In the first class, we learned that a project has three factors:
clear spec, timing and budget.
I am impressed how similar this is to the "advice" from our ex-Chairman Mao.
When I was in elementary school long long ago, which was the end of culture revolution. There was a very very popular quote from Chairman Mao:
We must build our socialist country with "many", "fast", "good" and "cheap".
This 4 factors cover the 3 factors we learned in our first class.
Prof Tao told us these three factor are controdictory with each other. If you want cheap, you may sacrifice spec(good), and if you want "fast", you may also sacrifice "good", let alone "many".
It's very easy for a leader to say "many", "fast", "good" and "cheap", but it's very difficult for people to execute it.
In those days, if you doubt about these four factors, you have political issues, even "counter-revolutionary".
In China, if you say good word, even though it's not practical, people will still regard at least you have good purpose. But if you say anything sounds not "mainstream", even though it's practical, people will think you try to be lazy or be bad. Gradually people become so unrealistic, people even think they can make 10 thousand jing of rice with small land, and so on. And many people still use this philosophy to treat Chairman Mao's achievement and mistake.
People think Chairman made mistake with "good purporse". This is very different from western people. Result is more important than "purporse". It's very difficult to evaluate "purporse".
Monday, June 14, 2010
BUS528: My project
Project Name: EMU system design(Extended Memory Unit)
Goal: This project is a sub-project under the whole Kalos2 system project. Kalos2 is a flagship flash ROM tester in Credence systems Corp. EMU is used to provide LVM(logic vector meory), DBM(data bit memory) and ECM(error capturing memory).
The timeline is not very clear when I was adviced to start this project, but I have to finish it at the same pace when we finish Kalos system
The budget is also not very clear in the beginning, but later on this prove to be a big issue.
Now let me introduce a little bit about the background of the company and the project.
Credence Systems Corporation was setup around 1977 by some testing veterans. It has been quite successful until year 2000, and it become one of the major ATE company in the world.
Credence provide testing equipment for semiconductor industry, and it has the trademark cycle of semiconductor industry, further ATE industry has more significant cycle than normal semiconductor cycle, the reason is because equipment is very expensive, easily over $1M, so when economy is good, ATE company make a lot of money from each equipment sale, but if economy is bad, people can't afford new equipment, they just use or modify old one for new features.
In about 1994, Credence acquired a company called EPRO, which was a startup to design and manufacture Flash ROM tester. Flash ROM was a emerging star at that time, so the flash ROM tester looks very lucrative at that time. It seems a very good acquiration for Credence to take on EPRO.
The original EPRO product was name Kalos1, after the acquisization, a much more powerful kalos2 was planed
Goal: This project is a sub-project under the whole Kalos2 system project. Kalos2 is a flagship flash ROM tester in Credence systems Corp. EMU is used to provide LVM(logic vector meory), DBM(data bit memory) and ECM(error capturing memory).
The timeline is not very clear when I was adviced to start this project, but I have to finish it at the same pace when we finish Kalos system
The budget is also not very clear in the beginning, but later on this prove to be a big issue.
Now let me introduce a little bit about the background of the company and the project.
Credence Systems Corporation was setup around 1977 by some testing veterans. It has been quite successful until year 2000, and it become one of the major ATE company in the world.
Credence provide testing equipment for semiconductor industry, and it has the trademark cycle of semiconductor industry, further ATE industry has more significant cycle than normal semiconductor cycle, the reason is because equipment is very expensive, easily over $1M, so when economy is good, ATE company make a lot of money from each equipment sale, but if economy is bad, people can't afford new equipment, they just use or modify old one for new features.
In about 1994, Credence acquired a company called EPRO, which was a startup to design and manufacture Flash ROM tester. Flash ROM was a emerging star at that time, so the flash ROM tester looks very lucrative at that time. It seems a very good acquiration for Credence to take on EPRO.
