Hong Kong public listed companies searching potential partners through SMS?

I received an SMS offering an opportunity to become a partner to a public listed company. By referring to the text msg, really sounds opportunity not to be missed. But after analyze to logical part of it, why the hell a public listed company approaching informally through sms?

There are 2 possibilities I can possibly think of:
1. Scam - there are everywhere in the cyberworld nowadays.
2. MLM - there are many public listed companies, and becoming downline of somebody is equivalent as partner.

If you are interested, please call the number!
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device via Vodafone-Celcom Mobile.

An Unfair Advantage

Robert Kiyosaki, who is famous with his Rich Dad Poor Dad, will be announcing his new book : An Unfair Advantage. In his previous book, the conspiracy of the Rich, Robert has mentioned how the monetary system has changed during President Nixon in 70's detach the US Dollar from gold and let the paper value determine by the fluctuation of the market. Since then, the rules of money have changed. Besides, he also explained how the tax system benefits the riches and the middle class will always have to be the victim. His justification is very simple, the riches make the rules and those who makes the rules will always wants something that will benefit them. (or in the other way round, we can say those who make the rules knows better where the loop-holes are). In other words, the riches will always win in any economic situation.

Robert always tried to educate people on the agenda behind all the economic crisis. The 2008 financial crisis is something that he predicted earlier and has warned people by writing a book called Prophecy published in 2002. Robert is very much passionate in researching about the riches and he openly reveal all the politics behind it. I have once attended his talk during the National Achievers Congress 2009 where he brings his 'Rich Dad's Advisor' team. To me, Robert has a very good team which each of them consist of those who are very expert in each field in which most rich people find their fortune, namely sales, real-estate, paper assets, gold and silver, and franchising. The good about all these are, they are creating passive income once you build it.

As a son of an high-educated teacher, it is Robert's passion to teach others. Robert will continue to reveal all those agenda and it is good for us to get some update from him at least we know where the traps are. The Unfair Advantage only will be officially announce on early November.

Budget 2011: What is your opinion?

Government just recently announced the budget of 2011. Those who on government side, as usual will give a damn good credit for the government and created terms like 'bajet untuk rakyat' or what-so-ever to praise the budget announced. And as predicted, the opposition will find 1000 reason why this budget is not cool and why people should think the budget is sucks.

As for me, whoever created the budget will have some pros and cons - we are all human maaa.... what matter is how you look the budget or in other words in which angle you position yourself to view the budget from. I personally thinks that I don't want to always be cynic and keep on condemn what ever had been announced, rather put myself as opportunist and gain the most out of the budget. After all, it already been announced.

I got lucky when our BDM asked me to review on the budget and see how it will benefit with the company's capacity. I personally read each lines of the speech text by YAB. You can always find it here.

Personal Opinion
1. 100 storey building
Urmm.. This create a lot of huha everywhere. The first question will be "we already have petronas twin tower. Why should be build another tower???" At first I thought it was a bad idea to spend RM5B for the building. But then, when I look back again, it was actually proposed by PNB CEO and already inside the megazine, newspaper a few years ago that the direction is to invest in property sector. It is claimed that even before the building start to build, they have managed to sold most of the space. If the demand was there, should we ignore the idea and focus on other thing? I think we should look deeper before we made a blind comment. While some people said, it is wasting "duit rakyat", these people did not read the news. PNB uses their own money (after more than 20 years operating) which is not even those unit trust (amanah saham) fund. Why don't you get a property nearby the location as the land value is expected to grow exponentially in these 5 years?


2. Handphones

This might be good for youngsters and tech savvy. Students will be the happiest people because of the most luxury gadget that they can afford to is more affordable now! Malaysian mobile penetration is actually already reached more than 100%, however, Singapore and Thailand has achieved more than 120% of penetration since 2007. Four reasons why people wants to use more than 1 handphone:
i. Privacy - people that wants to separate business and personal contact number. Most of the time, companies gives their employees a 'work' number only for business purpose.
ii. Reduce cost - either calling/SMS the same mobile operator or different plans. Perhaps some might have a prepaid and a postpaid plan. I was been using 2 phone and the other specifically for my broadband access.
iii. Network reliability (coverage sucks) - Some places only A operator got coverage, but some places only B operator covered.
iv. Technology factor - If I have access money, I would love to have all the smartphone platform and play around with all those functions. Wish I could have BlackBerry, iPhone, Android and Symbian in my hand.
You can name more reasons, but as we discussing about budget, it is more possible to suit on above reasons to buy new handphone. I personally tired with my Sony Ericsson always hang when I make a call.

