Saturday, 1 July 2017
MIT Technology Review: 50 Smartest Companies
50 Smartest Companies
The ist +
1 Nvidia
2 SpaceX
3 Amazon
4 23andMe
5 Alphabet
6 iFlytek
7 Kite Pharma
8 Tencent
9 Regeneron
10 Spark Therapeutics
11 Face ++
12 First Solar
13 Intel
14 Quanergy Systems
15 Vestas Wind Systems
16 Apple
17 Merck
18 Carbon
19 Desktop Metal
20 Ionis Pharmaceuticals
21 Gamalon
22 Illumina
23 Facebook
24 Udacity
25 DJI
26 MercadoLibre
27 Microsoft
28 Rigetti Computing
29 Kindred AI
30 Sophia Genetics
31 Tesla
32 Oxford Nanopore
33 Foxconn
34 M-KOPA
35 ForAllSecure
36 Flipkart
37 Bluebird Bio
38 Adidas
39 IBM
40 General Electric
41 Alibaba
42 HTC
43 Blue Prism
44 Jumia (Africa Internet Group)
45 Veritas Genetics
46 Daimler
47 Salesforce
48 Snap
49 Ant Financial
50 Baidu
Past Lists +
2017
2016
2015
2014
2013
2012
2011
2010
Nvidia
SpaceX
Amazon
23andMe
Alphabet
iFlytek
Kite Pharma
Tencent
Regeneron
Spark Therapeutics
Face ++
First Solar
Intel
Quanergy Systems
Vestas Wind Systems
Apple
Merck
Carbon
Desktop Metal
Ionis Pharmaceuticals
Gamalon
Illumina
Udacity
DJI
MercadoLibre
Microsoft
Rigetti Computing
Kindred AI
Sophia Genetics
Tesla
Oxford Nanopore
Foxconn
M-KOPA
ForAllSecure
Flipkart
Bluebird Bio
Adidas
IBM
General Electric
Alibaba
HTC
Blue Prism
Jumia (Africa Internet Group)
Veritas Genetics
Daimler
Salesforce
Snap
Ant Financial
Baidu
MIT Technology Review
50 Smartest Companies 2017
Our editors pick the 50 companies that best combine innovative technology with an effective business model.
June 27, 2017
Each year we identify 50 companies creating new opportunities by combining important technologies and business savvy. Some are large companies that seem to be growing ever larger, like Amazon and Apple. Others, like IBM, or General Electric are old-guard giants betting on technology renewal. And the list is full of ambitious startups like SpaceX, which is changing the economics of space travel with reusable rockets; Face ++, a pioneer in face recognition technology; and additive-manufacturing firms Carbon and Desktop Metal. For additional perspective on the list, which starts below, please see our essay, "It Pays to Be Smart."
1
Nvidia
Headquarters Santa Clara, California
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Public
Years on the List 2015, 2016, 2017
Valuation $90.9 billion
Summary Though Nvidia still makes most of its money from selling graphics chips for video games, it has established itself as the leading provider of processing power for AI software, and its newer, AI-related businesses are growing quickly. During its most recent financial quarter, revenues from its data-center and automotive businesses increased by 186 percent and 24 percent, respectively, over the previous year. The company says all the major Internet and cloud-service providers use its chips to accelerate their processes, and a number of large carmakers, including Toyota, are using its autonomous-driving technology.
$3 billion: spending on R&D to create its new data-center chip
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2
SpaceX
Headquarters Hawthorne, California
Industry Transportation
Status Private
Years on the List 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017
Valuation $12 billion
Summary In 2017, SpaceX proved it’s possible to fly a rocket into space carrying a payload, bring it back, refurbish it, and launch it again with a new payload. Reusable rockets make space travel far cheaper and faster: they are critical to SpaceX’s long-term goal of establishing an interplanetary transport system. The startup also compressed the time needed to refit its recycled rockets (from one year to a few months) and began preliminary tests of its Falcon Heavy booster, which is expected to be the world’s most powerful rocket when it is completed later this year.
10 percent: price discount being considered for customers who agree to fly their payloads on reused rockets
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3
Amazon
Headquarters Seattle, Washington
Industry Connectivity
Status Public
Years on the List 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017
Valuation $479.3 billion
Summary Amazon is using a range of AI technologies, including computer vision, machine learning, and natural-language processing, to reinvent mobile computing and shopping. The company’s voice-activated assistant Alexa now controls everything from TVs to cars and is poised to be the next important computing platform. Amazon is also streamlining the brick-and-mortar shopping experience through its Seattle-based Amazon Go convenience store. Customers simply enter the store, scan an app on their smartphones, and walk out with the items they wish to purchase. Amazon uses AI, cameras, and sensors to identify the products they have selected and bills them automatically—no lines or checkouts necessary.
12,000: number of programs that software developers have published for Alexa
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4
23andMe
Headquarters Mountain View, California
Industry Biomedicine
Status Private
Years on the List 2016, 2017
Valuation $1.1 billion
Summary A pioneer of direct-to-consumer genetic testing since its founding in 2006, 23andMe ran into trouble in 2013 when the FDA barred it from distributing health information. But this year the regulator changed course and reopened a major business line for the company, permitting it to market genetic reports on risks for late-onset Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, and eight other conditions. After extracting DNA from the cells in saliva samples sent in by customers, the company uses a DNA-genotyping chip made by Illumina (No. 22) to capture features related to health and ancestry—information customers are then able to access online. 23andMe now has more than two million customers worldwide, and its products have been used in a number of research projects, including studies of female fertility, depression, Parkinson’s disease, and even nail biting.
1 million plus: number of customers who have consented to have their genetic information used for scientific research
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5
Alphabet
Headquarters Mountain View, California
Industry Connectivity
Status Public
Years on the List 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017
Valuation $673.9 billion
Summary Alphabet’s subsidiaries are technology leaders in AI, autonomous vehicles, and AR and VR, among other areas. Its DeepMind division keeps devising new ways for AI systems to mimic human intelligence and learn more quickly. Its self-driving-car project, Waymo, continues to improve performance and has aggressively defended its intellectual property by suing rival Uber after a top engineer switched teams. Google, Alphabet’s best-known and largest subsidiary, is collaborating with hardware makers to create standalone VR headsets for its Daydream VR platform. The new models will have built-in displays and processors rather than relying on users’ smartphones, and will use sensors to better track peoples’ movements in virtual worlds.
40 percent: amount of energy the company says it saves applying machine-learning algorithms from its DeepMind subsidiary to cooling its data center.
Read about the software transforming Google
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6
iFlytek
Headquarters Hefei, China
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $6.8 billion
Summary iFlytek already dominates China’s voice recognition market and is now expanding into voice-activated command systems for cars, homes, robots, and schools. In the past year, it launched systems that enable people to control their cars, TVs, and home appliances via voice; invested in a startup that makes home robots; and established a joint venture to develop educational products that incorporate its instant translation features. It also established a multimillion-dollar fund to invest in AI-related startups around the world. It says that more than 160,000 developers use its software and more than 400 million people use its products.
70 percent: iFlytek’s share of China’s market in voice-based technologies
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7
Kite Pharma
Headquarters Santa Monica, California
Industry Biomedicine
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $5.7 billion
Summary This immunotherapy company is taking the body’s T cells, which naturally fight infections, and engineering them to fight cancer. It is farthest along with its therapy for aggressive non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, with more than a third of one study’s participants showing no sign of disease six months after treatment. There were two deaths associated with the therapy based on its known side effects—approximately 2 percent of study participants—but it seems to be nearing FDA approval.
39 percent: proportion of study participants very sick with lymphoma who showed no sign of the disease six months after a single treatment with Kite’s therapy
8
Tencent
Headquarters Shenzhen, China
Industry Connectivity
Status Public
Years on the List 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017
Valuation $350 billion
Summary It’s been a blowout year for Tencent, which owns China’s biggest social network, WeChat, and is also the world’s largest video-gaming company. Though WeChat already boasts more than 900 million monthly active users, Tencent keeps expanding the mobile app so that it now offers messaging, online gaming, shopping, music, videos, and peer-to-peer payments. The breadth of features attracts new users and keeps existing ones active inside WeChat, which enables Tencent to sell more ads and services. In April, the Internet giant passed Wells Fargo to become one of the world’s 10 most valuable companies by market capitalization, thanks to growth in its gaming, online advertising, and payments businesses.
50 percent: proportion of WeChat’s 770 million daily users who are on the service at least 90 minutes a day
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9
Regeneron
Headquarters Tarrytown, New York
Industry Biomedicine
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $55.5 billion
Summary A well-established biotech with a track record in treating eye and other diseases, Regeneron emphasizes the use of genetic information to focus its drug development efforts. In March it announced that, along with the U.K. Biobank and pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline, it would be sequencing genetic data from 500,000 volunteers to help support research into drug development and the connections between DNA and disease. It’s also put a focus on creating “off-the-shelf” engineered T cells to target tumors without requiring a patient’s own immune cells to be used, an approach that could make this field of treatment much easier to scale. Company revenue for calendar year 2016 was $4.9 billion, net income nearly $900 million.
500,000: number of U.K. volunteers whose genetic data it is helping sequence
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10
Spark Therapeutics
Headquarters Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Industry Biomedicine
Status Public
Years on the List 2016, 2017
Valuation $1.9 billion
Summary In addition to its treatment for a progressive form of blindness, the company has also been testing a way to combat hemophilia B, a blood clotting disorder, by intravenous treatment with viruses carrying a corrected version of the gene that codes for a blood-clotting protein called factor IX. This is one to watch because the disease, which affects one in 5,000 men, is expensive to treat conventionally.
1 in 30,000: estimated number of individuals affected by the disease, Leber hereditary optic neuropathy
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11
Face ++
Headquarters Beijing, China
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $1 billion
Summary Facial recognition services are prevalent in China, and Face++’s software powers many of the country’s most popular applications. Alipay, the popular online payment platform, uses the technology to let users log in and make payments using their face as ID; ride-sharing provider Didi Chuxing uses it to verify the identity of its freelance drivers; and smartphone app maker Meitu uses it to offer highly detailed photo-retouching features. The five-year-old startup is believed to be the first facial recognition “unicorn,” having raised at least $145 million in recent years, including at least $100 million in December 2016.
106: maximum number of points on a person’s face that its technology tracks
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12
First Solar
Headquarters Tempe, Arizona
Industry Clean energy
Status Public
Years on the List 2010, 2011, 2012, 2016, 2017
Valuation $4.3 billion
Summary Landed some of the biggest solar-plant deals in the world last year, including a 140-megawatt solar farm in North Queensland, Australia, the largest in that country. The company, which develops, constructs, and operates photovoltaic power plants connected to the electric grid, also continues to invest heavily in its cadmium telluride cells, a promising alternative to silicon solar cells that are making big advances. This year is off to a good start too, with the company reporting better-than-expected results in the first quarter of 2017 and raising expectations for its current quarter as well.
$2.9 billion: estimated 2017 revenue
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13
Intel
Headquarters Santa Clara, California
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Public
Years on the List 2010, 2012, 2013, 2016, 2017
Valuation $160 billion
Summary Intel is benefiting from a series of AI-centric investments and acquisitions it made to offset the decline of its main market, chips for personal computers. In the past year, it bought the deep-learning startup Nervana, the computer-vision chipmaker Movidius, and Mobileye, a supplier of assisted-driving systems. The Movidius purchase enabled Intel to sell chips to drone giant DJI, while the Mobileye acquisition brought it autonomous-driving partnerships with BMW and Delphi Automotive. In March, Intel launched an AI products group to further accelerate its AI efforts.
46 percent: portion of revenues derived from areas beyond PC chips
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14
Quanergy Systems
Headquarters Sunnyvale, California
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $1.6 billion
Summary There are many startups trying to create compact, low-cost, high-quality lidar systems for autonomous vehicles, but Quanergy was the first to develop one using solid-state technology, which increases the reliability of the laser-scanning radar. The startup’s lidar is also relatively cheap to make because it uses some of the same materials and manufacturing processes as computer chips. The sensors, which are small enough to be embedded in car headlights, can be used in advanced driver-assistance systems and will be integrated into autonomous vehicles by 2021.
$250: price of its S3 Lidar sensors for autonomous vehicles
15
Vestas Wind Systems
Headquarters Aarhus, Denmark
Industry Clean energy
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $19.1 billion
Summary In recent months, Vestas cemented its position as the world’s largest wind turbine supplier and edged ahead of General Electric to lead the market in the United States. Overall, it added nearly 6,500 megawatts of capacity in the second half of last year, according to Navigant Research. The Danish wind giant also quadrupled its net income in the most recent quarter, marking its 14th profitable quarter in a row. The company is now looking to make investments in energy storage, an effort to expand wind power’s market and potential.
14: consecutive number of profitable quarters
16
Apple
Headquarters Cupertino, California
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Public
Years on the List 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2015, 2017
Valuation $761.4 billion
Summary Derided of late for a lack of innovative new products and tepid customer response to Apple Pay and the Apple Watch, Apple has launched a Siri-enabled speaker called HomePod to compete with Amazon’s Alexa-equipped Echo speaker. It’s also begun to tout its AI chops, including acknowledging its work on autonomous-driving systems. For some time Apple has been quietly hiring some impressive robotics and AI talent for its project, and its history of smart design and smooth integration of hardware and software may prove valuable assets.