The original EPRO product was name Kalos1, after the acquisization, a much more powerful kalos2 was planed
A trip to a fruit grower
Yesterday, I was invited to join a group of "Oversea alumni of Taiwan Normal University" to a trip to Ripon to do cherry picking.
In other years, we only went to Brentwood to do cherry picking, never think about go this far almost Modesto to do cherry picking. It turns out that even though Ripon is much farther, but because it's almost right off the freeway 99, it's more convenient to drive to Ripon than Brentwood.
The cherry trees are much better than those we visited in Brentwood, and there are a lot of white cherry together with black cherry. People know that white cherry is more expensive than black cherry in grocery store, so everyone was picking white cherry, seems all those black cherry will be wasted. I wonder whether we can sell it in farmers market to make a little profit.
The most important gain in this trip is we have chance to talk to the farm owner Charles and have an opportunity to understand a farmer's life.
Charles obviously have lived there for a long time. He has a lot of fruit fied. He grow cherry, grapes, almond, water melon and many others. But it's difficult to deal with those retailers. Every year less than 40% of cherry is taken by retailer, all those left over either wasted or picked by people like us.
He talked a lot about how he deals with retailors, it seems a quite difficult business.
Also a big topic is about whether pestcide should be used. Everybody is concern about pestcide, and Charles said he almost doesn't use pestcide at all. But in some year, if there is a lot of bug, he has to use, and he will choose least dangerous one. He mention his neighbor use a lot of pestcide.
Another topic is about labor used to pick up fruit. To reduce cost, Charles has to use new immigrant. So he support American allow "honest", "hardwarking" immigrant. Otherwise, Charles said, cherry will cost $8 per pound in grocery store, and this is actually a fact in some LA cities.
Also Charles looks very old alredy, he need to pass his business to his next generation. That's why his son Michale came back home. But it seems Michael doesn't like this business very much, but I can tell Michael is a very nice young man.
Sitting in his yard, we found another interesting thing. Even though I saw hummingbird feeder in Home Deport, Wal-Mart, and many places in the park, but I never really see hummingbird feed on it. And this time we saw two hummingbird drinking on the feeder. Charles use red color sugar water, and after many test, they finally found hummingbird like red color water better than other colors.
The more interesting story about the hummingbird is, as Michael said, when the sugar water runs out, hummingbird will knock their window glass to ask more, this sounds unbelievable!
This is a interesting trip, and I understand why we should do cherry picking, and the life of a farmer.
In other years, we only went to Brentwood to do cherry picking, never think about go this far almost Modesto to do cherry picking. It turns out that even though Ripon is much farther, but because it's almost right off the freeway 99, it's more convenient to drive to Ripon than Brentwood.
The cherry trees are much better than those we visited in Brentwood, and there are a lot of white cherry together with black cherry. People know that white cherry is more expensive than black cherry in grocery store, so everyone was picking white cherry, seems all those black cherry will be wasted. I wonder whether we can sell it in farmers market to make a little profit.
The most important gain in this trip is we have chance to talk to the farm owner Charles and have an opportunity to understand a farmer's life.
Charles obviously have lived there for a long time. He has a lot of fruit fied. He grow cherry, grapes, almond, water melon and many others. But it's difficult to deal with those retailers. Every year less than 40% of cherry is taken by retailer, all those left over either wasted or picked by people like us.
He talked a lot about how he deals with retailors, it seems a quite difficult business.
Also a big topic is about whether pestcide should be used. Everybody is concern about pestcide, and Charles said he almost doesn't use pestcide at all. But in some year, if there is a lot of bug, he has to use, and he will choose least dangerous one. He mention his neighbor use a lot of pestcide.
Another topic is about labor used to pick up fruit. To reduce cost, Charles has to use new immigrant. So he support American allow "honest", "hardwarking" immigrant. Otherwise, Charles said, cherry will cost $8 per pound in grocery store, and this is actually a fact in some LA cities.
