.
Business process optimization contains two process; transition and transformation.

Transition
When companies have problems it should identify these problems. Analyzing the existing system ,identifying the problem causing underperformance and finally providing recommendations is called transition. In another word we can call it problem identificationa and idea generation stage.
Transformation
This is working phase to implement the recommendations. In this stage plans and strategies are generated to execute those recommendation to transform from current state to improved state. Many tools, techniques and processes are applied here to get new optimized environement which is enable to operate efficiently and effectively.

portfolio diversification, simple phenomenon

2008-11-30T09:15:00.000-08:00

Investment is an art. If one wants to grow financially s/he has to invest in such a way that his/her wealth should increase. One way to invest money in secured way is to make portfolio. This theory is based on a proverb that never put your all eggs in one basket. If you put then simply there is risk of loosing each one of them.
Portfolio, in another term is diversification is investing the money in different assest that will increase net wealth with low risk. Diversification are of many type i.e. Superfluous diversification, markowitz diversification etc.
Superfluous diversification means diversify your investment in 20-30 assests. This diversification is only for the shake of diversification. It makes the things complicated, increase the cost of portfoli management. Another diversification is markowitz diversification. This diversification suggest to invest money accrding to risk and return associated to the assests. Further there is some kind of correlation among the assests and markowitz diversification strongly suggests that this correlation should also be considers while investing your hard earned money.
One simple example

nAssume that the investor invests 50% of capital stock in stock A and 50% in B
•1. Calculate E(R)
•E(Rp) = sum of xi E(Ri)
•E(Rp) =.5(.05) + .5(.15)
•E(Rp) = .025 + .075
•E(Rp) = .10 or 10%

here if one invests money in only one assest then the risk is very high. Portfolio risk is simple weighted average value of standard deviation.

New terrorist attack in Mumbai

2008-11-29T03:28:00.000-08:00

I was almost drunk on that day in a German city Dortmund with one of my friend here. After 21:30 we went home and turned on the TV. To my surprise Mumbai was on fire. CNN was telecasting the live news report of explosion and attack in two renowned hotel of India; Hotel Taj and Hotel Oberoy. More than 100 people were killed and more than 300 were injured. I could not stop myself changing news channel but every channel had same news. i was watching TV till 2:oo oclock and the next day each news paper, news site had only one news; Mumbai on fire, terrorist attack in Mumbai etc.
Suddenly i remembered some of my indian friends and worried about them. Thank god all them and their family are safe. But i have deep sorrow to the people and the family who are killed and injured in this hinious attack.
India a growing economy and a rising power of the world was shoked from this attack. India has accused pakistan as attacker and supporter of that attack which pakistan has already rejeted and condemned the attack. Many countries have condemned the attack but major question is to fasten the rescue operation which i saw lacking in Mumbai. Still people are trapped in two hotels and some other places. Terrorist have made some hostages and mumbai pilice and army has been trying to take the situation n control.
After 1993 mumbai attack this is the biggest one attack in Mumbai, the economic capital and film capital of India.

people pretending to forget mother tounge

2008-10-29T04:45:00.000-07:00

Now a days people from Nepal are going abroad and therefore learning foreign languages. When i came to Germany then came to know that people are forgetting nepalese language. When speaking they use many english words which has confused me. Though i can speak very good nepalese language and english as well but when some one speaks mixing both language then i feel awakward. Thats not the major problem but the major problem is when i speak typical nepalese language then they say that its hard to understand. What a pity.
They speak nepalese language like this.
A:helo ke cha aaja ko news
B: Actually, ma city tira yeso walk ko lagi gako thiye suddenly euta sathi bhethiyo. Then hami ekchin restaulant ma baseu. nothin special yaar.
A: mero yaar, i do not know aajkal ke bhai rachha. i am not feeling good. jindagi yaar khoi ke bhanne bhanne.
B: But for me , perfect, mauj nai mauj.

what a conversation. I ave to think alot to understand the thing.
There is nothing wrong to speak any language but speak one at a time. If you are speaking nepalese language then do not mix other language as much as possible and for other language as well.