$257 billion: cash on its balance sheet, more than the entire market value of General Electric
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17
Merck
Headquarters Kenilworth, New Jersey
Industry Biomedicine
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $182.5 billion
Summary This pharma giant has one of the most successful immunotherapies on the market. Following a big jump in the number of lung cancer patients being tested to see if they would benefit from the treatment, sales are predicted to grow significantly. Keytruda has been approved in testing in some people who have not had chemotherapy, putting it a step ahead of rivals in immunotherapy.
$39 billion: estimated 2017 revenue, buoyed by sales of Keytruda
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18
Carbon
Headquarters Redwood, California
Industry Advanced manufacturing
Status Private
Years on the List 2016, 2017
Valuation $1 billion
Summary Using its process for rapidly printing objects with high-performance polymers like polyurethanes and epoxies, four-year-old Carbon is pursuing an approach fundamentally different from other methods of 3-D printing, which put down layers of plastic one at a time. The company says this technology enables it to print polymer objects rapidly, in some cases thousands of times faster than other 3-D printers, and use a wider range of materials, including rubber-like elastomers and durable, hard plastics. Carbon has a growing number of clients, including Adidas (No. 38), which is using its technology to manufacture elastomer midsoles for athletic shoes. Other customers are using it to print parts for electric motorcycles, server farms, and cooling systems, all of which have been difficult to make with other methods.
100,000: number of pairs of shoes Adidas will print by the end of 2018 using Carbon technology
Read about Carbon’s new approach to 3-D printing
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19
Desktop Metal
Headquarters Burlington, Massachusetts
Industry Advanced manufacturing
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Valuation N/A
Summary With nearly $100 million from VC firms, GE, Alphabet, and others, this startup is trying to use 3-D printing, a technology that has focused on plastics, to reinvent how we make the metal parts essential to much of manufacturing. Making this kind of printing easy and cost-effective is a challenge, but Desktop Metal has laid out the pricing for its products, a promising indication of progress toward commercialization. Its first offering, including a printer and sintering furnace, will cost $120,000. Its full production system, to begin shipping in 2018, will cost $420,000. Renting is also an option.
$120,000: cost of its first product, to begin shipping in September
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20
Ionis Pharmaceuticals
Headquarters Carlsbad, California
Industry Biomedicine
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $6.9 billion
Summary Along with Biogen, Ionis developed Spinraza, a novel type of drug called an RNA therapeutic. Approved in 2016, it combats spinal muscular atrophy, a condition difficult to treat successfully with existing options. The drug is a chemically enhanced strand of RNA that is matched up with a mirror copy of the genetic messenger molecule in a patient’s cells, allowing the patient’s body to correctly assemble a protein that nerve cells need. Other Ionis drugs are being tested against five additional rare but severe genetic disorders.
36 plus: number of its RNA-targeted drugs in development
21
Gamalon
Headquarters Cambridge, Massachusetts
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Valuation N/A
Summary Many of today’s most popular AI techniques require massive amounts of data to train their systems. Gamalon claims its probabilistic programming algorithms are far more efficient because they can learn from just a few examples, and they can run on an iPad or laptop rather than pricey servers and graphics processors. The startup, which emerged from stealth mode in February 2017, currently helps e-commerce and manufacturing companies structure and match text data from disparate sources, such as inventory databases. It has raised $4.45 million in seed funding and has $7.7 million in government contracts.
100 times: its technology’s efficiency advantage over other machine-learning methods
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22
Illumina
Headquarters San Diego, California
Industry Biomedicine
Status Public
Years on the List 2010, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017
Valuation $28 billion
Summary The leader in commercializing the rapid sequencing of human DNA, the company reported a steep drop in sales last fall, suggesting that the market for its sequencing machines might be saturated. Three months later it unveiled a new machine, NovaSeq, that it says is capable of sequencing as many as 48 entire human genomes in two and a half days—and someday pushing the cost of sequencing down to $100, potentially low enough to significantly expand what researchers can learn about diseases.
$850,000: price of the cheaper of its two NovaSeq models
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23
Headquarters Menlo Park, California
Industry Connectivity
Status Public
Years on the List 2011, 2012, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2017
Valuation $447.9 billion
Summary It’s been a tumultuous year for Facebook, but the fierce debates surrounding its role in disseminating “fake news” and violent content via its social-networking app have not stymied its progress in AI. The company has leveraged computer vision and neural networks to develop greater capabilities for “M,” its AI assistant, and new ways of searching photos that don’t require captions or tags. Facebook is using some of these technologies, such as algorithms that identify potentially suicidal messages and pro-terrorism propaganda, to counter public criticism of its services.
20: number of natural-language data sets built into the company’s AI research tool, ParlAI.
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24
Udacity
Headquarters Mountain View, California
Industry Connectivity
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $1 billion
Summary After stumbling in its attempt to make money from free online courses, Udacity now offers classes that teach specific skills needed by technology companies, such as data analysis, digital marketing, and engineering for self-driving cars. Most of the startup’s “nanodegree” programs cost $200 a month and take six to nine months to finish. Five of the classes are part of an additional, paid program that promises graduates a job within six months or a full refund of their tuition. To boost its students’ job prospects, Udacity frequently asks large companies to help develop curricula and agree to consider hiring graduates. It also recently launched a program called Blitz that matches alumni with tech companies for contract assignments.
15: number of “nanodegrees” the company offers in skills for selected jobs
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25
DJI
Headquarters Shenzhen, China
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $10 billion
Summary DJI continues to lead the consumer drone market by making smaller, more capable aircraft at lower cost. Its $999 Mavic Pro drone boasts advanced flight features like obstacle avoidance and can be transported in a backpack thanks to folding arms and propellers. The company’s latest drone, the $499 Spark, fits in the palm of a hand, weighs less than a soda can, and can be controlled with hand gestures. DJI is also targeting the more lucrative enterprise market with a rugged drone, the Matrice 200, designed to do industrial inspections and search-and-rescue missions. The company rang up $1.4 billion in sales in 2016 and expects revenues to exceed $1 billion in 2017.
50 percent: estimated North American market share
26
MercadoLibre
Headquarters Buenos Aires, Argentina
Industry Connectivity
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $12.1 billion
Summary MercadoLibre, based in Argentina, is Latin America’s biggest e-commerce and online payments platform—essentially, the region’s Amazon, eBay, and PayPal. The company is beating Amazon in the one market they share—Mexico—and is active in 17 other countries, including Brazil and Venezuela. Founded in 1999, it continues to expand into new markets, make acquisitions, and deliver strong financial results, despite the sluggish Latin American economy.
182 million: number of registered users, a 20 percent increase over the previous year
27
Microsoft
Headquarters Redmond, Washington
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Public
Years on the List 2013, 2015, 2016, 2017
Valuation $549.7 billion
Summary Its cloud business is growing, reducing its reliance on PC sales and increasing its margins. Its consumer products have been reenergized with the Surface Book, Studio, and Laptop and its HoloLens augmented-reality headset. More futuristic initiatives include its work on using DNA as a storage system for data and on its particular approach to quantum computing, focused on manipulating a subatomic particle called the Majorana fermion.
$15 billion: projected annual revenue for its commercial cloud business
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28
Rigetti Computing
Headquarters Berkeley, California
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Valuation N/A
Summary Rigetti Computing not only aims to build the world’s most powerful computer using quantum computing, it also plans to make that computational power accessible to a range of companies. The startup has already created a prototype quantum chip and is developing a cloud computing platform that will leverage the chips to support AI and computational chemistry. Large companies—among them Google, IBM, and Microsoft—are also researching quantum computing, but Rigetti thinks its approach is lower in cost and can be scaled up more quickly.
$64 million: venture funding raised by the company in the past year
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29
Kindred AI
Headquarters San Francisco, California
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Valuation N/A
Summary Unlike other AI startups, Kindred envisions a future in which intelligent machines work together with people to increase the efficiency of both. Its system pairs robots with human “pilots” who are outfitted with VR headsets and handheld motion-tracking controllers. The robots use machine-learning algorithms to operate, but if one runs into problems—say, while grasping and placing items inside a warehouse—the human can temporarily take control, and the robot will improve its performance via reinforcement learning. The technology could lead to a new type of AI and general-purpose robots that are capable of multiple tasks.
Immersive teleoperation: the type of technology the company makes, in which a human controls a robot via a wearable device
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30
Sophia Genetics
Headquarters Lausanne, Switzerland
Industry Biomedicine
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Valuation N/A
Summary Sophia Genetics uses AI algorithms to sort through patients’ DNA sequences in an attempt to diagnose cancer and other illnesses more quickly. The company’s business model is to charge hospitals and doctors a fee—reportedly between $50 and $200 per test—each time they use the tool. It does not sell directly to the consumer. The company’s expectation is that as the number of patients increases, the sophistication of its analysis will improve. The technology is now being used in more than 300 hospitals in 50 countries mostly in Latin America, Europe and Africa.
106,000: number of patients tested to date
31
Tesla
Headquarters Palo Alto, California
Industry Transportation
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $64 billion
Summary There are certainly concerns that Tesla is overextending itself, between its giant factory buildouts and its acquisition of SolarCity. Autopilot accidents and car maintenance issues add to the negatives. Still, the company continues to make bold bets. Among businesses focused on sustainability, Tesla remains the best example of a brand success, advancing the technology and economic viability of electric vehicles, energy storage, and solar. Tesla flipped the switch on its massive battery factory earlier this year, and this summer the company expects to roll out its next product, the more affordable Model 3, introducing its vehicles to a far larger market. Its 400,000-plus preorders show there is demand.
400,000 plus: number of preorders for its lower-cost Model 3
Read why Tesla is worth more than GM
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32
Oxford Nanopore
Headquarters Oxford, United Kingdom
Industry Biomedicine
Status Private
Years on the List 2016, 2017
Valuation $1 billion
Summary Its MinION, a DNA sequencer the size and weight of a deck of cards, reads DNA as it’s pulled through around 500 nanoscopic pores by measuring an electrical signal produced by each DNA letter. The size and design of the device, which has taken 12 years and $200 million to develop, enables sequencing to be done in remote locations. Especially useful for identifying and studying bacteria and viruses, it was used in Brazil in 2016 to sequence the genome of mosquitoes infected with the Zika virus, providing clues about the epidemic’s origins. Now the company is working to prove that its technology can be widely useful in a market for high-speed DNA sequencers currently dominated by the faster and more accurate machines made by Illumina (No. 22).
882,000 letters: record length of a single DNA strand read continuously by one of its machines
Read the story of Oxford Nanopore’s hand-held DNA analyzer
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33
Foxconn
Headquarters New Taipei City, Taiwan
Industry Advanced manufacturing
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $160 billion
Summary The maker of iPhones and a dominant force in contract manufacturing in China, Foxconn is considering a $7 billion investment in a U.S. display-making facility and could employ tens of thousands, according to statements by chairman Terry Gou. At the same time Gou is talking up the possibility of employing U.S. workers, the company is investing in automation in its home market, a response to rising labor costs there. Foxconn makes its own manufacturing robots, known as Foxbots, 40,000 of which are already in operation. Eventually, Foxconn executive Dai Jia-peng has said, the company aims to fully automate the making of PCs, monitors, and, yes, iPhones.
60,000: number of jobs automation eliminated at a single Chinese factory
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34
M-KOPA
Headquarters Nairobi, Kenya
Industry Clean energy
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Valuation N/A
Summary The largest off-grid solar operator in sub-Saharan Africa, it offers clean power to consumers in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania for a daily fee. It connected its 500,000th home this spring, to sells its products through the major communications company Safaricom and others, and that it has put its new solar TV systems in 60,000 households.
500,000: number of homes connected as of this spring
Related Stories
Africa Finds Power Off the Grid
35
ForAllSecure
Headquarters Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Summary ForAllSecure’s cybersecurity tools, which automatically find and fix vulnerabilities in software, draw upon more than a decade of research from Carnegie Mellon University. The Pittsburgh startup spun out of CMU in 2012 and attracted global attention in 2016, when its cybersecurity system outmaneuvered more than 100 automated machines to win DARPA’s Cyber Grand Challenge. The contest was the first to prove that fully automated systems could protect people from software vulnerabilities in real time. The company is now signing up its first customers, which are likely to include federal government agencies, financial services companies, and manufacturers of Internet-connected devices.
14: number of previously undiscovered vulnerabilities in networking devices the company’s tools have found
36
Flipkart
Headquarters Bengaluru, India
Industry Finance
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $11.6 billion
Summary Amazon’s aggressive investments in India have upended the country’s e-commerce industry, but Flipkart—India’s largest online marketplace—keeps battling back. In April, the homegrown e-tailer raised $1.4 billion in funding from several global tech giants, including Tencent, eBay, and Microsoft. As part of the deal, Flipkart will acquire eBay’s India unit, which will bring it more international customers and enable its third-party sellers to sell products across borders. To further boost its competitiveness, Flipkart is expanding its private-label product lines and hiring AI experts to improve product search and recommendations on its website.
$11.6 billion: company’s current valuation, the highest for any Indian e-commerce startup
37
Bluebird Bio
Headquarters Cambridge, Massachusetts
Industry Biomedicine
Status Public
Years on the List 2015, 2017
Valuation $4.5 billion
Summary About 300,000 people are born each year with sickle-cell disease, a condition caused by a faulty gene involved in the development of red blood cells: it can put them at increased risk of anemia (characterized by tiredness and shortness of breath), serious infections, and other dangerous conditions. Some patients require regular blood transfusions to manage the condition, and people of specific origins—including African, Middle Eastern, and Asian—are more likely to be affected. In March, it was reported that 15 months after undergoing a new treatment in a Paris hospital, a teenager with sickle-cell was symptom-free. The treatment, a gene therapy that alters the DNA in bone marrow, was created by Bluebird Bio. Bluebird is also investigating treatments for adrenoleukodystrophy (the Lorenzo’s Oil disease) and beta thalassemia, an inherited blood disease that can cause severe anemia.