Also Charles looks very old alredy, he need to pass his business to his next generation. That's why his son Michale came back home. But it seems Michael doesn't like this business very much, but I can tell Michael is a very nice young man.
Sitting in his yard, we found another interesting thing. Even though I saw hummingbird feeder in Home Deport, Wal-Mart, and many places in the park, but I never really see hummingbird feed on it. And this time we saw two hummingbird drinking on the feeder. Charles use red color sugar water, and after many test, they finally found hummingbird like red color water better than other colors.
The more interesting story about the hummingbird is, as Michael said, when the sugar water runs out, hummingbird will knock their window glass to ask more, this sounds unbelievable!
This is a interesting trip, and I understand why we should do cherry picking, and the life of a farmer.
BUS528-SU10 Why I want to study project management
I am Gerald, this is the second semester for me to study in Calmat.
This semester, originally I register four classes, BUS528: Project Management, BUS520: Organizational Behavior, BUS552: Accounting Financial and Managerial, and also Financial. After review all the class, finally I dropped the "Financial" class, because I think I need to spend more time than I expected to each class.
Project Management is highly related to my work. I have worked 15 years in semiconductor industry. I have personally manage several different project. One is called EMU project, which is to design a memory system to support a test equipment. This project requests me to design a memory controller chip, purchase different memory, such as DDR SDRAM, QDR SRAM and other component, design the PCB board and then debug and test. I have about five people under my command. This project really make me exhausted, and it teach me a big lesson. I made many mistakes, and some of them is remendable, some are not. Finally even though we finish this project, but it also cause many regret.
I was also involved in another project, which I am one of the major member of the chip design team. This project is finally also finished, but with a very long delay and high cost.
I wonder if I learn project management before, maybe I can handle my project better.
This semester, originally I register four classes, BUS528: Project Management, BUS520: Organizational Behavior, BUS552: Accounting Financial and Managerial, and also Financial. After review all the class, finally I dropped the "Financial" class, because I think I need to spend more time than I expected to each class.
Project Management is highly related to my work. I have worked 15 years in semiconductor industry. I have personally manage several different project. One is called EMU project, which is to design a memory system to support a test equipment. This project requests me to design a memory controller chip, purchase different memory, such as DDR SDRAM, QDR SRAM and other component, design the PCB board and then debug and test. I have about five people under my command. This project really make me exhausted, and it teach me a big lesson. I made many mistakes, and some of them is remendable, some are not. Finally even though we finish this project, but it also cause many regret.
I was also involved in another project, which I am one of the major member of the chip design team. This project is finally also finished, but with a very long delay and high cost.
I wonder if I learn project management before, maybe I can handle my project better.
Friday, May 14, 2010
BUS 600-SP10, Day 7 Operations
Operations seems boring to a MBA class. It's not like finance, which is so glamous, it seems we are playing with money.
Operation is like working in a factory, it seems boring, but still all the financial plans have to be implemented in firms.
Theory X, Theory Y and Theory Z have different view to human being, none of them can work at all time in all situations.
Operation is like working in a factory, it seems boring, but still all the financial plans have to be implemented in firms.
Theory X, Theory Y and Theory Z have different view to human being, none of them can work at all time in all situations.
BUS 600-SP10, Day 6: Finance
Finance is my favorite part of this book.
I learned the three kind of firms in US, which are Proprietorships, partnerships and Corporations. I understand they are difference in liability. Right now I have a Proprietorship firm, I plan to incorporate it in future.
As for investment, I learned how to use beta, probability distributions to quantitize risk. The CAPM give us a method to estimate the value of an investment.
I am amazed about this risk factor.
This remind me a lesson I learned in the financial crisis. In year 2008, I read a book called "how to make money by selling put option". It seems selling put option is a very easy money. The author list how he made money by selling put option. According to the author, when you sell option, you will gain in three situation, if the market go up, stay flat and go down but not too much. You only lose money when the market goes down too much.