Expensive cars of the world

2008-10-20T14:17:00.000-07:00

Bugatti the most expensive car

Porsche BMW

Development through international cooperation

2008-10-15T09:04:00.000-07:00

After being republic, Nepal is looking forward to develop itself through international co operation and help. Having tremendous natural resources Nepal is one of the poorest nation of the world. Nepal sandwiched in between China and India could have been developed taking the advantage of higher growth and development in these big nations. But Nepal failed to do so because of many reasons. One of these is committed government.
Now Nepal has committed government headed by Maoist and all are looking forward to having developed nation.

US financial crisis

2008-09-19T10:17:00.000-07:00

After collapse of Lehman Brothers, now another financial institution i.e. AIG is in trouble. Everyday NYSC index is going down. Big financial institutions are going down day by day. To protect the down going economy US treasury and Federal reserve have decided to inject huge amount of money in the economy. Halting short selling is another step to control the economy. What next? is the main question.
Being the largest economy, it has direct impact on other economy and it has seen overnight. Russian stock has plunged down by almost 30 percent and similar condition has seen in european and asian stock exchange.
To resolve the situation allmost all central bank have decided to inject billions of dollar in the economy. But is it only solution? Even if the answer is yes, government should take care of inflation and negative impact on economy. However major step should be taken to realise bad debts. If this action is taken public confidence will raise in the economy.

Conflict between ministers in Nepal

2008-09-16T14:59:00.000-07:00

After two days of PM's visit to India, one minister of his cabinet has been showing the power of post and power of armed force. Recent incident in Mirchaiya shows irresponsible behavior of Maoist ministers which ultimately underpine the popularity of Maoist government.

May be the land owned by Birendra Shah was bought from the relative of former king of Nepal of this does not give any right to minister of land reform Mr. matrika Prasad Yadav loot from real owner in the name of capitalist or whatever. He has YCL, a armed force of Maoist and with this power he got power to do everything he wants? I think he has either gone mad or in the process.:)

Otherwise minister himself went to loot? Unbelieveable!!!!!!

Even home minister could not stop him doing so. Matrika threatned PM to resign from the post and party if any action taken against him. What a daring but this is called "Dussahas" in nepalese language. I think PM Prachanda should kick his ass for his such kind of irresponsible behavior.

Manners after leaving home

2008-09-14T12:13:00.000-07:00

Being out of home is really painful. At the same time it is an opportunity to learn something new and explore the world. I am writing this blog about being abroad and leaving good manners at home.
I am now far from home and enjoying total freedom. parents have limited access with me and its totally upto me to make contact with them. But it does not mean that i should forget all the good thing and do whatever i want whatever i think. All of my thinking may not be good neither yours. Yours means somebody else.
Some of my friends are also abroad and have learnt using "F" word. Is this their tension or a nwe manner to be smart in front of others? Obviously its their tension, panic and frustration. In frustration they strat scolding others, underpining others emotion. But who is actually loosing?
Loosers are thise who slip fron their base. Base is once character, manner, knowledge. Only showing anger to other does not help you. What really help are becoming calm, patient and cooperative.
Never forget one thing you can make many friends but true friend is that who sits by your side even in your tough time.

Largetst experiment in Physics

2008-09-10T13:31:00.000-07:00

Today CERN has experimented the largest test in Physics. In franco Swiss boarder CERN has built 27 KM long tunnel to fire the protone particals. It is expected that these proton particals will be collided each other which creats the similar situation of Big Bang explosion. It is also expected that it will give more insights to the origin of Galaxy.

Some critics said that this process will create balck holes and it will swallow the earth but this successful experiment has rubbished these kind of criticism.

My visit to Aachen and Bonn

2008-09-05T09:59:00.001-07:00

Last thursday was very nice for me. I and one of my friend went to visit two German cities Bonn and Aachen. First of all we headed to Aachen which shares boarder with Belgium. At around 1200 hrs we were in Aachen main station. However we had no idea about the places to visit. So we asked to one person and we found him very kind and helpful. He told us about all the places of Aachen and bus route as well. So we headed for the Aachen dome which is a church and was beautiful. After visiting some other places like Rathaus and another church we wanted to go to a hill from where all Aachen city can be watched. We took a bus and went there. The scene was outstanding. We had plan to visit Bonn, former capital city of west Germany so we walked down but we saw a beautiful garden with red and white flowers. We could not stop ourself to visit that place. We spent 1 hour there and durig visit i slipped in a pond. Both of my shoes got wet and i was panic.

