Learn the cruel reality from this youtube playlist:
http://www.youtube.com/user/Monsanto720p#grid/user/B8DC51B28C789BB2
Or this other website:
http://www.twilightearth.com/environment-archive-2/the-world-according-to-monsanto-full-documentary/
“Nanotechnology is the engineering of functional systems at the molecular scale. In its original sense, 'nanotechnology' refers to the ability to construct items from the bottom up.” (Center for Responsible Nanotechnology)
Two examples of nanotechnology include the manufacturing of super strength polymers, and the design of computer chips at the molecular level (quantum computing). This is related to biotechnology, where technology is applied to living systems, such as recombinant DNA, biopharmaceuticals, or gene therapy.
How do we apply nanotechnology concepts to User-centric EA?
The field of information technology, like that of nanotechnology and biotechnology is not only evolving, but is moving so quickly as to seem almost revolutionary at times. So in enterprise architecture, we need to use lots of imagination in thinking about the future and target state. Additionally, we need to think not only in terms of traditional architecture decomposition (a top-down view), but also integration (a bottom-up view) of the organization, its processes, information shares, and technologies. And finally, we need to constantly remain nimble and agile in the globalized, competitive marketplace where change is a constant.
In recent months, major drug developers such as Genentech and Schering-Plough, who were previously partnering targets, are now going through the process of mergers (with Roche, and Merck, respectively). This means it is likely that there will be a continued gradual decrease in the number of potential partners looking to acquire co-ownership of new drugs going forward.
As big drugmakers continue to merge, the consolidated portfolios will also change. At first glance it would seem like the mergers and acquisitions would allow the combined company to expand its portfolio. However, these mergers often result in management trimming off ‘excess’ to increase focus on the most profitable areas. Therefore, not only is the number of companies decreasing, but the number of disease indications being pursued by these companies is also likely to continue to decrease.
Consequently, as small companies have ever decreasing choices, major drug developers have more options from which to choose when selecting a partner. It is no longer enough for a start-up biotech to be first-in-class. Instead, it is more important than ever for biotechs to see their own programs from the perspective of major drug developers and create fully enabled programs that are attractive to potential partners in multiple ways.
Essex Woodlands Health Ventures has closed its eighth fund at $900 million, missing its $1 billion goal but still amassing one of the largest amounts ever for a health care-only venture fund.
The total for Essex Woodlands Health Ventures VIII LP equals the amount that health care firm MPM Capital secured for its third fund in 2002. It’s also 50% larger than the $600 million pool Essex Woodlands rounded up in for fund seven in 2006. Including its $400 million sixth fund, closed in March of 2004, the firm has now closed on $1.9 billion in the last five years.
Though it didn’t reach its target, the amount the firm did raise shows that limited partners strongly endorse its diversified strategy of making growth-equity and venture-capital investments in biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, medical devices and health-care services.
Using this approach, the firm has backed winners in multiple industries, including Dow Pharmaceutical Sciences Inc., acquired by Valeant Pharmaceuticals International in December for $285 million cash, plus about $200 million in milestones, and LipoSonix Inc., a developer of a body-contouring technology acquired by Medicis Pharmaceutical Corp. in July for $150 million cash, plus $150 million in milestones.
Essex Woodlands began fund-raising in December 2007 with a goal of $1 billion and a $1.25 billion hard cap, though it never issued a private-placement memorandum, according to Managing Director Immanuel Thangaraj.
The partners expected to hold a final closing that would bring the fund to $1 billion or more in 2008, but those plans fizzled as the economy soured and as its LPs saw the values of their holdings plummet. In November 2008, the firm asked its LPs to allow it to extend its fund-raising until February 2009 to accommodate some undisclosed investors who needed more to time deal with the fallout from the financial meltdown. In the end, however, these investors came through, Thangaraj said.
“We got all the investors who had the appetite and the allocation. Nobody that wanted to invest was precluded from doing so because of time,” Thangaraj said. With valuations falling and capital scarce “fund eight has the kind of purchasing power we’ve not seen in 25 years of operations.”
Essex Woodlands plans to invest the bulk of its fund in growth-equity deals. The firm, which sees opportunity to help companies with rapidly growing revenue to expand, will consider growth-equity investments as large as $75 million. In its most recent deal, for example, it led a $45 million round for Victory Pharma Inc., a profitable specialty-pharmaceutical company focused on pain and related conditions.
The firm, however, will also continue to consider early-stage, traditional venture capital investments. Biotech companies with strong platforms, for example, are still of interest. This formula previously proved successful with companies such as Rinat Neuroscience Corp., a neurological drug developer acquired by Pfizer Inc. for about $500 million in 2006.
Enterprise architecture analyzes problem areas in an organization and identifies gap, redundancies, inefficiencies, and opportunities. It uses this information to drive business process improvement, reengineering, and the introduction of new technologies.
Enterprise architecture can benefit any process or problem area, even the difficult area of solving crimes.
Crime fighting has long faced major problems, such as identifying murder victims and tracking their killers. Now new technologies and associated analytical processes are being introduced to help solve these murder mysteries.
MIT Technology Review, 27 February 2008, reports that “Researchers at the University of Utah say that they are able to determine a person's recent travel history by comparing the isotope ratios of oxygen and hydrogen in a strand of his or her hair.”
The study, which was published February 25 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found a strong correlation between the isotopes in the water that a person drinks and the isotopes in her hair.”
“The hair closest to the root indicates where a person has been most recently. The longer the hair, the more recorded history the researchers have to work with. Hair grows one millimeter every three days, so if the hair is 20 centimeters long, that represents about 20 months' worth of history, says Ehleringer.”
Hair analysis is considered a major breakthrough for law enforcement in helping detectives narrow locations where a murder victims and their perpetrators have been and ultimately to identify them.
In the case of hair analysis for crime solving, the enterprise architecture solution actually crosses all three technology areas—information technology, biotechnology, and nanotechnology. Hair analysis involves evaluating hydrogen and oxygen isotopes (biotechnology) in various regions’ water and air and comparing that to molecules from a person’s hair follicles (nanotechnology) using technologies called mass spectrometers (information technology), and then analyzing “geographic region of origin and travel history of humans” through predictive modeling (information technology).
As an enterprise architect, we look to deliver mission performance and results of operations through technology enablement. These technologies can take the form of information technologies, biotechnologies, or nanotechnologies. The use of these technologies in combination can solve even the toughest problem areas.