66 percent: increase in stock price over the past year
Related Stories
When Will Gene Therapy Come to the U.S.?
38
Adidas
Headquarters Herzogenaurach, Germany
Industry Advanced manufacturing
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $39.5 billion
Summary The sneaker maker is changing the way it manufacturers shoes, launching a robot-intensive microfactory in Ansbach, Germany, where it will begin to produce locally and on demand later this year. A similar factory offering customization and faster reaction times to local fashion trends has been announced in the U.S. This marks a shift of commercial production from Asia. At the same time, Adidas is working with 3-D-printing company Carbon (No. 18) on new ways of manufacturing materials, including the lattice-structured midsole used in its Futurecraft 4D shoes. One hundred fifty different iterations of the elastomer used to print the midsole are being tested.
300 million: number of pairs of shoes Adidas makes each year, largely in Asia
39
IBM
Headquarters Armonk, New York
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Public
Years on the List 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017
Valuation $145.4 billion
Summary IBM continues to invest in a range of emerging technologies that it thinks will yield sustainable growth, such as the distributed-ledger technology blockchain. With IBM’s help, corporate customers such as Walmart are using blockchain to track products as they move through global supply chains. Though IBM has yet to deliver the financial turnaround it has been promising investors for years, its newer businesses—including blockchain, cloud computing, and AI services—brought in more than 40 percent of the company’s total revenue in 2016. IBM also continues to develop quantum computing technology, which it plans to sell as a cloud service.
400: number of customers the company has worked with on blockchain applications
Read about the trials and possibilities of IBM’s Watson machine-learning system
Related Stories
Chemists Are First in Line for Quantum Computing’s Benefits
New Weather App Can Spread Urgent Alerts Even When Cell Networks Are Down
Air Force Tests IBM’s Brain-Inspired Chip as an Aerial Tank Spotter
40
General Electric
Headquarters Boston, Massachusetts
Industry Advanced manufacturing
Status Public
Years on the List 2012, 2013, 2014, 2017
Valuation $237.4 billion
Summary More than 120 years old, General Electric has readjusted its strategy many times, and under its newly announced CEO, John Flannery, may change yet again. But in recent years its focus has been on investing aggressively in forward-looking industries like wind and renewable energy and building up its data-driven services. Its large services business, built around monitoring of existing products like aircraft engines, locomotives, and gas turbines, is an area where the company has been focusing on capturing and interpreting data. These systems now incorporate artificial intelligence both to track performance and to predict failures in advance. GE’s stated goal is to become one of the world’s top software providers by 2020, even as it competes against longtime rivals like Siemens and newer ones such as IBM that are now expanding into industrial analytics.
60,000: number of jet engines GE says will be connected to the Internet by 2020
Read about GE’s plan to integrate AI throughout its operations
Related Stories
Patching the Electric Grid
SolarCity Shows Off Its New Modules; Now It Has to Manufacture Them
Designing Brain Implants to Detect More and Last Longer
41
Alibaba
Headquarters Hangzhou, China
Industry Connectivity
Status Public
Years on the List 2015, 2016, 2017
Valuation $363.7 billion
Summary Alibaba is already the world’s largest e-commerce company, and now it’s taking on Amazon and Microsoft as a provider of cloud computing services. Like Amazon, Alibaba originally invested in cloud infrastructure to support its online stores and payment services before deciding to offer it as a service to other companies. The company’s Alibaba Cloud subsidiary is now its fastest-growing business and extends beyond mainland China, with data centers in the U.S., Europe, Australia, and East Asia. Alibaba is also leveraging the cloud to deliver big-data services to small and medium-size companies around the world. The initiative is part of its “electronic world trade platform” project, which aims to help small companies do more business across national borders.
57 percent: Alibaba’s share of Chinese online commerce
Related Stories
Can China and the Internet Save American Small Business?
Meet the Chinese Finance Giant That’s Secretly an AI Company
Consumer Insurance Can Save Shoppers from Floods of Fake Gadgets
42
HTC
Headquarters Taoyuan, Taiwan
Industry Connectivity
Status Public
Years on the List 2010, 2011, 2017
Valuation $7.3 billion
Summary HTC has pivoted successfully from a declining business (smartphones) to a growing one (VR). Though it continues to make a few high-end smartphone models a year, its current focus is its motion-tracking Vive VR system, which enables users to walk around virtual worlds instead of simply moving their heads and arms. HTC will also be one of the first companies to create, through a collaboration with Google, a “standalone” VR headset that doesn’t require smartphones, PCs, or cables to work. And it has invested in more than 60 VR startups globally through its $100 million accelerator program, Vive X.
1,500: number of pieces of content outside developers have created for its VR system, Vive
Related Stories
The Best Gadgets Coming in 2017
Behind the Numbers of Virtual Reality’s Sluggish Debut
VR Is Cool and All, But Will People Buy It?
43
Blue Prism
Headquarters London, United Kingdom
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $591.5 million
Summary If companies could hand off their mundane administrative tasks to software robots, employees could focus on higher-level work. That’s Blue Prism’s pitch, and an increasing number of companies—in finance, health care, law, and other industries—are receptive. Blue Prism’s “Robotic Process Automation” software mimics the way humans complete rules-based tasks, such as manually entering data from a paper form into a database. The U.K.-based firm recently expanded its U.S. and Australian operations and signed partnerships with Accenture and IBM. It is currently worth about 500 million pounds, a tenfold increase in value since it went public in March 2016.
189: number of deals the company signed in 2016, more than four times its 2015 number
44
Jumia (Africa Internet Group)
Headquarters Lagos, Nigeria
Industry Finance
Status Private
Years on the List 2016, 2017
Valuation $1.1 billion
Summary Founded in 2012, Jumia (formerly called Africa Internet Group) last spring became the continent’s first “unicorn” startup, valued at over $1 billion during a $327 million funding round that included Goldman Sachs among its investors. Now operating all its consumer Web services—shopping, travel, food delivery, real estate, cars—under the Jumia name, the company is working to overcome the challenges of e-commerce in the region—clogged roadways, skeptical consumers, lack of Internet penetration in some market—to unlock the spending potential of an expanding middle class. To that end, Jumia is launching programs like a network of commissioned sales agents it calls J-Force, which can place orders for clients who have limited online access or are not comfortable ordering themselves.
500,000: number of African companies that use Jumia’s platform
Related Stories
Ghana’s Last Mile
45
Veritas Genetics
Headquarters Cambridge, Massachusetts
Industry Biomedicine
Status Private
Years on the List 2016, 2017
Valuation N/A
Summary This startup, spun out of Harvard University’s Personal Genome Project, raised $30 million last year from investors including Eli Lilly and China’s Jiangsu Simcere Pharmaceutical. After customers’ DNA is screened for a wide variety of mutations connected to health issues, the results are available in an app. There have been reports that DNA processing is slow, and it’s unclear how much demand for the analysis there has been. The company stepped into controversial territory this year with its offer to decode the genomes of newborns in China for $1,500 each, a service that some experts worry may lead to incorrect assumptions about the child’s future.
1,250: number of conditions, risks, and traits it will tell parents about in their newborns
Related Stories
Baby Genome Sequencing for Sale in China
For $999, Veritas Genetics Will Put Your Genome on a Smartphone App
10 Breakthrough Technologies 2016: DNA App Store
46
Daimler
Headquarters Stuttgart, Germany
Industry Transportation
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $78.3 billion
Summary Daimler AG is delivering electric vehicles to a broader class of customers with this year’s introduction of the Urban eTruck, the first all-electric heavy-duty truck. With a limited range of around 124 miles, it is intended primarily for city deliveries, offering a way to reduce noise and emissions in one important piece of the transportation puzzle. But given the continued high cost and weight of batteries, EV alternatives to gas-guzzling long-haul trucks don’t look likely anytime soon. The eTruck is expected to be on the market by 2020. Daimler is also working on vehicle connectivity and autonomous driving, including a project on an AI car it is developing with Nvidia (No. 1).
200 kilometers: range of its lithium-battery-powered eTruck
Related Stories
Electric Cars Could Be Cheaper Than Internal Combustion by 2030
Self-Driving Trucks: 10 Breakthrough Technologies 2017
FedEx Bets on Automation as It Prepares to Fend Off Uber and Amazon
47
Salesforce
Headquarters San Francisco, California
Industry Connectivity
Status Public
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $63.8 billion
Summary Salesforce and its platform for sales organizations hit revenue of $8.4 billion last year, and the company predicts that over the next five years artificial intelligence will transform the way people work and propel the growth of customer relationship management software like its own. After buying natural-language startup MetaMind in 2016, the company this year launched an algorithm that shows one way our work lives may be evolving. It summarizes documents using machine learning, producing coherent and accurate synopses, and could help us sort through e-mails or the day’s news stories. It is smart enough to avoid a common issue with summarization algorithms—producing too many repetitive strands of text—but does not yet the equal human-generated results.
20 percent: market share in customer relationship software
Related Stories
An Algorithm Summarizes Lengthy Text Surprisingly Well
Microsoft Readies a Virtual Assistant for the Corporate World
Software Predicts Which Companies Are an Easy Sell
48
Snap
Headquarters Los Angeles, California
Industry Connectivity
Status Public
Years on the List 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017
Valuation $21.1 billion
Summary Competition from Facebook and slowing user growth have weighed down Snap’s shares, which currently hover around $17, the price it set in its March initial public offering. Yet the company, which owns the messaging app Snapchat, continues to innovate by acquiring startups and using their technology to launch new Snapchat features. In recent months, it gave users the ability to share content on a map and Photoshop-like editing tools for images. The additions should help bolster Snap’s claims that it enables users to connect in ways that Facebook’s apps—including Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp—do not.
3 billion: number of snaps users create each day
Related Stories
Messaging App Sweeping Asia Could Blunt Snapchat’s Global Ambitions
Snap Is Going Public—Offering Ideas, Not Profits
If Apple Builds Smart Glasses, They’d Better Be Spectacular
49
Ant Financial
Headquarters Hangzhou, China
Industry Finance
Status Private
Years on the List 2017
Valuation $60 billion
Summary Created by Alibaba (No. 41) in 2014 to operate its rapidly expanding Alipay mobile payments service, Ant Financial has staked out global ambitions, investing in financial ventures in India, Thailand, Singapore, and the U.S. The company executes over half of all mobile-payment transactions in China, with more than 450 million annual active users. (Apple Pay, by contrast, has about 12 million users.) Ant is building artificial intelligence into new products, including an insurance claim system that uses machine learning to process images of accidents taken on a smartphone, using them to determine how serious the damage is and begin to process the claim with an insurer. The company, which reportedly holds billions of dollars in customers’ money before and after executing transactions, has also begun to offer small loans to consumers, evaluating their creditworthiness partly on the basis of their spending history.
450 million: number of annual active users
Related Stories
Meet the Chinese Finance Giant That’s Secretly an AI Company
Consumer Insurance Can Save Shoppers from Floods of Fake Gadgets
50
Baidu
Headquarters Beijing, China
Industry Intelligent machines
Status Public
Years on the List 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017
Valuation $61.1 billion
Summary Baidu keeps pouring money into AI research despite declining revenue growth and the defection of some prominent AI experts. In January, it launched a voice-enabled smart assistant called DuerOS, which is similar to Amazon’s Alexa. To bolster its driverless-car initiative, Baidu also acquired a computer-vision startup, signed partnerships with component makers Bosch and Continental, and announced plans to release its self-driving hardware and software as open-source technology. While it remains to be seen whether Baidu can commercialize these projects, the Chinese government signaled its confidence in the company by choosing it to lead the country’s first national AI research lab.
1,300: number of employees dedicated to working on AI
Related Stories
Baidu’s Plan for Artificial Intelligence without Andrew Ng
The President of Search Giant Baidu Has Global Plans
Baidu Will Release a Free Operating System for Self-Driving Cars
Andrew Ng Is Leaving Baidu in Search of a Big New AI Mission
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Silicon Valley Business Journa/Cromwell Schubarth: 500 Startups co-founder's role cut after 'inappropriate interactions with women'
Silicon Valley Business Journal
Home
By Cromwell Schubarth - TechFlash Editor at the Silicon Valley Business Journal.
July 1, 2017, 9:32am PDT
More male investors in Silicon Valley have been accused of sexual harassment in a shocking New York Times story Friday that included an accusation against one of the region's most colorful and vocal startup promoters.
Dave McClure, co-founder of 500 Startups, was accused by a female founder in the story of propositioning her when she applied for a job at his prominent Mountain View accelerator.
That prompted a blog by Christine Tsai — McClure's co-founder at 500 Startups — to announce that his role there was reduced in recent months due to "inappropriate interactions with women in the tech community."
McClure is no longer listed on 500 Startups' website as a founding partner. He is now a general partner, according to Tsai, "limited to fulfilling his obligations to our investors." She is listed as managing partner.
The new accusations against McClure and others comes in the wake of the collapse of San Francisco-based Binary Capital. Its co-founder, Justin Caldbeck, was accused in a story by The Information of groping and making unwanted advances towards six women founders while he was at that firm and while investing previously at Lightspeed Venture Partners.