But we did not postponed our visit to the Bonn. We took train and came to Bonn. I had plan to visit University of Bonn and my friend was fascinated by the environment of that university. He was not ready to return on that day but we had to. We took a lot of photos there and headed to Rheine river, a main river of Europe. We walked on the bank of Rheine till evening and came back to the main train station of Bonn to return to Dortmund.

However the time was not enough to cover all the parts of Bonn city which stants for the beauty and culture of Germany.

It was a great experience in my life in Germany.

Development agenda in least developed countries

2008-09-02T11:47:00.000-07:00

Out of 192 countries ( member of UNO) more than 50 countries are listed as least developed countries. Which means people of these countries are living with less than 1 dollar per day. Stories of other many countries are not different. It shows that majority countries are either least developed or developing countries.
Among these least developed countries "NEPAL" is one which is situated between China and India. Nepal shares boarder with India from three sides and with China from one side. So Nepal is land linked country which does not have direct access to sea. Since the membership in UNO, Nepal has been listed as least developed country. It means in last may decades Nepal could not develop itself. Why?
Answer is simple, political instability and corruption. Before 1950 Nepal was ruled by Rana regime putting the people in darkness. No education was available. After democracy in 1950 again Nepal was ruled by king without providing political freedom.
Till 2006 Nepal had countless government whose age was from 9 month to 2-3 years. So major reason of no development was political instability. During democracy Nepali Congress held power most of the time. Political leaders of this party became rich but the nation became poor and poor. Every day there was conspiracy to make and dissolve the government. Parties had no time for national development.
Another reason is wide spread corruption. It starts from the very lower level of bureaucracy to the prime minister level. If we see the top level personnel of government, their living style is far better than the people of most developed countries. This is not possible without corruption. And important thing, even judiciary is not out of this corruption network. people are becoming poor and poor and leaders are becoming rich and rich.
To develop, major investment should be made in infrastructure such as road, irrigation, power and major emphasis should be given to agricultural sector. Investment should be made in productive sector such as export and agriculture. Only then economy of Nepal can be improved. Otherwise we remain poor and gap between haves and have not become wide.

Visit Nepal

2008-08-27T01:46:00.000-07:00

its available only in Nepal
Its the himalaya

Visiting Nepal is an experience in paradise.

Recent visit of "Prachanda" to China

2008-08-27T01:32:00.000-07:00

Recent visit to attend Olympic game in china by PM Prachanda has aroused many questions among different parties. India who is always acted as a care taker of Nepal vowed deep concern over the visit and even Indian PM Singh told that it was a mistake.
Though it was a hard decision taken by the Nepali PM to visit China before India which was almost a tradition. But it has initiated a new age of foreign affairs of Nepal.

Current nepalese news

2008-08-25T13:40:00.000-07:00

View current nepalese news and videos

http://www.bbc.co.uk/nepali/

http://www.mysansar.com/

http://www.nepalnews.com/archive/main.htm

Watch Mumbai meri jaan online

2008-08-24T08:52:00.000-07:00

Go to this link

bharatmovies.com
musicn.movies.com

NEPAl

2008-08-17T04:56:00.001-07:00

A country of peace and glory.

Interest rate swap

2008-08-17T04:24:00.000-07:00

everybody needs money and business can not run without money. But when one company takes loan from bank then it has to pay interest eithr in fixed rate or in floating rate. If the interest rate is based on floating rate then company has risk of incresing interest rate. What is the solution? Among many , interest rate SWAP is one financial instrument which can reduce interest rate risk.

interest rate swap is recently developed financial tool in which two parties exchange their cash flow generated from interest thereby reducing interest rate risk. How it works?

There must be two parties to exchange the interest rate. One party gives interest of other party and other party does the same. Confused!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We can explain it with one example. Company A which has better credit rating so it can get loan at lower interest rate which is based on floating rate i.e. LIBOR (London Interbank offering rate) e..g at LIBOR +50bp or at fixed interest rate i.e. lets say 10%. At the same time another party B has lower credit rating and can get loan at LIBOR + 150 bp or at fixed rate of 9%.

here party A can get lower interest based on LIBOR but wants to fix its interest rate however if it takes at fixed rate it has to pay 10% and party B can get lower interest at fixed but wants floating rate. If they on their own they can not get cheaper loan and even can not reduce interest rate risk. So swap is one alternative. Among many types of interest rate swap floating to fixed rate swap is available and one bank lets say Deutsche Bank can work as intermediator to deal the swap. How it works here we can show.