3. R&D&C
R&D is good but without the C which is the commercialization part, it is useless. Commercial value of new invention is very much the main factor to make new innovation success. Just imagine motorola a huge company comes out with a superb technology of satellite phone. Under the company Iridium, they started the R&D in 1990. They have developed a 66 satellite of global telecommunication network and the technology was proven to work. However, they have failed to commercialize and the company has to declare bankrupt in 1999 as the billions of dollar spend in R&D ended up become a hi-tech crap.

MTDC will be organizing International Venture Capital Symposium for an international business matching to create more technological commercialization for high technology industry. Beside funds of RM100 million also will be given to MTDC as initial capital for commercialization.


4. Program latihan 1Malaysia. 
People saying this as wasting money. Why? They did thought RM500 million is wasted for the 1Malaysia concept. If you read the breakdown, it is non-other than a normal training budget for competency. The 1Malaysia theme is just to add spice for the budget. Being in training industry currently, I do think this is a good budget for us and it is an opportunity to tap on. All the western developed country, training is something very common. Why stop learnig after you gain your degree? In fact, you should learn more because degree graduate is almost everywhere today. And to stand outstanding, these training might help.

5. Housing loan 100% for less than RM3000 household income
This is a good news for those new graduates. They can afford to buy a new house and drag the installment as long as they could so that they pay a very minimum monthly payment without any installment. While this is good for these people, real-estate investors might not like the idea if they make money is from the rental for this target of people.

What good about this budget is, PM personally asked input from the peoples. Some opportunist will have asked for budget for whatever that will benefit them. While this is fairly open for all, a lot of people did not do so, and after the budget announce only they started to complain.
In my opinion, if you did not give any input, you should not complain. I personally feels that it is better to focus on which area can benefit me or my organization rather than condemning the negative side of the budget. As I mentioned earlier, after all, it was already been announced. You can take what ever opportunity for every new direction set and gain all the benefits immediately, or you can cast your vote only every 5 years, which will not guarantee you are in the majority group.

If you think there is a way, you'll find the way

I would like to share some of my experience about a week ago. My dad asked me to open up a HSBC savings account for some reason. As the nearest branch is at Puchong.Since the urgency to open the account is there, I skipped my lunch to open the account. Being wiser I made a phone call to HSBC to minimize all the potential problems. When I asked what do I need to bring along? she list down only 3 things:

   1. Identity Card (IC)
   2. RM20
   3. My signature (I need to bring my signature???)

On my way to Puchong, I did what I normally do, asking for the most strategic parking lot. After making 1 round of seeking for parking, I got a spot just a few steps from the main entrance of the bank (trust me, the law always worked for me to find parking, so you should do the same thing!)

The interesting story begins when I showed up my IC.
"Eh encik, alamat ni dekat Muar. Kita tak boleh proses ni. Nak kena ada utility bills untuk supporting document."
"Saya dah call center tadi, dia mintak IC dgn RM20 jek"
"Dorang kat call center tak tau.... Kena ada kalau tak saya tak boleh proceed."
As I remembered there is a takaful policy inside my car, "kalau saya bawak policy Takaful boleh."
"Aaaa... boleh..."

As I ran the fastest towards my car and showed the policy to the officer, "Alamak encik, ni dah outdated la. Kita pernah ada kes 2 bulan lepas punya utility bills pun central reject. Nak kena pakai yang latest."
"Takkan saya nak balik rumah. Rumah saya jauh. Dah la saya nak keluar dari ofis ni susah, nak kena mintak approval management untuk time-off! Can I see your manager?"