The news also comes in the wake of the resignation of Uber CEO Travis Kalanick after an investigation into accusations of a pattern of sexual harassment at the world's most valuable venture-backed business.
New on Friday of McClure's demotion came as a surprise. There were no announcements of any changes at 500 Startups before the New York Times story appeared.
As recently as a May 18 Demo Day in San Francisco, Tsai and McClure were still identified as founding partners. He was front and center, as usual, at the start of the day to tout the accelerator's investment record.
It is also a surprise because McClure and 500 Startups have been vocal promoters of the need for more diversity in Silicon Valley venture and tech.
McClure flew two weeks ago to launch a new 500 Startups accelerator program in Melbourne, Australia, and named a woman to lead it.
According to Tsai, the changes at 500 came a few months ago after an internal investigation. She further said that McClure has been attending counseling "to work on changing his perspectives and preventing his previous unacceptable behavior."
McClure isn't the only prominent startup investor and public supporter of women founders to be accused of misbehavior in the New York Times story.
Chris Sacca, the former Google executive and former Shark Tank start investor who was an early backer of Twitter and Uber, was accused in the New York Times story of touching a woman investor's face in 2009 "without her consent in a way that made her uncomfortable."
The same woman who made that accusation, entrepreneur and investor Susan Wu, told the Times she was also propositioned by Caldbeck while fund-raising in 2010.
Sacca posted a pre-emptive blog on Thursday, the day before the Times story was posted, titled, "I Have More Work To Do," in which he wrote generally about regretting some of his interactions with women early in his career as an investor.
The Times initially reported that Sacca didn't dispute the woman's account in its story but later changed it to say that he is disputing it.
The billionaire investor has been a vocal supporter of the need for more women founders, saying at this year's South by Southwest conference in Austin, Texas, that tech companies that don't invest in, hire and promote more women "must hate money."
Sacca announced a month after that conference that he was retiring from startup investing.
He wrote then that he and his wife, Crystal, "are also deeply committed to paying forward the luck and opportunities we have enjoyed in our space. So we’ve been quietly backing the next generation of investors, but specifically women and people of color who have been starting venture funds. A lot more to come across all of these fields."
New accusations of misbehavior were also made by women in the New York Times story against investor Jose De Dios and Macromedia founder Marc Canter. Both denied the allegations.
The developments at Uber and Binary Capital, brought about by women going on the record with allegations of sexual harassment, has apparently encouraged others to go public with their stories.
That has prompted many in the venture community to take a "decency pledge" proposed by Reid Hoffman, the LinkedIn cofounder who invests for Greylock Partners.
But this is clearly a story that isn't going away any time soon.
Cromwell Schubarth is TechFlash Editor at the Silicon Valley Business Journal.
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© 2017 American City Business Journals. All rights reserved. Use of this Site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement (updated 12/23/13) and Privacy Policy (updated 12/23/13). The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of American City Business Journals.
Home
By Cromwell Schubarth - TechFlash Editor at the Silicon Valley Business Journal.
July 1, 2017, 9:32am PDT
More male investors in Silicon Valley have been accused of sexual harassment in a shocking New York Times story Friday that included an accusation against one of the region's most colorful and vocal startup promoters.
Dave McClure, co-founder of 500 Startups, was accused by a female founder in the story of propositioning her when she applied for a job at his prominent Mountain View accelerator.
That prompted a blog by Christine Tsai — McClure's co-founder at 500 Startups — to announce that his role there was reduced in recent months due to "inappropriate interactions with women in the tech community."
McClure is no longer listed on 500 Startups' website as a founding partner. He is now a general partner, according to Tsai, "limited to fulfilling his obligations to our investors." She is listed as managing partner.
The new accusations against McClure and others comes in the wake of the collapse of San Francisco-based Binary Capital. Its co-founder, Justin Caldbeck, was accused in a story by The Information of groping and making unwanted advances towards six women founders while he was at that firm and while investing previously at Lightspeed Venture Partners.
The news also comes in the wake of the resignation of Uber CEO Travis Kalanick after an investigation into accusations of a pattern of sexual harassment at the world's most valuable venture-backed business.
New on Friday of McClure's demotion came as a surprise. There were no announcements of any changes at 500 Startups before the New York Times story appeared.
As recently as a May 18 Demo Day in San Francisco, Tsai and McClure were still identified as founding partners. He was front and center, as usual, at the start of the day to tout the accelerator's investment record.
It is also a surprise because McClure and 500 Startups have been vocal promoters of the need for more diversity in Silicon Valley venture and tech.
McClure flew two weeks ago to launch a new 500 Startups accelerator program in Melbourne, Australia, and named a woman to lead it.
According to Tsai, the changes at 500 came a few months ago after an internal investigation. She further said that McClure has been attending counseling "to work on changing his perspectives and preventing his previous unacceptable behavior."
McClure isn't the only prominent startup investor and public supporter of women founders to be accused of misbehavior in the New York Times story.
Chris Sacca, the former Google executive and former Shark Tank start investor who was an early backer of Twitter and Uber, was accused in the New York Times story of touching a woman investor's face in 2009 "without her consent in a way that made her uncomfortable."
The same woman who made that accusation, entrepreneur and investor Susan Wu, told the Times she was also propositioned by Caldbeck while fund-raising in 2010.
Sacca posted a pre-emptive blog on Thursday, the day before the Times story was posted, titled, "I Have More Work To Do," in which he wrote generally about regretting some of his interactions with women early in his career as an investor.
The Times initially reported that Sacca didn't dispute the woman's account in its story but later changed it to say that he is disputing it.
The billionaire investor has been a vocal supporter of the need for more women founders, saying at this year's South by Southwest conference in Austin, Texas, that tech companies that don't invest in, hire and promote more women "must hate money."
Sacca announced a month after that conference that he was retiring from startup investing.
He wrote then that he and his wife, Crystal, "are also deeply committed to paying forward the luck and opportunities we have enjoyed in our space. So we’ve been quietly backing the next generation of investors, but specifically women and people of color who have been starting venture funds. A lot more to come across all of these fields."
New accusations of misbehavior were also made by women in the New York Times story against investor Jose De Dios and Macromedia founder Marc Canter. Both denied the allegations.
The developments at Uber and Binary Capital, brought about by women going on the record with allegations of sexual harassment, has apparently encouraged others to go public with their stories.
That has prompted many in the venture community to take a "decency pledge" proposed by Reid Hoffman, the LinkedIn cofounder who invests for Greylock Partners.
But this is clearly a story that isn't going away any time soon.
Cromwell Schubarth is TechFlash Editor at the Silicon Valley Business Journal.
User Agreement | Privacy Policy | Your California Privacy Rights | Ad Choices
© 2017 American City Business Journals. All rights reserved. Use of this Site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement (updated 12/23/13) and Privacy Policy (updated 12/23/13). The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of American City Business Journals.
AfID: Overseas Probono Support
Top Opportunities
Express Interest
Overseas Probono Support
Recruitment Services
UK Volunteer Support
Introduction
AfID supports a broad range of non-profit organisations globally through the provision of both pro-bono and professional accountants & consultants. Assignments from 2 weeks to 12 months or more formal permanent salaried placements form part of our ongoing commitment to build the financial management capacity of non profit partners globally. AfID have arranged assignments for over 1000 accountants, providing over 250,000 hours of one to one support to more than 500 non-profit partners in 57 countries.
Our partners are a broad mix of small grassroots, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), social enterprises and larger international charities. All are undertaking important work to alleviate poverty and inequality within their communities and include micro-finance projects, local enterprise initiatives, rural cooperatives, street child centres, conservation projects, schools and vocational training courses.
We are happy to support organisations with varying levels of financial management and planning expertise; from those with no accounting processes, budgets or financial plans to more established organisations with full time accounting staff and recognisable accounting software. We only seek partners who are committed to the continual development of their finance & accounting departments, that can provide the environment and resources needed for our volunteers' support to be effective, sustainable and rewarding for all parties.
AfID offers its partners 3 different programmes of support each one tailored to our partners unique profile.
Overseas Volunteer / Probono Financial Consultant Support
Volunteer assignments from 2 weeks to 12 months form part of an ongoing strategy to build the financial management capacity of partners operating in over 50 countries. Programmes typically follow one of the following formats;
a) Ongoing support whereby one volunteer hands over to the next shaping the focus in close collaboration with the partner organisation.
b) Specific & timely interventions under directed by our international partners, often in response to an unforeseen or urgent issue.
Recruitment Services (UK & Overseas)
After placing over 1000 accountants with over 500 non-profit organisations globally, AfID is uniquely positioned to assist our partners with their salaried recruitment needs by providing access to an exceptional pool of talent. In the seven years since we started we have built up a network of over 50,000 accountants globally keen to support non-profits.
It is very important to us that we are not viewed as a commercial recruitment agency, motivated by fees alone. We therefore want to offer a pricing schedule that gives access and value to all our partners and will enable them to reduce their annual recruitment spend dramatically. For this reason our rates for permanent recruitment are very simple and the lowest in the sector. Rates typically range from 9 to 15%.
UK Volunteer Support (incl. Trustees & Treasurers)
This programme is designed to give charities with limited resources access to pro-bono qualified accounting expertise and is an excellent way to reduce a reliance on expensive temps.
For more information on any of the services listed above please follow the links on the sidebar or contact us on 0208 741 7000 or partners@afid.org.uk.
Top Opportunities
Express Interest
+44 (0) 208 741 7000
info@afid.org.uk
Careers
AFRICA
LATIN AMERICA
Testimonials
ASIA
EUROPE
Express Interest
Overseas Probono Support
Recruitment Services
UK Volunteer Support
Introduction
AfID supports a broad range of non-profit organisations globally through the provision of both pro-bono and professional accountants & consultants. Assignments from 2 weeks to 12 months or more formal permanent salaried placements form part of our ongoing commitment to build the financial management capacity of non profit partners globally. AfID have arranged assignments for over 1000 accountants, providing over 250,000 hours of one to one support to more than 500 non-profit partners in 57 countries.
Our partners are a broad mix of small grassroots, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), social enterprises and larger international charities. All are undertaking important work to alleviate poverty and inequality within their communities and include micro-finance projects, local enterprise initiatives, rural cooperatives, street child centres, conservation projects, schools and vocational training courses.
We are happy to support organisations with varying levels of financial management and planning expertise; from those with no accounting processes, budgets or financial plans to more established organisations with full time accounting staff and recognisable accounting software. We only seek partners who are committed to the continual development of their finance & accounting departments, that can provide the environment and resources needed for our volunteers' support to be effective, sustainable and rewarding for all parties.
AfID offers its partners 3 different programmes of support each one tailored to our partners unique profile.
Overseas Volunteer / Probono Financial Consultant Support
Volunteer assignments from 2 weeks to 12 months form part of an ongoing strategy to build the financial management capacity of partners operating in over 50 countries. Programmes typically follow one of the following formats;
a) Ongoing support whereby one volunteer hands over to the next shaping the focus in close collaboration with the partner organisation.
b) Specific & timely interventions under directed by our international partners, often in response to an unforeseen or urgent issue.
Recruitment Services (UK & Overseas)
After placing over 1000 accountants with over 500 non-profit organisations globally, AfID is uniquely positioned to assist our partners with their salaried recruitment needs by providing access to an exceptional pool of talent. In the seven years since we started we have built up a network of over 50,000 accountants globally keen to support non-profits.
It is very important to us that we are not viewed as a commercial recruitment agency, motivated by fees alone. We therefore want to offer a pricing schedule that gives access and value to all our partners and will enable them to reduce their annual recruitment spend dramatically. For this reason our rates for permanent recruitment are very simple and the lowest in the sector. Rates typically range from 9 to 15%.
UK Volunteer Support (incl. Trustees & Treasurers)
This programme is designed to give charities with limited resources access to pro-bono qualified accounting expertise and is an excellent way to reduce a reliance on expensive temps.
For more information on any of the services listed above please follow the links on the sidebar or contact us on 0208 741 7000 or partners@afid.org.uk.
Top Opportunities
Express Interest
+44 (0) 208 741 7000
info@afid.org.uk
Careers
AFRICA
LATIN AMERICA
Testimonials
ASIA
EUROPE
Investopedia/Claire Boyte: What is the difference between revenue and income?
Academy
What is the difference between revenue and income?
By Claire Boyte-White | Updated May 22, 2017 — 5:36 PM EDT
A:
There are a number of financial terms that often get misused in day-to-day conversation. The disconnect between common and professional usage can lead to a great deal of confusion for the first-time investor or entrepreneur who lacks a formal financial education. Revenue and income are often used interchangeably by the average person, but in an accounting or corporate governance context, these terms refer to very specific concepts that differ in important ways.
When analyzing a company's income statement, revenue is found at the top of the page. This is the number from which all calculations originate. Revenue is simply the total amount of cash generated by the sale of products or services associated with the company's primary operations, less any returns or discounts. It can also be thought of as net sales. For a grocery store, this includes the sale of anything found in the store, from vegetables to floral arrangements. However, many companies also have alternate income streams from investments or the sale of other assets. These funds are not counted as revenue because they do not stem from the main business, so they are accounted for elsewhere in the income statement.
Income is often considered a synonym for revenue, as both terms refer to positive cash flow. However, in a financial context, the term income almost always refers to the bottom line, or net income. Also referred to as net profit, this number represents the total amount of cash that remains from the original amount of revenue after accounting for all expenses and additional income. Expenses include the cost of goods sold (COGS); operating expenses such as rent, utilities, and payroll; interest paid on debts; depreciation and amortization expenses; tax costs; and one-time payments due to extraordinary events such as lawsuits. Additional income streams, as referenced above, can include interest accrued on investments or funds from the sale of physical or intangible assets, such as equipment or bonds.