Company A pays a fixed rate to the bank at 9.5% and bank pays fixed rate of 9%to company B. At the same time Company B pays a Floating rate i.e. LIBOR + 125 bp to bank and bank pays to company A LIBOR+100 bp.

Now net effect to companoes:

Company A: -9.5%+LIBOR+100bp-LIBOR + 50bp ( to own bank)= 9% fixed

here what ever happens to the floating interest rate net effect to company A will remain 9%

Company B:+9%- LIBOR+125bp-10% ( to own bank)= LIBOR + 225bp

In our previous paragraph we explained that company A wants fixed interest and it got and B wants floating rate and it also got. Now bank has also got the margin . This is a typical win win situation for all parties and interest rate risk has been also reduced.

The first interest rate swap was done between IBM and World bank in 80's and now it has become very popular financial tool.

Program portfolio management

2008-08-16T00:20:00.000-07:00

Program portfolio Management

Perspective

Companies can not survive with only one project. Projects are cash flow generator in companies and to survive and to compete in the market more than one project should be managed parallel. We can help to manage your portfolio effectively applying our model which is proven best in communication industry.

Not all the project will add the value to the company so evaluation, prioritize and selection of profitable projects is the main objective of program and portfolio management.

1. Benefit of Program Portfolio Management

Major benefit is to synergize the operation of different projects running at the same time. Companies are running many projects at the same time and to achieve the goal of the company the portfolio should be optimized.

With the help of our project portfolio management companies can better manage their project and portfolio. Following are the major benefits:

1) Better allocation of organizational resources to all the projects

2) Link projects to strategy and ultimately to attain the vision & Mission of the company

3) Better project coordination

4) Maximize the value of portfolio

5) Benefit management for the client

6) Program governance which controls and provide a framework for the effective risk management

2.1. Program portfolio management

All the project activities will contribute to the attainment of mission and goal of the company. Ericsson follows following process for project portfolio management.

Process

1) Business Alignment and project Screening

2) Project scoring

3) Project ranking

4) portfolio simulation

5) Portfolio monitoring

6) Portfolio definition

program management addresses different aspects . These are:

1) Benefit management

Benefit management is the management of program by coordinating different projects aligned to the company’s vision and strategy. In a program many projects are interrelated. Evaluating and allocation of organizational resources efficiently increases the benefit of whole program.

Program benefits can be

a) Tangible such as increased profit, sales etc. which can be quantifiable

b) Intangible e.g. increased customer satisfaction, increased employee morale, reduced absenteeism etc.

2) Stakeholder management

A program has broader stakeholders than that of Project. So program management has to deal with different stakeholders such as Program directors, program managers, project managers, customers, program governance board, and others. Ericsson program management service can address all the expectation of the stakeholders and ultimately lead to the attainment of program and company objectives.

3) Program governance

Third aspect of the program management is program governance and it controls the activities within the program. Project governance controls the company’s investment, monitor the benefits and the result of these activities is to provide a framework for effective risk management.

3. Program Portfolio can be managed using two methods

1) Financial method

2) Non financial method

Return from each project is valuable to the company and we can analyze the financial performance of each project that you run and manage portfolio which will be the optimal. Financial criteria are key to the portfolio management. These criteria we use are:

1) Return on Investment (ROI)

2) Discounted cash flow method: Analysis of project and portfolio performance considering time value of the money.

a. Net present value (NPV)

b. Internal rate of return (IRR)

3) Cost benefit analysis: Analysis of the individual project based of cost and profit. An efficient portfolio can be formed by taking beneficial projects.

Non financial method considers almost all criteria which affect the project and influence its outcome. These methods covers the qualitative aspects of the project portfolio management. Following methods can be used for better portfolio management:

1) Checklist method

a. Check all the requirement of project and portfolio

2) Multiple weighted method

a. Assign weight for each criterion and rank them according to the weight.