I was so excited, I put $100k account into this venture. I sold many put option. One example shows my logic. Due to the bearish view of wall steet, stock has been down from October of 2007. Until the middle of year 2008, many stock already dropped a lot. MGM is one of them. I am very confident about MGM, because I know half of the Las Vegas belong to MGM, and its capital size drop to only $5B. When MGM dropped to $47 from $100, I sold put option at $30. And this lead me to the journey to the hell. Whenever MGM drop, I said it's manipulation, and I hold it. Guess what, this stock all the way dropped to $3!
Same thing happen in other stock which I sold put option, such as STP, LVS, OIH, and even INTC.
I got numerous margin call, and finally my whole account was wiped out.
What's wrong here? Because I don't know the risk factor!
If I came to study in Calmat earlier, I can save the $100k!
Now I fully understand the put selling is so called naked put. As what my friends told me, selling naked put is like operating an insurance company for stock market. In normal case, you make money by collecting premium. But whenever disaster hit, you will pay back all your premius and end up with big loss. No insurance company will insure your stock, that's the reason.
Last week, a stock with a symbol ITMN dropped from $45 to $10 in one day after FDA rejected their medicine application. I saw a guy in message board said he lose $70k in one day due to selling naked put of $20. The $1 option at $20 level is very attractive, but actually that is because market make already consider the high risk.
I learned the three kind of firms in US, which are Proprietorships, partnerships and Corporations. I understand they are difference in liability. Right now I have a Proprietorship firm, I plan to incorporate it in future.
As for investment, I learned how to use beta, probability distributions to quantitize risk. The CAPM give us a method to estimate the value of an investment.
I am amazed about this risk factor.
This remind me a lesson I learned in the financial crisis. In year 2008, I read a book called "how to make money by selling put option". It seems selling put option is a very easy money. The author list how he made money by selling put option. According to the author, when you sell option, you will gain in three situation, if the market go up, stay flat and go down but not too much. You only lose money when the market goes down too much.
I was so excited, I put $100k account into this venture. I sold many put option. One example shows my logic. Due to the bearish view of wall steet, stock has been down from October of 2007. Until the middle of year 2008, many stock already dropped a lot. MGM is one of them. I am very confident about MGM, because I know half of the Las Vegas belong to MGM, and its capital size drop to only $5B. When MGM dropped to $47 from $100, I sold put option at $30. And this lead me to the journey to the hell. Whenever MGM drop, I said it's manipulation, and I hold it. Guess what, this stock all the way dropped to $3!
Same thing happen in other stock which I sold put option, such as STP, LVS, OIH, and even INTC.
I got numerous margin call, and finally my whole account was wiped out.
What's wrong here? Because I don't know the risk factor!
If I came to study in Calmat earlier, I can save the $100k!
Now I fully understand the put selling is so called naked put. As what my friends told me, selling naked put is like operating an insurance company for stock market. In normal case, you make money by collecting premium. But whenever disaster hit, you will pay back all your premius and end up with big loss. No insurance company will insure your stock, that's the reason.
Last week, a stock with a symbol ITMN dropped from $45 to $10 in one day after FDA rejected their medicine application. I saw a guy in message board said he lose $70k in one day due to selling naked put of $20. The $1 option at $20 level is very attractive, but actually that is because market make already consider the high risk.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
BUS 600-SP10, Day 4: Organizational behavior
Organizational behavior sounds like a social science.
The main problem for operation is:
Capacity: How much can I produce?
Scheduling: How am I going to do it?
Inventory: How much inventory is there and how can I reduce it?
Standards: What do I consider efficient production and quality output?
Control: Is the production process working?
The main problem for operation is:
Capacity: How much can I produce?
Scheduling: How am I going to do it?
Inventory: How much inventory is there and how can I reduce it?
Standards: What do I consider efficient production and quality output?
Control: Is the production process working?
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