For example, for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2016, Time Warner Inc. (TWX) had $29.32 billion in revenues and $3.93 billion in income.
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What is the difference between revenue and income?
By Claire Boyte-White | Updated May 22, 2017 — 5:36 PM EDT
A:
There are a number of financial terms that often get misused in day-to-day conversation. The disconnect between common and professional usage can lead to a great deal of confusion for the first-time investor or entrepreneur who lacks a formal financial education. Revenue and income are often used interchangeably by the average person, but in an accounting or corporate governance context, these terms refer to very specific concepts that differ in important ways.
When analyzing a company's income statement, revenue is found at the top of the page. This is the number from which all calculations originate. Revenue is simply the total amount of cash generated by the sale of products or services associated with the company's primary operations, less any returns or discounts. It can also be thought of as net sales. For a grocery store, this includes the sale of anything found in the store, from vegetables to floral arrangements. However, many companies also have alternate income streams from investments or the sale of other assets. These funds are not counted as revenue because they do not stem from the main business, so they are accounted for elsewhere in the income statement.
Income is often considered a synonym for revenue, as both terms refer to positive cash flow. However, in a financial context, the term income almost always refers to the bottom line, or net income. Also referred to as net profit, this number represents the total amount of cash that remains from the original amount of revenue after accounting for all expenses and additional income. Expenses include the cost of goods sold (COGS); operating expenses such as rent, utilities, and payroll; interest paid on debts; depreciation and amortization expenses; tax costs; and one-time payments due to extraordinary events such as lawsuits. Additional income streams, as referenced above, can include interest accrued on investments or funds from the sale of physical or intangible assets, such as equipment or bonds.
For example, for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2016, Time Warner Inc. (TWX) had $29.32 billion in revenues and $3.93 billion in income.
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Learn about the relationship between gross profit, operating profit and net income and how these financial concepts are calculated. Read Answer >>
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FreedomUnited: TAKE ACTION: Libya’s slave markets
Dear Reader,
“The men on the pick-up were brought to a square, or parking lot, where a kind of slave trade was happening. There were locals – he described them as Arabs – buying sub-Saharan migrants.” Livia Manante, IOM Officer.[1]
As you read this, traffickers are selling migrant men and women in make-shift ‘slave markets’ in Libya. Yet the international community is failing to take action to close them. Unbelievably, these modern day slave markets are thriving as much of the world remains oblivious to the shocking reality. Only when many thousands of us start making a noise can we convince decision-makers that they need to act.
Watch our video to find out what happens to migrants and refugees sold in Libya’s slave markets.
Known as the ‘Gateway to Europe’, Libya has become a transit point for thousands of migrants and refugees desperate to cross the Mediterranean to Europe in search of a better life. But many don’t make it that far. Instead, smugglers offering to take them to the coast are selling them to the highest bidder.
“They took people and put them in the street, under a sign that said ‘for sale’” Shamsuddin Jibril, from Cameroon.[2]
First hand witnesses report men and women are sold on the street for between $200 and $500 each.[3] Once bought, they are held for ransom in mass prisons and detention centers, or used as forced labor and for sexual exploitation. Conditions are extreme, with hundreds crammed into filthy rooms, with inadequate space, food or hygiene facilities.
This is unacceptable. We must make this an issue of international political concern. The best way to get this on decision-makers’ radar is to increase awareness. This is why we’re asking for your help.
Watch our video to learn more and then sign to call for action against slavery in Libya.
Survivors have spoken of the methods used by slave masters to extract ransoms from relatives, including beating and torturing their captives while on the phone to their families. “People were tied up like goats, beaten with broom handles and pipes every blessed day, to get the money,” said Isoomah, from Liberia.[4]
We must call for immediate action.
The more people like you that make a noise about this issue, the more interest politicians and decision-makers will take.
Watch our video and then sign the pledge to call for action against slavery in Libya.
In solidarity,
Zoe, Joanna, Miriam and the Freedom United Team
WATCH
Our team relies on donations from supporters like you to continue the work that is so crucial. Please keep Freedom United strong by setting up a monthly donation or chipping in $5. Your donation will help change the future.
CHIP IN NOW
[1] https://www.iom.int/news/iom-learns-slave-market-conditions-endangering-migrants-north-africa
[2] http://africa-online.com/2017/05/26/african-migrants-flee-poverty-only-to-get-sucked-into-violent-crime/
[3] http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/04/iom-african-migrants-traded-libya-slave-markets-170411141809641.html
[4] http://africa-online.com/2017/05/26/african-migrants-flee-poverty-only-to-get-sucked-into-violent-crime/
[5] http://www.newsweek.com/libya-eu-migrants-malta-declaration-slaves-583616
[6] http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/04/iom-african-migrants-traded-libya-slave-markets-170411141809641.html
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©2017 Freedom United is a registered 501(c)3 not-for-profit organization.
7413 Six Forks Rd. #271, Raleigh NC 27615 USA
“The men on the pick-up were brought to a square, or parking lot, where a kind of slave trade was happening. There were locals – he described them as Arabs – buying sub-Saharan migrants.” Livia Manante, IOM Officer.[1]
As you read this, traffickers are selling migrant men and women in make-shift ‘slave markets’ in Libya. Yet the international community is failing to take action to close them. Unbelievably, these modern day slave markets are thriving as much of the world remains oblivious to the shocking reality. Only when many thousands of us start making a noise can we convince decision-makers that they need to act.
Watch our video to find out what happens to migrants and refugees sold in Libya’s slave markets.
Known as the ‘Gateway to Europe’, Libya has become a transit point for thousands of migrants and refugees desperate to cross the Mediterranean to Europe in search of a better life. But many don’t make it that far. Instead, smugglers offering to take them to the coast are selling them to the highest bidder.
“They took people and put them in the street, under a sign that said ‘for sale’” Shamsuddin Jibril, from Cameroon.[2]
First hand witnesses report men and women are sold on the street for between $200 and $500 each.[3] Once bought, they are held for ransom in mass prisons and detention centers, or used as forced labor and for sexual exploitation. Conditions are extreme, with hundreds crammed into filthy rooms, with inadequate space, food or hygiene facilities.
This is unacceptable. We must make this an issue of international political concern. The best way to get this on decision-makers’ radar is to increase awareness. This is why we’re asking for your help.
Watch our video to learn more and then sign to call for action against slavery in Libya.
Survivors have spoken of the methods used by slave masters to extract ransoms from relatives, including beating and torturing their captives while on the phone to their families. “People were tied up like goats, beaten with broom handles and pipes every blessed day, to get the money,” said Isoomah, from Liberia.[4]
We must call for immediate action.
The more people like you that make a noise about this issue, the more interest politicians and decision-makers will take.
Watch our video and then sign the pledge to call for action against slavery in Libya.
In solidarity,
Zoe, Joanna, Miriam and the Freedom United Team
WATCH
Our team relies on donations from supporters like you to continue the work that is so crucial. Please keep Freedom United strong by setting up a monthly donation or chipping in $5. Your donation will help change the future.
CHIP IN NOW
[1] https://www.iom.int/news/iom-learns-slave-market-conditions-endangering-migrants-north-africa
[2] http://africa-online.com/2017/05/26/african-migrants-flee-poverty-only-to-get-sucked-into-violent-crime/
[3] http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/04/iom-african-migrants-traded-libya-slave-markets-170411141809641.html
[4] http://africa-online.com/2017/05/26/african-migrants-flee-poverty-only-to-get-sucked-into-violent-crime/
[5] http://www.newsweek.com/libya-eu-migrants-malta-declaration-slaves-583616
[6] http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/04/iom-african-migrants-traded-libya-slave-markets-170411141809641.html
Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube LinkedIn Pinterest
Privacy Policy | View In A Browser | Send To A Friend | Feedback
Change Your Email Address | Unsubscribe From All Emails
©2017 Freedom United is a registered 501(c)3 not-for-profit organization.
7413 Six Forks Rd. #271, Raleigh NC 27615 USA
Investopedia:What is 'Liquidity'?
Academy
Liquidity
What is 'Liquidity'
Liquidity describes the degree to which an asset or security can be quickly bought or sold in the market without affecting the asset's price.
Market liquidity refers to the extent to which a market, such as a country's stock market or a city's real estate market, allows assets to be bought and sold at stable prices. Cash is the most liquid asset, while real estate, fine art and collectibles are all relatively illiquid.
Accounting liquidity measures the ease with which an individual or company can meet their financial obligations with the liquid assets available to them. There are several ratios that express accounting liquidity.
VIDEO
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BREAKING DOWN 'Liquidity'
Cash is considered the standard for liquidity because it can most quickly and easily be converted into other assets. If a person wants a $1,000 refrigerator, cash is the asset that can most easily be used to obtain it. If that person has no cash, but a rare book collection that has been appraised at $1,000, they are unlikely to find someone willing to trade them the refrigerator for their collection. Instead, they will have to sell the collection and use the cash to purchase the refrigerator. That may be fine if the person can wait months or years to make the purchase, but it could present a problem if the person only had a few days. They may have to sell the books at a discount, instead of waiting for a buyer who was willing to pay the full value. Rare books are therefore an illiquid asset.
Market Liquidity
In the example given above, the market for refrigerators in exchange for rare books is so illiquid that, for all intents and purposes, it does not exist. The stock market, on the other hand, is characterized by higher market liquidity. If an exchange has a high volume of trade that is not dominated by selling, the price a buyer offers per share (the bid price) and the price the seller is willing to accept (the ask price) will be fairly close to each other. Investors, then, will not have to give up unrealized gains for a quick sale. When the spread between the bid and ask prices grows, the market becomes more illiquid. Markets for real estate are pretty much inherently less liquid than stock markets. Even by the standard of real estate markets, however, a buyer's market is relatively illiquid, since buyers can demand steep discounts from sellers who want to offload their properties quickly.
Accounting Liquidity
For an entity, such as a person or a company, accounting liquidity is a measure of their ability to pay off debts as they come due, that is, to have access to their money when they need it. In the example above, the rare book collector's assets are relatively illiquid, and would probably not be worth their full value of $1,000 in a pinch. In practical terms, assessing accounting liquidity means comparing liquid assets to current liabilities, or financial obligations that come due within one year. There are a number of ratios that measure accounting liquidity, which differ in how strictly they define "liquid assets."
Current Ratio
The current ratio is the simplest and least strict ratio. Current assets are those that can reasonably be converted to cash in one year.
Current Ratio = Current Assets / Current Liabilities
Acid-Test or Quick Ratio
The acid-test or quick ratio is slightly more strict. It excludes inventories and other current assets, which are not as liquid as cash and cash equivalents, accounts receivable and short-term investments.
Acid-Test Ratio = (Cash and Cash Equivalents + Short-Term Investments + Accounts Receivable) / Current Liabilities
A variation of the acid-test ratio simply subtracts inventory from current assets, making it a bit more generous than the version listed above:
Acid-Test Ratio (Var) = (Current Assets - Inventories) / Current Liabilities
Cash Ratio
The cash ratio is the most exacting of the liquidity ratios, excluding accounts receivable as well as inventories and other current assets. More than the current ratio or acid-test ratio, it assess an entity's ability to stay solvent in the case of an emergency. Even highly profitable companies can run into trouble if they do not have the liquidity to react to unforeseen events.
Cash Ratio = (Cash and Cash Equivalents + Short-Term Investments) / Current Liabilities
For more, check Liquidity Measurement Ratios.
Next Up Quick Ratio
Liquidity
Quick Ratio
Acid-Test Ratio
Liquid Asset
Liquidity Ratios
Current Assets
Cash Asset Ratio
Overall Liquidity Ratio
Quick Liquidity Ratio
Quick Assets
Quick Ratio
Share
Video Definition
The quick ratio is an indicator of a company’s short-term liquidity. The quick ratio measures a company’s ability to meet its short-term obligations with its most liquid assets. For this reason, the ratio excludes inventories from current assets, and is calculated as follows:
Quick ratio = (current assets – inventories) / current liabilities, or
= (cash and equivalents + marketable securities + accounts receivable) / current liabilities
The quick ratio measures the dollar amount of liquid assets available for each dollar of current liabilities. Thus, a quick ratio of 1.5 means that a company has $1.50 of liquid assets available to cover each $1 of current liabilities. The higher the quick ratio, the better the company's liquidity position. Also known as the “acid-test ratio" or "quick assets ratio."
BREAKING DOWN 'Quick Ratio'
For example, consider a firm with the following current assets on its balance sheet:
Read More +
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Liquidity
What is 'Liquidity'
Liquidity describes the degree to which an asset or security can be quickly bought or sold in the market without affecting the asset's price.
Market liquidity refers to the extent to which a market, such as a country's stock market or a city's real estate market, allows assets to be bought and sold at stable prices. Cash is the most liquid asset, while real estate, fine art and collectibles are all relatively illiquid.
Accounting liquidity measures the ease with which an individual or company can meet their financial obligations with the liquid assets available to them. There are several ratios that express accounting liquidity.
VIDEO
Loading the player...