4. Value add for the clients

project portfolio management helps to remove following problem in multi project environment and optimize the portfolio performance:

2) under and over utilization of capacity in projects and programs

3) Coordinate all the project to achieve the goal of the company

4) Manage the information for all project and programs

5) Prioritize the projects in portfolio which adds value for the company

6) Make synergy effect of each project to the portfolio

traditional way of film making in Nepal

2007-06-19T06:54:00.002-07:00

Today i am writing about the Nepalese film and its tradition. Till the date i have seen more than 50 nepalese movies and i hardly found a movie without a song in so called "Mela". In each and every film they have at least one song in Mela without necessity. It is only to make lengthy film. Further they have fight scene without any cause. Yes in each film songs and fight scenes are required to attract the viewer but if it is in unnecessary places they are like drama and viewer think that they have spoiled their hard earned money.
I have also seen many english and hindi movies but they hardly have songs and fight scenes in unnecessary places. So we always talk about that our film industry is underdeveloped and still infant. But if we start to improve from today it will grow up early and soon we can say that nepalese film is the best

Environment Protection

2007-06-18T13:25:00.000-07:00

Again about the business. When i was reading the business journal i came to know that world business leaders are also considering the environment protection. As i have already mentioned in my previous blog that Bank of America has announced to spend more than 20 billion US dollar for environment protection. Here i give you more example of environment protection initiation taken by corporations and if not are punished either by locals or governments.
SUBARU a small vehicle production company has announced that its 99% waste is recycled and 1% is turned in to electricity therefore producing null waste. SUBARU's Indiana plant got this reputation. Further the emission made by SUBARU vehicles (some models) are cleaner than the air we breathe. So if taken initiation corporation can make difference to protect the environment.
Cargil, world food supplier has to shut down its soy processing and shipping plant in Brazil because of amid public outcry that it was contributing to the destruction of the Amazon rain forest.
These are only some example. But in Nepal environment protection is still considered as waste and non productive expenses for the corporations. Carpet industries are dumping their waste in rivers polluting water, other manufacturing companies are emitting smoke in the air. Many people think that we are not developed so we should not care about these things but if we consider these things from the very beginning we will considered as developed and will rise as a nation which is committed for environment protection. So corporations should take initiation and should use environment friendly technology which will reduce the natural resource consumption and protect the environment.

An Hour with Korean National

2007-06-18T10:16:00.000-07:00

There is a proverb that never say what the country has given you, say that what you have given to the country. Today I totally agree with this proverb and one Korean national made me to accept that fact.

I met him in Germany during my college time and we were talking about study and other normal things. When I asked him about his schooling he told me that he went to US for his schooling as his father had to move from one country to another because his father is an army. During 1997 he was in the US and at the same time there was Asian economic crisis which made Korean economy downward. Many companies went bankrupt. So his father told him to go back to Korea. I asked him why ? And answer was amazing and shocking for me. He told me that he was spending scares dollar at that time is US which makes Korean economy further down. Therefore his father told him to go back to his country and save dollars.

I was really surprised and felt guilty that even my country is in economic crisis and I am spending Euro here. I wanted to salute his patriotism and thinking. Though he told me that it was bad for his career but for country sake it is ok. Then I felt I also should follow his way of thinking but I am compelled to stay here because I can no return without completing my study here. But there are a lot of people who have already settled in foreign can contribute to the nation not only by providing dollars or Euro or other hard earned money. So I urge them to return to the country and contribute as much as they can. I have decided that after completion of my study I will return to Nepal and will contribute at least by spending nothing in foreign country.

corporate responsibility in Nepal

2007-06-18T09:08:00.000-07:00

Profit is the main goal of any corporation, no matter it is Nepal or in any other country. However how responsible the corporations are in Nepal? is the major question for their stakeholders and how Nepalese corporation can improve their corporate responsibility? Is another one.

Corporate responsibility can be defined as the responsibility of corporations towards its stakeholders such as shareholders, employee, customers, government and environment. Each and every stakeholder has its own expectation and corporation should fulfill all the possible expectation of its stakeholders. For example corporation should provide dividend to the shareholders, quality product at reasonable price to the customer, safe and equal working environment to employees, fair tax to government and use of environment friendly technology for environment.

All above responsibilities can be divided in to three broad categories and these are: Corporate financial Responsibility, Corporate Social Responsibility and Corporate Environmental Responsibility. Are Nepalese corporations are performing all these responsibilities properly or not? We will discuss in following paragraphs and also how they can improve their responsibility toward stakeholders?