Sembang with the manager, end up the same thing. Even the branch manager could not help me on this. As I really want it soo very badly, my mind keep on searching everything around. Oh ya, I saw TM point at the other block just now. I paid my bills, asked them to print out my statement and company stamp etc. Finally, I managed to get the account open.

Upon receiving my card, when I tried to deposit my money at the machines. Luckily I remembered she never gave me my account number. How the hell am I going to asked people to bank-in money to this account if I don't know my account number. Luckily I got some vision on what will happened in the future, or else I need to make another trip to the branch just to ask for my account number.

Overall summary, I learn something today: If you think there is a way, you'll find the way!

MMU Cnergy Open House and Toastmasters Meeting

It is still in Syawal. Yes, even thought Eid al-fitr was awarded on the 1st day of Syawal, been in Malaysia, we have extended the celebration from 1 day to 1 month. Lately, the open house has became one of our culture and it is organized everywhere in the country. MMU Cnergy also took the opportunity of the final week of Syawal to organize the Open House.

The goal of organizing such event, besides filling our half-empty stomach, is to appreciate those who work with us and to strengthen silaturrahim among us. Besides, this is a very good opportunity for networking purpose. Ketupat, lemang rendang and satay was served on that day. Ketupat and rendang naturally you can only find during Raya season, but nowadays you can find at some stall in Jusco or some selected shopping mall. If you we're there during makan-makan, feel free to drop some comment below on the food. :)

Just a coincidence, the three of us is wearing the same colour theme of the day. Blue is my favourite, and this year complete with the yellowish-blue songket makes the dress looks more awesome. Azlysham and Sherliza  were also wearing the same colour. This picture was one of the greatest picture taken during that day. Besides the colour of the costume and our good looking faces, the height also growing diagonally. (Perhaps nobody notice I'm wearing my songkok senget). :)

The picture of myself with my boss, Mr. Shamsul with the background of MMU Cnergy and the CEO's office. Yes, we are all patrioffice (patriotic to the office) After 5 months working in MMU Cnergy, so many changes happens, including line of reporting. :) Hopefully it is still not late to congratulate him for the promotion.  You can see a cheerful face of Shamsul, but nobody notice how the things inside his mind on the job load and things need to settle. Even before the Open House, he stills in a discussion to settle down a few things.

Thanks to all the committee who makes things happened. I was glad to come and eat and laugh and make some fun. Being a Malaysian, we have abundance of food to eat and variety of choices. 

Toastmasters Meeting

Complete the Open House, my activity continues with the Toastmasters meeting. I have joined the meeting a few times, but only this time I have made to for my very first maiden speech. I am very lucky that the theme of the day is to put on the "Baju Melayu". Or else I will be the only person who's putting on Baju Melayu. The Ice Breaking speech requires me to talk about myself. So, I have drafted some points and talk about my interest. I have a very unique interest (I believe eveybody does) and I believe this is the best topic to talk about myself. The first experience of talking as a Toastmasters was a very pleasant. I have used to talk to infront of people but still a lot need to be improved. My greatest weakness I noticed since I was in secondary school was to say "aaaa..." "errmmm..." and so on and so forth. With the Toastmasters system, I wish I could at least reduce if not totally eliminate those kind of words. As the picture beside, I really feels that I look like a politician giving a speech on some political campaign. Do I?

The good thing about Toastmasters is I am surrounding with the very like minded people. As the organization is a non-profit, only those who volunteer will join the club and attend the meeting. In other words, only those who really feels that they need to improve on their self will attend such kind of meeting. This makes the environment very positive. Advantage of being a club at MMU, there are some international students joining the club. The good thing is, we get to share different essence of English pronounciation and different culture sharing. The picture speaks for itself, the costume in the middle is from Nigeria.

The best part of the meeting was, I was awarded as the Best Speaker. We have 3 awards on that day including Best Evaluator - won by Arif and Best Table Topic Speaker - won by a guess from Saudi, Abdul Moeen. Since this is my first time giving the speech, I receive another ribbon for the first speech. With all that recognition, it concludes the day as one of my best day of the year! If you wish to come over as a guest, feel free to contact me or visit http://mmutmc.blogspot.com/ for more info. (Log on and see more picture of me inside). :)