BREAKING DOWN 'Liquidity'
Cash is considered the standard for liquidity because it can most quickly and easily be converted into other assets. If a person wants a $1,000 refrigerator, cash is the asset that can most easily be used to obtain it. If that person has no cash, but a rare book collection that has been appraised at $1,000, they are unlikely to find someone willing to trade them the refrigerator for their collection. Instead, they will have to sell the collection and use the cash to purchase the refrigerator. That may be fine if the person can wait months or years to make the purchase, but it could present a problem if the person only had a few days. They may have to sell the books at a discount, instead of waiting for a buyer who was willing to pay the full value. Rare books are therefore an illiquid asset.
Market Liquidity
In the example given above, the market for refrigerators in exchange for rare books is so illiquid that, for all intents and purposes, it does not exist. The stock market, on the other hand, is characterized by higher market liquidity. If an exchange has a high volume of trade that is not dominated by selling, the price a buyer offers per share (the bid price) and the price the seller is willing to accept (the ask price) will be fairly close to each other. Investors, then, will not have to give up unrealized gains for a quick sale. When the spread between the bid and ask prices grows, the market becomes more illiquid. Markets for real estate are pretty much inherently less liquid than stock markets. Even by the standard of real estate markets, however, a buyer's market is relatively illiquid, since buyers can demand steep discounts from sellers who want to offload their properties quickly.
Accounting Liquidity
For an entity, such as a person or a company, accounting liquidity is a measure of their ability to pay off debts as they come due, that is, to have access to their money when they need it. In the example above, the rare book collector's assets are relatively illiquid, and would probably not be worth their full value of $1,000 in a pinch. In practical terms, assessing accounting liquidity means comparing liquid assets to current liabilities, or financial obligations that come due within one year. There are a number of ratios that measure accounting liquidity, which differ in how strictly they define "liquid assets."
Current Ratio
The current ratio is the simplest and least strict ratio. Current assets are those that can reasonably be converted to cash in one year.
Current Ratio = Current Assets / Current Liabilities
Acid-Test or Quick Ratio
The acid-test or quick ratio is slightly more strict. It excludes inventories and other current assets, which are not as liquid as cash and cash equivalents, accounts receivable and short-term investments.
Acid-Test Ratio = (Cash and Cash Equivalents + Short-Term Investments + Accounts Receivable) / Current Liabilities
A variation of the acid-test ratio simply subtracts inventory from current assets, making it a bit more generous than the version listed above:
Acid-Test Ratio (Var) = (Current Assets - Inventories) / Current Liabilities
Cash Ratio
The cash ratio is the most exacting of the liquidity ratios, excluding accounts receivable as well as inventories and other current assets. More than the current ratio or acid-test ratio, it assess an entity's ability to stay solvent in the case of an emergency. Even highly profitable companies can run into trouble if they do not have the liquidity to react to unforeseen events.
Cash Ratio = (Cash and Cash Equivalents + Short-Term Investments) / Current Liabilities
For more, check Liquidity Measurement Ratios.
Next Up Quick Ratio
Liquidity
Quick Ratio
Acid-Test Ratio
Liquid Asset
Liquidity Ratios
Current Assets
Cash Asset Ratio
Overall Liquidity Ratio
Quick Liquidity Ratio
Quick Assets
Quick Ratio
Share
Video Definition
The quick ratio is an indicator of a company’s short-term liquidity. The quick ratio measures a company’s ability to meet its short-term obligations with its most liquid assets. For this reason, the ratio excludes inventories from current assets, and is calculated as follows:
Quick ratio = (current assets – inventories) / current liabilities, or
= (cash and equivalents + marketable securities + accounts receivable) / current liabilities
The quick ratio measures the dollar amount of liquid assets available for each dollar of current liabilities. Thus, a quick ratio of 1.5 means that a company has $1.50 of liquid assets available to cover each $1 of current liabilities. The higher the quick ratio, the better the company's liquidity position. Also known as the “acid-test ratio" or "quick assets ratio."
BREAKING DOWN 'Quick Ratio'
For example, consider a firm with the following current assets on its balance sheet:
Read More +
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Positivemoney.com.nz/Marc Joseph: Change Money, Change the World
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Change Money, Change the World
By Marc Joseph
Isn't it frustrating to witness the growing inequality, poverty, homelessness, and suffering that plagues society? The government's efforts to address these ills are feeble and year after year the situation gets worse. We all know well the government's litany of excuses: "we don't have the money, we'd have to raise taxes, we have to be fiscally prudent, we have to service the debt, money doesn't grow on trees." It all boils down to money, doesn't it? But is it true?
No, it's not true. The government's excuses don't stand up to scrutiny, especially when we look at the facts about money. Money comes in two forms, paper (notes and coin) and electronic. The paper part comes from the RBNZ but that portion, about 2%, is insignificant. All the digital money we use is produced by the private banks. It's our national money, yet private institutions have been given the power of producing it for our economy. Think of it. 98% of New Zealand's dollars, which we must have to participate in the economy, is supplied by private institutions.
So what about this digital money? It's produced by tapping a keyboard and making an entry in a database, and this entry is shown on a computer screen. This happens whenever a bank makes a loan. Here, it's important to note that the financial system is based on a lie, the lie that says the private banks act as financial intermediaries between savers and borrowers. They do not. When you borrow from a bank, you borrow new debt-money that is "printed" fresh just for you. No pre-existing money is loaned. The bank creates the debt-money by merely changing the number that appears in your account. This may come as a shock to you, and it should because it's the shocking truth.
There is an important distinction to understand here. This new money is unearned money. You have agreed to repay it, but the only way you can repay it is to go out and earn it. The banking lie has you believing that you are borrowing someone else's hard-earned money and so you abide by the agreement to repay not just the loan but a premium as well. Your relationship with the bank is completely unequal and lacks full disclosure, and the interest is effortless profit for the banks.
So we need to ask ourselves, is this how we want our nation's money to be produced, only as loans? Is it right that the production of our money be in the hands of private institutions that profit so vastly with little or no effort? No way. And this debt has interest attached, which means that the debt grows over time, increasing beyond the capacity of the people to repay it. Indeed, the total debt owed to the private banks today is almost two times greater than the total money supply! This debt cannot and will not ever be repayed. So we work to repay the unrepayable debt to private institutions who have done virtually nothing. How can this be?
The reason is that people just don't know. Somehow, we've been indoctrinated to never question the source of money. The result of this is evident: inequality, poverty, homelessness, environmental degradation, crisis. Are you concerned about the ludicrous prices being paid for housing in Auckland and Wellington? The private banking system, given free rein by the government, is your culprit. For a private bank, the bigger the mortgage, the better.
And consider this. The authority to produce money comes from government, so why is the government in debt? If 98% of New Zealand's money is digitally produced, why doesn't the government do it? Indeed, the government is constantly invoking "financial prudence" when it explains why it can't provide the programs and services we all say we want, so why does the government allow private production of these debt-soaked dollars? How financially prudent is that?
Let's imagine a hypothetical situation. Society wants an end to poverty and homelessness so the government embarks on a brilliant initiative to do just that, mobilising the fabulous expertise and intelligence of the people of NZ. It pays for it by issuing the money straight out of the Treasury. No bonds, no borrowing, no debt. No excuses. Meanwhile, the government passes laws to restrict debt-money production by the private banks.
Of course, now we hear the last resort of the financial fear-mongers: that would be inflationary! they cry. They don't mention that private debt-money production in the last 100 years has decimated the purchasing power of our dollar by 95%. They never admit that interest-bearing debt is the true cause of inflation. And how many financial crises of the last century can we enumerate? They were all caused by their debt-soaked money and no doubt there's another crisis lurking on the horizon. What possible justification can there be for private control of our money supply? Debt-free money is far less inflationary, if at all.
We need money. We don't need debt. Debt distorts the economy. It makes it run inefficiently, squanders natural resources, drives the growth imperative, wastes human potential, and greatly enriches a few at the expense of the many. It's clear that society would reject private production of our money if it understood this brutal regime with its deplorable consequences.
Our challenge is to expose the lie and reveal the truth about the production of money. Once society knows the truth, the private control of our money will end. The people will demand that the government assume control over our money supply and soon the financial solution to our myriad problems will be available. No more debt.
So the truth is that there is no shortage of money. All that is socially desirable is financially possible. The private banking system's effortless profit is a millstone around our necks. It's imperative that government assert its authority over the money supply and properly fund, debt-free, an end to poverty and homelessness.
Money reform is a growing movement but you'll never read about it in the media. Thankfully there are excellent resources on the internet. Is there a more important use of one's time than to get informed about the true nature of the financial regime? We've lived all our lives in debt bondage, is that what we want for our grandchildren too?
So we have to provoke a public outcry. Why? Because the money scam is an outrage. Because poverty and homelessness are guaranteed by the debt-money system, we cannot succeed while it remains in place. It's not a joke, the situation is dire and getting worse. Once people know, poverty will end. Get informed. Tell everyone. Change money, change the world.
©2017. International Movement for Monetary Reform. All rights reserved.
PMNZ YouTube
Change Money, Change the World
By Marc Joseph
Isn't it frustrating to witness the growing inequality, poverty, homelessness, and suffering that plagues society? The government's efforts to address these ills are feeble and year after year the situation gets worse. We all know well the government's litany of excuses: "we don't have the money, we'd have to raise taxes, we have to be fiscally prudent, we have to service the debt, money doesn't grow on trees." It all boils down to money, doesn't it? But is it true?
No, it's not true. The government's excuses don't stand up to scrutiny, especially when we look at the facts about money. Money comes in two forms, paper (notes and coin) and electronic. The paper part comes from the RBNZ but that portion, about 2%, is insignificant. All the digital money we use is produced by the private banks. It's our national money, yet private institutions have been given the power of producing it for our economy. Think of it. 98% of New Zealand's dollars, which we must have to participate in the economy, is supplied by private institutions.
So what about this digital money? It's produced by tapping a keyboard and making an entry in a database, and this entry is shown on a computer screen. This happens whenever a bank makes a loan. Here, it's important to note that the financial system is based on a lie, the lie that says the private banks act as financial intermediaries between savers and borrowers. They do not. When you borrow from a bank, you borrow new debt-money that is "printed" fresh just for you. No pre-existing money is loaned. The bank creates the debt-money by merely changing the number that appears in your account. This may come as a shock to you, and it should because it's the shocking truth.
There is an important distinction to understand here. This new money is unearned money. You have agreed to repay it, but the only way you can repay it is to go out and earn it. The banking lie has you believing that you are borrowing someone else's hard-earned money and so you abide by the agreement to repay not just the loan but a premium as well. Your relationship with the bank is completely unequal and lacks full disclosure, and the interest is effortless profit for the banks.
So we need to ask ourselves, is this how we want our nation's money to be produced, only as loans? Is it right that the production of our money be in the hands of private institutions that profit so vastly with little or no effort? No way. And this debt has interest attached, which means that the debt grows over time, increasing beyond the capacity of the people to repay it. Indeed, the total debt owed to the private banks today is almost two times greater than the total money supply! This debt cannot and will not ever be repayed. So we work to repay the unrepayable debt to private institutions who have done virtually nothing. How can this be?
The reason is that people just don't know. Somehow, we've been indoctrinated to never question the source of money. The result of this is evident: inequality, poverty, homelessness, environmental degradation, crisis. Are you concerned about the ludicrous prices being paid for housing in Auckland and Wellington? The private banking system, given free rein by the government, is your culprit. For a private bank, the bigger the mortgage, the better.
And consider this. The authority to produce money comes from government, so why is the government in debt? If 98% of New Zealand's money is digitally produced, why doesn't the government do it? Indeed, the government is constantly invoking "financial prudence" when it explains why it can't provide the programs and services we all say we want, so why does the government allow private production of these debt-soaked dollars? How financially prudent is that?
Let's imagine a hypothetical situation. Society wants an end to poverty and homelessness so the government embarks on a brilliant initiative to do just that, mobilising the fabulous expertise and intelligence of the people of NZ. It pays for it by issuing the money straight out of the Treasury. No bonds, no borrowing, no debt. No excuses. Meanwhile, the government passes laws to restrict debt-money production by the private banks.
Of course, now we hear the last resort of the financial fear-mongers: that would be inflationary! they cry. They don't mention that private debt-money production in the last 100 years has decimated the purchasing power of our dollar by 95%. They never admit that interest-bearing debt is the true cause of inflation. And how many financial crises of the last century can we enumerate? They were all caused by their debt-soaked money and no doubt there's another crisis lurking on the horizon. What possible justification can there be for private control of our money supply? Debt-free money is far less inflationary, if at all.
We need money. We don't need debt. Debt distorts the economy. It makes it run inefficiently, squanders natural resources, drives the growth imperative, wastes human potential, and greatly enriches a few at the expense of the many. It's clear that society would reject private production of our money if it understood this brutal regime with its deplorable consequences.
Our challenge is to expose the lie and reveal the truth about the production of money. Once society knows the truth, the private control of our money will end. The people will demand that the government assume control over our money supply and soon the financial solution to our myriad problems will be available. No more debt.
So the truth is that there is no shortage of money. All that is socially desirable is financially possible. The private banking system's effortless profit is a millstone around our necks. It's imperative that government assert its authority over the money supply and properly fund, debt-free, an end to poverty and homelessness.
Money reform is a growing movement but you'll never read about it in the media. Thankfully there are excellent resources on the internet. Is there a more important use of one's time than to get informed about the true nature of the financial regime? We've lived all our lives in debt bondage, is that what we want for our grandchildren too?
So we have to provoke a public outcry. Why? Because the money scam is an outrage. Because poverty and homelessness are guaranteed by the debt-money system, we cannot succeed while it remains in place. It's not a joke, the situation is dire and getting worse. Once people know, poverty will end. Get informed. Tell everyone. Change money, change the world.