Being a profit oriented entity, business has obligation to provide return to its shareholders which is regarded as financial responsibility of the corporation. Further corporation should do all these activities to increase the value of share so that wealth of share holder will maximize. Let have a close financial market scenario of Nepal. Only a bunch of financial institutions are able to perform financial responsibility providing sufficient dividend annually and market price of share is also sky rocketing. Last year Standard Chartered Bank provided 120% dividend which is amazing to the shareholder and due to this share price standard chartered stock have been growing. Same is applicable for all A rated financial institutions but even some so called joint venture banks and financial institutions are failed to even maintain its growth and in the verse of bankruptcy. NB Bank, NCC Bank and Nepal Sri Lanka Merchant Bank are some example to take. These institutions have been suffering from loss since last some years. They do not only fail to provide dividend but also fail to maintain their market price of share. NCC stock even went down below its face value.

Further Nepal Bottlers Ltd and Uniliver ltd are some fine example of excellent financial performer. Uniliver also provided 400% cash dividend which is unbelievable and bottlers Nepal is also maintaining its share price. But at the same time other manufacturing company Birat Shoes Ltd. And Hari Siddi Brick and Tiles Ltd. Are in the verse of extinction. They are now days in ventilator and any time they could die sinking all the investment of shareholders. These are some example of poor performer of corporate financial responsibility.

Another important responsibility of corporations is social responsibility. Corporate social responsibility is the responsibility beyond profit. This is comparatively new phenomenon but almost all the reputed companies in the world are performing social responsibility. When a corporation make donation it is not regarded as social responsibility. It includes respect of human rights, labor right and consumer rights etc. When companies fail to perform these responsibilities they will be swiped out from the business arena. Human right and labor right have been always like a taboo in Nepal. Still in companies specially in manufacturing companies gender discrimination is exist. Discrimination in work, salary wage, and in other area women are suffering. Though the situation is satisfactory in financial institution but still they use ladies in front office and customer service centre to attract the customers. This is simply exploitation. One can easily see that in banks and finance companies ladies are serving for customers not gents. Why ? ladies are only showpiece. If the corporations publish , we are equal opportunity provider then why this kind of discrimination? Further in Nepalese corporations labor right is almost prohibited. Only one bank has labor union and that is NABIL Bank which respects human right as well as labor right. But in other banks either employees are transferred or sacked who wanted to form labor union is their organization. Again NB Banks labor union case in court can prove it. No labor union can find in other companies except government corporations. However in some manufacturing companies blue color employees are free to join labor union. This shows the clear performance of social responsibility of Nepalese corporations. Moreover consumer right is like “Hauguji” in Nepali which means no consumers knows that and companies are far behind to perform this responsibility. Some consumer right activists and organizations have been working toward this.

Third responsibility of the corporations is environmental responsibility. Every companies in developed countries are doing their best to perform this responsibility. For example Bank of America has planned to spend $20 billion towards environment protection. It does not spend all money to protect the environment but will lend money to these corporations who are really working for environment protection and using environment friendly technology. But in Nepal no company is doing such activity. All the manufacturing corporations are emitting their waste water to the nearest river polluting the ecosystem. Is it not possible for Nepalese bank?

Why Nepalese companies are failed to perform their responsibilities towards their stakeholders? The answer is lack of corporate governance, lack of investors’ protection act and negligence to the environment. In Nepal there is no corporate governance codex which is now a days common in other countries which ensures the authority and responsibility of different level of management in any organization. It ensures the delegation of authority and transparency which it ultimate goal of any corporation. Normally public do not know what is happening inside the corporation and minority shareholders are misguided by majority. No employee can represent him/herself in board of director. So government should initiate toward the formulation of corporate governance codex and should compel the companies to abide by this codex. Nepalese corporations are operating under company act which is not sufficient for internal control and investors protection. There should be special act or law for investors’ protection so that investor can invest their hard earned money without hesitation in their dream company. Like in US Sarbanes Oxley Act 2000, Nepal should also enact the same type of law. Though Nepal is a signing party of human right and labor right but why corporations are not following such rules? Are these laws coercive so? If then UN Global Compact may be another solution. This is voluntary initiation taken by former secretary general of UN, Kofi Annan shouting the attention of corporate world to respect human right , labor right and environment protection. This is not a law. It’s pure voluntary initiation and once joined this compact corporations should be obliged to the norms of Global compact.

Though Nepalese corporate world is not developed but it is the time to take such initiation to work for society and environment which in future turn to be fruitful not only for nation but also for the corporate world.

Need of Business school in Nepal

2007-06-18T07:26:00.000-07:00

Economic development of the country depends upon the growth of business and business activities. And business growth directly depends upon the qualified business graduates who can found or run a business well. But the backbone is business school and Nepal lacks that.

Normally every country had its reputed business school whose product can act as economic catalyst. Let’s take the example of Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT) and Indian School of Business (ISB). These are only example and the products of these business schools are really incredible to lead a business. We can take the example of the CEO of Asian Paints Nepal, who is IIM (Ahmadabad) graduate and there are many more to name.

Lets take the example of business heaven i.e. USA. Wharton Business School, Kellogg School of Management, Harvard Business School, Stanford school of Management and many more. Now a days the product of these schools are leading the world business. Millions of people dream to enter these business schools and after graduation they come outside to lead, to make difference.

In Europe INSEAD is referred as Harvard Business School and there are another business school such as EDHEC in Paris, London Business School (LBS), ESADE France etc. These schools are world renowned. To get admission in these schools only academic excellence is not enough but also leadership skills and many things to consider.

In Nepal there are lots of schools and colleges offering business education but have we ever heard that any company had visited Shanker Dev campus which is consider as Business School of Nepal, and offered any job? Have we ever heard that students of Nepal Commerce Campus got scholarship in Harvard and Stanford? Never and it will not happened in future if the trend is same.

Above mentioned business schools have long tradition of quality education and best products. So to keep their reputation and tradition they have strict admission procedure. But in Shanker Dev Campus and Nepal Commerce Campus student union decides who will get admission and who will not. Admission is the main agenda of student politics and if someone does not get admission union announces strike which spoils the others lives. During these days I had opportunities to interact with students from IIM, IIFT and professors of Wharton and Kellogg business schools and the methodology they use to teach and experience they share really help to develop future business leaders. Students themselves are really eager to learn and they can even contribute to the learning process while teaching. They always discuss the real time business problem and get solution as well. When I was in Shanker Dev, I had heard about Harvard and Stanford and other business schools. And I used to think that what kind of “Jadibuti” they eat or they feed to the students that they will become the world’s leaders? But after meeting some students and some teachers I got to know that they teach no books they teach reality and they teach to solve the problem. In classes they discuss the cases and make presentation to learn from the cases. Group work and group discussions are other major tools to teach. During group work students learn how to work with group and how to develop leadership skill. Further one major thing is cross cultural learning environment. In foreign business schools there is real world. Students can interact with Asians Europeans .Americans and Africans and learn from their experience. In this way students develop their skill which they apply in business to make difference.

In Nepal Katmandu University and some private business institutions have been offering graduate program in business of still it is not so effective. Tribhuvan University, being the largest and government university it should opt for the establishment of business school which will produce qualified business graduate. It should start from the beginning i.e. designing of course and entrance procedure. Current entrance procedure either should be eliminated or improved so that only cream students get admission and no political pressure from either side. In Shanker dev Campus and Nepal Commerce Campus we can see the huge number of students in one class which makes the learning environment worse. In one class there should be not more than 30-40 students so that teacher student contact can be made and both side can contribute the learning process. Curriculum should be based upon the real world problem. If one students is doing major in Marketing school should teach how solve the marketing problem of products. If the student is doing major in Finance then school should teach real banking problem, share market problem and other financial problem. In Nepal, even in whole 2 years, Masters students do not get chance to visit one company, stock exchange or any other corporate world. Then what can they learn after joining the business school? Nothing. After graduation when they get job, the company should provide training from the very beginning. Then what is the need of these business schools? Now a days, graduates of our business schools are searching for job taking their certificates in hand and corporate world are denying offering them job because they do not know the business. They only know the book

There is a proverb, “It’s never too late”. We can improve and we should do that. If Government University can not do that private sector should do that. After all business schools are making also profit and it is also a business. So corporate world another business opportunity is knocking your door. There is burning example near to you that is Indian School of Business whose total fee for the course is around two million INR.