©2017. International Movement for Monetary Reform. All rights reserved.
Ghanaian Media Houses Must Keep Their Powerful Spotlights Focused On High-Level Corruption And Expose All Who Engage In It
It must be pretty obvious to many in Ghana by now that it is only the vigilance of the media that will save our nation from being destroyed by high-level corruption.
As things currently stand, perforce, the media must focus on the regime of President Akufo-Addo. But we must also examine the past - and help bring all those who took part in the brutal gang-rape of Mother Ghana during the Mahama-era to book too.
However, having said that, it also needs pointing out that every fair-minded and independent-minded Ghanaian citizen, who is also a one-nation patriot and nationalist, will concur with those who say it is still too early to judge the government of President Akufo-Addo.
Many such Ghanaians simply await passage of legislation establishing the office of the independent special public prosecutor to be passed by Parliament.
Current events show clearly that the president was right and very wise in deciding that he would use someone outside his regime to fight high-level corruption in Ghana.
This blog wholeheartedly backs the appointment of Mr. Akoto Ampaw as the first independent public prosecutor. He is fearless, strong-willed, fair-minded, principled, and, best of all, firmly committed to riddimg Ghana of high-level corrpution.
In light of the many shenaningans the downstrean sector of Ghana's oil industry is awash with - which are slowly bleeding Mother Ghana to death whiles enriching a callous, super-ruthless, greedy and powerful few - it is now clear that it is only when the independent special public prosecutor starts his work that the final battle to bring an end to egregious high-level corruption in Ghana can begin in earnest.
The unedifying war of words - over the sale of contaminated fuel by the Bulk Oil Storage and Transportation Company Limited (BOST) - between the two biggest political parties in Ghana, the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), and the main opposition party, the National Democratic Congress (NDC), shows clearly how systemic graft is slowly strangulating our nation.
The question is: How can anyone possibly justify the importation for sale in Ghana of substandard fuel?
And how can anyone who truly loves Mother Ghana think it morally right to reward a party "financier" with the job of running BOST?
Are we to assume that the main objective of the appointment is to enable his ruling party to engage in pork-barrel-politricks distributing sundry oil sector downstream Kweku-Ananse-contracts - to create a new clutch of super-wealthy NPP crony-capitalits: the very sin the NPP accuses the NDC of.
In other words the constituent parties that make up the NPP/NDC duopoly - that have dominated the politics of our country since 1992 - think that it is OK to treat BOST and other strategic state-owned entities as veritable cash-cows. Incredible.
To protect our nation and its people the more responsible sections of the Ghanaian media must make fighting high-level corruption in our homeland Ghana their number one priority-task.
Alas, if we don't make those who engage in high-level corruption understand that they will eventually be exposed by the media, the greediest of Ghana's many thieves-in-high-places will rob this country blind and eventually destroy it.
As society's watchdogs, the more responsible sections of the Ghanaian media must not allow that to happen. They must constantly keep their most powerful spotlights focused on high-level corruption in Ghana - and help to expose all those who engage in it. Enough is enough. Haaba.
As things currently stand, perforce, the media must focus on the regime of President Akufo-Addo. But we must also examine the past - and help bring all those who took part in the brutal gang-rape of Mother Ghana during the Mahama-era to book too.
However, having said that, it also needs pointing out that every fair-minded and independent-minded Ghanaian citizen, who is also a one-nation patriot and nationalist, will concur with those who say it is still too early to judge the government of President Akufo-Addo.
Many such Ghanaians simply await passage of legislation establishing the office of the independent special public prosecutor to be passed by Parliament.
Current events show clearly that the president was right and very wise in deciding that he would use someone outside his regime to fight high-level corruption in Ghana.
This blog wholeheartedly backs the appointment of Mr. Akoto Ampaw as the first independent public prosecutor. He is fearless, strong-willed, fair-minded, principled, and, best of all, firmly committed to riddimg Ghana of high-level corrpution.
In light of the many shenaningans the downstrean sector of Ghana's oil industry is awash with - which are slowly bleeding Mother Ghana to death whiles enriching a callous, super-ruthless, greedy and powerful few - it is now clear that it is only when the independent special public prosecutor starts his work that the final battle to bring an end to egregious high-level corruption in Ghana can begin in earnest.
The unedifying war of words - over the sale of contaminated fuel by the Bulk Oil Storage and Transportation Company Limited (BOST) - between the two biggest political parties in Ghana, the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), and the main opposition party, the National Democratic Congress (NDC), shows clearly how systemic graft is slowly strangulating our nation.
The question is: How can anyone possibly justify the importation for sale in Ghana of substandard fuel?
And how can anyone who truly loves Mother Ghana think it morally right to reward a party "financier" with the job of running BOST?
Are we to assume that the main objective of the appointment is to enable his ruling party to engage in pork-barrel-politricks distributing sundry oil sector downstream Kweku-Ananse-contracts - to create a new clutch of super-wealthy NPP crony-capitalits: the very sin the NPP accuses the NDC of.
In other words the constituent parties that make up the NPP/NDC duopoly - that have dominated the politics of our country since 1992 - think that it is OK to treat BOST and other strategic state-owned entities as veritable cash-cows. Incredible.
To protect our nation and its people the more responsible sections of the Ghanaian media must make fighting high-level corruption in our homeland Ghana their number one priority-task.
Alas, if we don't make those who engage in high-level corruption understand that they will eventually be exposed by the media, the greediest of Ghana's many thieves-in-high-places will rob this country blind and eventually destroy it.
As society's watchdogs, the more responsible sections of the Ghanaian media must not allow that to happen. They must constantly keep their most powerful spotlights focused on high-level corruption in Ghana - and help to expose all those who engage in it. Enough is enough. Haaba.
Investopedia/Nathan Rieff: Warren Buffett Makes $12 Billion on a Single Bank of America Investment
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Warren Buffett Makes $12 Billion on a Single Bank of America Investment (BAC, BRK-A) By Nathan Reiff | June 30, 2017 — 9:31 AM EDT
Share
Add To Watchlist
BAC
24.26
-0.25%
BRK-A
254,700.00
+0.32%
WFC
55.41
-0.66%
Six years ago, while Bank of America (BAC) was struggling in the years following the financial crisis, Warren Buffett had tremendous foresight, as only an investor like Warren Buffett would. Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway (BRK-A) has just announced that it will exercise warrants in BAC stock, acquired at that time, to purchase 700 million common shares at an exercise price of only $7.14 each. The total Berkshire will pay is roughly $5 billion. However, with BAC shares closing yesterday at $24.32 per share, the stake is worth over $17 billion, meaning that Buffett gains a quick profit of $12 billion on a single investment.
Increase of Annual Dividend Spurs Warrant Exercise
Berkshire's decision to exercise the warrants now seems to have been initiated in part by Bank of America's decision earlier this week to hike its annual dividend, increasing it to 48 cents per share. This represents a 60% gain. Buffett had the option of sitting on the warrants until 2021.
The story of this investment move began in 2011, when Berkshire made a deal to invest $5 billion in preferred shares of Bank of America's stock. Those shares pay a 6% dividend per annum, or roughly $300 million. With a dividend of 44 cents, the common shares would pay about the same each year, and with the rate hike to 48 cents, Berkshire stands to get $336 million annually.
Buffett Expects Increase?
Analysts at CNBC have speculated that Buffett's decision to exercise his warrants is a bullish move, and that the Oracle of Omaha expects BAC stock to rise in price. By the start of trading on Friday, BAC shares were up 7% for the week.
It is expected that Bank of America will make the dividend increase official by the beginning of the third quarter of the year: this coming Monday. Berkshire will officially wait to exercise the warrants until that time, meaning that Buffett could stand to gain even more than $12 billion in the stock climbs higher through the end of the week. The move will also position Berkshire as the largest stakeholder in the Bank, as Buffett overtakes Vanguard, which holds 6.6% of shares.
Buffett indicated his shift in plans to potentially exercise the warrants before the 2021 deadline in an earlier annual letter to Berkshire shareholders. "If the dividend rate on Bank of America common stock-now 30 cents annually-should rise above 44 cents before 2021, we would anticipate making a cashless exchange of our preferred into common," he indicated. It seems that Berkshire will do just that, netting at least $12 billion in easy profit through the process. Berkshire is already the largest shareholder in other big bank Wells Fargo (WFC).
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Warren Buffett Makes $12 Billion on a Single Bank of America Investment (BAC, BRK-A) By Nathan Reiff | June 30, 2017 — 9:31 AM EDT
Share
Add To Watchlist
BAC
24.26
-0.25%
BRK-A
254,700.00
+0.32%
WFC
55.41
-0.66%
Six years ago, while Bank of America (BAC) was struggling in the years following the financial crisis, Warren Buffett had tremendous foresight, as only an investor like Warren Buffett would. Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway (BRK-A) has just announced that it will exercise warrants in BAC stock, acquired at that time, to purchase 700 million common shares at an exercise price of only $7.14 each. The total Berkshire will pay is roughly $5 billion. However, with BAC shares closing yesterday at $24.32 per share, the stake is worth over $17 billion, meaning that Buffett gains a quick profit of $12 billion on a single investment.
Increase of Annual Dividend Spurs Warrant Exercise
Berkshire's decision to exercise the warrants now seems to have been initiated in part by Bank of America's decision earlier this week to hike its annual dividend, increasing it to 48 cents per share. This represents a 60% gain. Buffett had the option of sitting on the warrants until 2021.
The story of this investment move began in 2011, when Berkshire made a deal to invest $5 billion in preferred shares of Bank of America's stock. Those shares pay a 6% dividend per annum, or roughly $300 million. With a dividend of 44 cents, the common shares would pay about the same each year, and with the rate hike to 48 cents, Berkshire stands to get $336 million annually.
Buffett Expects Increase?
Analysts at CNBC have speculated that Buffett's decision to exercise his warrants is a bullish move, and that the Oracle of Omaha expects BAC stock to rise in price. By the start of trading on Friday, BAC shares were up 7% for the week.
It is expected that Bank of America will make the dividend increase official by the beginning of the third quarter of the year: this coming Monday. Berkshire will officially wait to exercise the warrants until that time, meaning that Buffett could stand to gain even more than $12 billion in the stock climbs higher through the end of the week. The move will also position Berkshire as the largest stakeholder in the Bank, as Buffett overtakes Vanguard, which holds 6.6% of shares.
Buffett indicated his shift in plans to potentially exercise the warrants before the 2021 deadline in an earlier annual letter to Berkshire shareholders. "If the dividend rate on Bank of America common stock-now 30 cents annually-should rise above 44 cents before 2021, we would anticipate making a cashless exchange of our preferred into common," he indicated. It seems that Berkshire will do just that, netting at least $12 billion in easy profit through the process. Berkshire is already the largest shareholder in other big bank Wells Fargo (WFC).
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Top Perks Warren Buffett Gets When Purchasing Equities
Learn about the many investment perks that Buffett enjoys and the rest of us can only try to imagine.
Investing
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Wells Fargo fallout, the Apple of Buffett's eye, self-driving cars and more.
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Understand how issues of succession, credit downgrade risk and increased regulation could hurt prospects for Berkshire Hathaway.
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A look into Berkshire Hathaway’s core management team and how they work together to deliver consistent returns over the long term.
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Berkshire's Record Cash Guarantees More Deals (BRK-B)
Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway is sitting on more than $70 billion in cash, almost guaranteeing what will happen next: more big acquisitions.
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Berkshire Fine Spinning Associated and Hathaway Manufacturing Company merged in 1955 to form Berkshire Hathaway.
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Buffett invests for the long-term and expects significant upside over that period. Investors would do well to take notes on what Buffett's buying now.
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© 2017, Investopedia, LLC. Feedback All Rights Reserved Terms Of Use Privacy Policy
Dr. Joseph Mercola: How to Eat the Freshest, Most Amazing Food Without Spending a Fortune
Biodynamic Farming and the Legacy of Rudolf Steiner
July 01, 2017 • 5,306 views
Visit the Mercola Video Library
Story at-a-glance
Biodynamic farming is a spiritual-ethical-ecological approach to agriculture initially developed by Austrian scholar Rudolf Steiner, Ph.D., (1861-1925)
Not only does biodynamic farming provide superior crops both in volume and increased density of nutrients, but biodynamic farms are also completely self-sustaining
What sets biodynamic farming apart from organic farming are the principles involving cosmological forces, such as taking moon phases and planetary cycles into account when planting and harvesting
By Dr. Mercola
Biodynamic farming is a spiritual-ethical-ecological approach to agriculture initially developed by Austrian scholar Rudolf Steiner,1 Ph.D., (1861-1925). It’s an approach that can provide far superior harvests compared to conventional chemical-based agriculture, while simultaneously healing the Earth.
Not only does biodynamic farming provide superior crops both in volume and increased density of nutrients, but biodynamic farms are also completely self-sustaining. As noted in the featured film, “The Challenge of Rudolf Steiner,” sustainability, and the personal independence and freedom that sustainability provides, was incredibly important to Steiner.
It’s a very long film — over three hours — but if you have an interest in biodynamic farming or Steiner’s worldview in general, it’s well worth watching. He taught there is an invisible force that aids and sustains humanity, and biodynamic farming makes use of a wide variety of influences, including planetary influences and moon phases.
Regenerative agriculture has been one of my passions for the past few years, and I’ve read many books and interviewed many experts in this area. Over these past few years, I’ve tested a number of different strategies to improve plant growth, such as vortexed compost tea, rock dust powders, magnetic structured water, ionic ocean minerals, biochar, many types of foliar sprays and mulch like wood chips.
Steiner’s Legacy Lives On
Steiner has had a profound influence, making an indelible mark on the world. Profoundly prolific, his complete works fill more than 330 books, much of which are now available online in German and English.2
Steiner was a trained scientist and respected philosopher, a true eclectic and visionary far ahead of his times. His voluminous works span a wide range of topics, from “The Mysteries of Antiquity” and writings on Nietzsche and Goethe, to “The Philosophy of Freedom” and “Spirit and Matter” to the “Birth of the Biodynamic Method.”
He wrote about economics, politics, art, architecture, drama, therapeutic speech, epistemology, religion, science, medicine, education and more. You could spend your entire life studying his life’s work, many aspects of which are detailed in this two-part film.
Education — The Steiner Way
Aside from agriculture, Steiner had a deep interest in early education, and his principles are alive and well to this day. In the U.K. alone, there are more than three dozen Steiner academies of learning, and the natural world, including farming skills, is an integral part of the curriculum.
Steiner kindergarten academies “provide ‘unhurried and creative’ environments for learning,” The Guardian wrote in 2012.3 Trevor Mepham, principal of Steiner Academy Hereford, told the paper, “It's about keeping that vitality and that freshness and that twinkling eye. I think that's common sense, though. It's just that we arguably try to do that as a matter of course.”
“There's something undeniably wholesome about the Steiner approach,” The Guardian notes. “In an age when toddlers are adept at using iPhones, the idea of children building shelters in the woods is profoundly attractive to parents. Access to television is restricted — under the homeschool agreement with parents, children are not meant to watch TV before the age of 8.
There is no uniform; the children wear hoodies, sturdy trousers and plimsolls, and the canteen serves mainly vegetarian food. A homely vegetable curry spiced with mustard seeds is dish of the day when I visit …
‘As human beings we have a close and important relationship with the natural world. To pretend that we just need gadgetry and technology, that misses out a very vital part of the piece,’ Mepham says. ‘Especially when children are young, we need to try to foster in them an interest and sense of inquiry and hopefulness about the natural world.’"
Biodynamic Farming and Reverence for Nature
Biodynamic farming is perhaps the area where his legacy lives on the strongest. In 1924, due to popular demand, Steiner offered an agriculture course in Koberwitz, a small village in what is now Poland.
The course consisted of eight lectures and five discussions, now available in the book “Agriculture: Spiritual Foundations for the Renewal of Agriculture,” which to this day serves as the basis of biodynamic farming everywhere. His course is also available for free online.4 As noted by Biodynamic Association:5
“Steiner was one of the first public figures to warn that the widespread use of chemical fertilizers would lead to the decline of soil, plant and animal health and the subsequent devitalization of food. He was also the first to bring the perspective of the farm as a single, self-sustaining organism that thrives through biodiversity, the integration of crops and livestock and the creation of a closed-loop system of fertility.”
In 1923, he also predicted that, in 80 to 100 years, honeybee populations would collapse6 — a prediction fulfilled with the sudden emergence of colony collapse disorder, which can be traced back to the use of toxic pesticides and herbicides.
As just one of many examples of Steiner’s comprehensive approach to farming, biodynamic farmers will not cut off the horns on their cows, as the animal’s horns are a primary sensory organ, and a complex interrelated relationship exists between the horns and the animal’s digestive system.
Why Agricultural U-Turn Is Necessary
We live in an increasingly toxic world, and according to a wide variety of scientists, we are looking at no more than 50 to 60 years’ worth of business as usual before we reach a point at which nature will no longer sustain us on any front, be it water, air or soil quality. Indeed, food security is no longer a given, even if you have plenty of available land, and here’s why:
Water scarcity is getting worse as aquifers are drained faster than they can be refilled
One-third of the largest groundwater aquifers are already nearing depletion,7 with three of the most stressed aquifers being located in areas where political tensions are already running high.8 To give you an idea of how quickly groundwater is being depleted, consider what’s happening in the High Plains Aquifer (also known as the Ogallala) in the American Midwest.
Here, the water level has been dropping by an average of 6 feet per year, while the natural recharge rate is 1 inch or less.9 Once this aquifer is depleted — and many wells have already run dry in the area — 20 percent of the U.S. corn, wheat and cattle output will be lost due to lack of irrigation and water for the animals.
Soil erosion and degradation is rapidly worsening
In a 2012 Time magazine10 interview, University of Sydney professor John Crawford noted that about 40 percent of agricultural soils around the globe is currently classified as degraded or seriously degraded. “Seriously degraded” means that 70 percent of the topsoil (the layer of soil in which plants grow) has already disappeared.
The reason for the erosion and degradation is farming methods that remove carbon from the soil and destroy the microbial balance in the soil responsible for plant nutrition and growth. At present, topsoil is being lost 10 to 40 times faster than nature can regenerate and replenish it naturally.
Water pollution is worsening
Precious water sources are also threatened by pollution from large-scale monocrop farms and concentrated animal feeding operations.11 According to a report12 by Environment America, corporate agribusiness is “one of the biggest threats to America’s waterways.” Tyson Foods Inc. was deemed among the worst, releasing 104.4 million pounds of toxic pollutants into waterways between 2010 and 2014.
Researchers have warned that many lakes around the world are at grave risk from fertilizer runoff that feeds harmful blue-green algae (cyanobacteria),13,14 and once established, it’s far more difficult to get rid of than previously thought. The answer, according to the authors of this study, is better land-use management that addresses fertilizer runoff. Dramatic reductions in fertilizer use are also recommended.
Air pollution is worsening
Scientists have declared farming and fertilizers as the No. 1 cause of particulate matter air pollution in much of the U.S., China, Russia and Europe today, specifically the nitrogen component of fertilizers.15,16 Industrial food and farming also release dangerous amounts of greenhouse gases, carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organization warns 25 percent of all deaths worldwide are attributable to environmental pollution, with air pollution being among the most significant.17
Desertification is speeding up
Land is turning into desert at a rapid clip and, with it, we’re losing biodiversity of both plant and animal life.
Biodynamic Farming Is Part of the Answer
Biodynamic farming addresses all of these problems and more. The good news is biodynamic farming is on the rise, gaining popularity among younger farmers — even people who don’t have a family background in farming. John Chester, for example, was a filmmaker before he left Hollywood for a 213-acre farm in Moorpark, California. The Guardian writes:18
“… Chester runs [Apricot Lane Farms] with his wife, Molly. The couple nurtures 100 different types of vegetables, 75 varieties of stone fruit, and countless animal residents: Scottish highland cattle, pigs, chickens, sheep, ducks, hens, horses and livestock dogs. Last year, Apricot Lane Farms was recognized by the National Wildlife Federation and the North American Butterfly Association for supporting so much wildlife — not a recognition typically given to farms.”
Last year, biodynamic farming in the U.S. increased by 16 percent, adding nearly 21,800 acres to its fold.19 To evaluate the impact of biodynamic methods on soil quality, Demeter USA, a nonprofit certifier of biodynamic goods, has started collecting topsoil samples from participating farms. Eventually, this will tell us just how quickly soil quality can be improved.
Demeter co-director Elizabeth Candelario told The Guardian, “This will provide a tool for farmers who continue to focus on building healthy soil, and give voice to power about biodynamic agriculture’s role in mitigating the impacts of climate change.”
Cosmic Influences
What sets biodynamic farming20 apart from organic farming are the principles involving cosmological forces, such as taking moon phases and planetary cycles into account when planting and harvesting. Each of the 12 zodiac signs are associated with a particular quality. As explained by Tony Carlton in the film, the four primary qualities or energies farmers work with are earth, light, water and warmth. Zodiac signs also fall into four different elements, namely earth signs, air signs, water signs and fire signs.
During the influence of an earth sign, you would plant root vegetables, as the astrological earth element corresponds with plant roots. Earth signs are: Taurus (April 20 to May 20), Virgo (August 23 to September 22) and Capricorn (December 22 to January 19)
During water signs, you would plant leafy greens (water element). Water signs are: Cancer (June 21 to July 22), Scorpio (October 23 to November 21) and Pisces (February 19 to March 20)
Air signs call for planting of flowering plants (light element). Air signs are: Gemini (May 21 to June 20), Libra (September 23 to October 22) and Aquarius (January 20 to February 18)
Fire signs call for planting of fruits (the element of warmth). Fire signs are: Aries (March 21-April 19), Leo (July 23 to August 22) and Sagittarius (November 22 to December 21)
To recap, the four elements of earth, water, air and fire correspond to the plant kingdom of root, leaf, flower and fruit. As an example, lettuce grows well under the influence of Pisces, but the bean does not. Beans prefer the influence of Aries. If you plant beans during the month of Pisces, the plant will hardly grow at all — until Aries comes around, at which time it will actually start to grow.
This further translates into moon phases as well. For example, when the moon is in Aries, a fire sign, you’ll want to plant fruiting plants, such as cherries. When the moon is in Taurus, an earth sign, plant carrots and other root veggies. Since the moon moves quickly through each sign, it will change signs every two days or so. For a planting guide based on moon phases, see The Gardeners Calendar.21
Biodynamic Is Organic and Regenerative, and Then Some
Biodynamic farming also differs a bit in the way farmers are certified. While an organic farmer can section off as little as 10 percent of the farm for the growing of certified organic goods, in order to be certified as a biodynamic farmer, your entire farm must be biodynamic. In addition to that, biodynamic certification also requires 10 percent of the land be dedicated to increasing biodiversity, such as forest, wetland or insectary. As noted by Lauren Mazzo, writing for Shape Magazine:22
“In the end, they're both about eliminating the scary stuff from our food. An organic certification means there are no synthetic fertilizers, sewage sludge, irradiation or genetic engineering used in the food, and farm animals must be fed organic feed, etc.
Biodynamic includes those guidelines, as well as making the farm even more self-reliant. For example, instead of simply requiring organic feed for animals, most of the feed must originate from other processes and resources on the farm.”
Biodynamic farming also has most or all of the features associated with regenerative agriculture, such as crop rotation, cover crops and so on. And, while neither use synthetic fertilizers or pesticides or herbicides, Steiner created a number of very specific preparations made from herbs, minerals and manure, which are then added to compost or sprayed on the fields.
One such preparation involves packing manure into a cow horn and burying it underground over the winter. In spring, the contents of the horn are scraped out, mixed with water and applied as a soil treatment to stimulate root growth. Another involves packing silica into a cow horn and burying it over the summer.23
You Are What You Eat
According to Steiner, man is a microcosm of the macrocosm. Certainly, it’s true that the biosphere that is the Earth is intricately connected, from the tiniest bacteria in the soil all the way up to the human body, which just so happens to contain 10 times more bacteria and other microorganisms than human cells. What separates us from the microbiome in the soil, you could say, is merely scale and perception.
With that in mind, we cannot afford to ignore soil, plant and insect health, as our health depends on theirs. While few are called to become full-time farmers, most people can grow some of their own food, even if it’s just some herbs or sprouts, which require little space and maintenance.
Even if you do none of those things, you can still help steer the agricultural industry toward safer, more sustainable systems by supporting your local farmers and choosing fresh, locally-grown organic and grass fed foods. If you live in the U.S., the following organizations can help you locate farm-fresh foods:
American Grassfed Association
The goal of the American Grassfed Association is to promote the grass fed industry through government relations, research, concept marketing and public education.
Their website also allows you to search for AGA approved producers certified according to strict standards that include being raised on a diet of 100 percent forage; raised on pasture and never confined to a feedlot; never treated with antibiotics or hormones; born and raised on American family farms.
EatWild.com
EatWild.com provides lists of farmers known to produce raw dairy products as well as grass fed beef and other farm-fresh produce (although not all are certified organic). Here you can also find information about local farmers markets, as well as local stores and restaurants that sell grass fed products.
Weston A. Price Foundation
Weston A. Price has local chapters in most states, and many of them are connected with buying clubs in which you can easily purchase organic foods, including grass fed raw dairy products like milk and butter.
Grassfed Exchange
The Grassfed Exchange has a listing of producers selling organic and grass fed meats across the U.S.
Local Harvest
This website will help you find farmers markets, family farms and other sources of sustainably grown food in your area where you can buy produce, grass fed meats and many other goodies.
Farmers Markets
A national listing of farmers markets.
Eat Well Guide: Wholesome Food from Healthy Animals
The Eat Well Guide is a free online directory of sustainably raised meat, poultry, dairy and eggs from farms, stores, restaurants, inns, hotels and online outlets in the United States and Canada.
Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture (CISA)
CISA is dedicated to sustaining agriculture and promoting the products of small farms.
FoodRoutes
The FoodRoutes "Find Good Food" map can help you connect with local farmers to find the freshest, tastiest food possible. On their interactive map, you can find a listing for local farmers, CSAs and markets near you.
The Cornucopia Institute
The Cornucopia Institute maintains web-based tools rating all certified organic brands of eggs, dairy products and other commodities, based on their ethical sourcing and authentic farming practices separating CAFO "organic" production from authentic organic practices.
RealMilk.com
If you're still unsure of where to find raw milk, check out Raw-Milk-Facts.com and RealMilk.com. They can tell you what the status is for legality in your state, and provide a listing of raw dairy farms in your area. The Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund24 also provides a state-by-state review of raw milk laws.25 California residents can also find raw milk retailers using the store locator available at www.OrganicPastures.com.
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