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Homage to My People
by admin | Feb 4, 2015 | Africa, Articles, Poetry | 0 comments
These poems, essays and stories thus represent my effort to think more clearly,
to work out problems; they constitute "my momentary stay against confusion,"
my effort to attend to the interior life
Poems and Essays
By Rose Ure Mezu
Thinking is the activity I love best, and writing is simply thinking through my fingers.
– – Isaac Asimov
Without knowing the force of words, it is impossible to know men.
For my people … tied and shackled and tangled among ourselves by the unseen creatures who tower over us omnisciently and laugh . . . For my people standing staring trying to fashion a better way from confusion from hypocrisy and misunderstanding . . . Let a new earth rise. Let another world be born Let a . . . generation full of courage issue forth let a people loving freedom come to growth. . . Let the dirges disappear. Let a race of men now rise and take control!
— Margaret Walker
This second collection of poems, essays and stories represents a more deliberate attempt at poetic and esthetic experimentation. For a long time after Songs of the Hearth (1993), I sincerely believed that I would not be able to write any more poetry. I felt that within that first volume is contained every possible range of emotions, desires, prayers and so on. I thought I had written my heart out. At appropriate moments, I would look up the particular poem to suit the need of the present and read it over again.
It was therefore with great surprise that I found myself beginning once again to scribble down (sometimes on any available scrap of paper) thoughts, emotions, needs and questions as they would occur to me. Whenever the inspiring thought flashed through my mind (sometimes even while driving), I would pull up by the roadside and scribble; I would sleep and wake up and scribble feverishly because experience has thought me that if I do not, I would forget the particular inspiration. Thus, I had learnt to trust my intuitions and dreams that much.
In essence, I now know that I have to, and must continually write because human beings are not static and neither are their thoughts. People grow daily in their thoughts, and in the emotions they feel as they go through different life experiences. My earlier feelings on issues, or even my perception of the same people would in time change. This is the dynamic process of organic growth which is continual. Change is thus the only constant there is.
These poems, essays and stories thus represent my effort to think more clearly, to work out problems; they constitute "my momentary stay against confusion," my effort to attend to the interior life, to explore new feelings and to gauge the quality of both old and new experiences. I accept now what I have always known – that writing for me is a continuing act of survival. It is as indispensable as sleep or fresh air. Without writing, life would become cluttered and dreams would remain hazy.
Consequently, many of the poems serve as a gauge of the growth of my philosophical, political and spiritual life. "Thinking through my fingers," I can keep track of the various stages of my growth as a thinking person, the different kinds of challenges that daily confront both me and the people I know and love, and how these challenges are met and overcome.
I mention dreams as a vibrant source of inspiration because I have from experience learnt to decode my dreams sufficiently to recognize a foreshadowing of some probable future events, to listen to an internal alarm system quickening me to intensify prayer as a means to forestall imminent calamity. Another source of prescience perhaps more vital is my intuitive feeling. For me Intuition means an inner knowingness that comes from the spiritual depth of me that connects me with the wisdom of God and which I rate higher than the rational mind. It represents the voice of the spirit ever gently but insistently helping me in crises, urging me to avoid dangers or to take risks or to renew, stretch and re-invent the Self.
Susan L. Taylor, Essence editor-in-chief and a kindred spirit sums up intuition as "the synthesis of heart, mind and soul working to expand awareness and understanding." Intuition is an inner knowing that links me to the wisdom of God. A moment in my life when I failed to heed the urging of that inner warning not to travel and nearly perished in an aborted air-crash decided me to pay close attention to this hidden but vibrant part of Me. Some of the poems therefore testify to the activities of this inner monitoring agency – my intuition.
As earlier mentioned, this collection contains a deliberate effort to construct thought-concepts and to experiment with word usage. The essays are an elaboration in prose of concepts, themes, beliefs already dealt with in poetic form. Conversely, some of the poems synthesize more tightly thoughts verbalized in prose. This exercise has afforded me immense pleasure as I see myself struggling to find just the right words, to turn ideas into just the right phrase, to write and to rewrite, to formulate the more appropriate ideological or philosophical conviction. The crafting and the search for appropriate words prompt me towards a better appreciation of T.S. Eliot's concern for the "integrity" of language — the pains of its crafting. In "Four Quartets" for instance, T. S. Eliot paints the agony and the ecstasy involved in crafting just the right word — the pain of turning words into just the right phrase or sentence:
Trying to learn to use words, and every attempt Is a whole new start and a different kind of failure Because one has only learnt to get the better of words For the things one no longer has to say, or the way in which One is no longer disposed to say it……. And every phrase And sentence that is right (every word is at home, Taking its place to support the others, The word neither diffident nor ostentatious, An easy commerce of the old and the new, The common word exact without vulgarity, The formal word precise but not pedantic The complete consort dancing together) Every phrase and every sentence is an end and a beginning every poem an epitaph
(Four Quartets in Bergonzi 33).
This search for the integrity — 'magic' — of language becomes la force inspiratrice for these poems.
Even more personally significant, this search is indeed a quest to rediscover, deepen and renew with "the force" of words what it is I believe in about my family, my culture, my race, my spirituality and my Faith. Faith is of cardinal importance in any spiritual life. As many before me discovered, Faith is a precious but very fragile gem that must be guarded carefully lest it be lost in a beach of gleaming pebbles. Like a plant, faith has to be watered and nurtured constantly, nay, minute by minute or one faces the risk of seeing it ossify and die off.
The alternative to a life of faith is spiritual and moral if not physical decay and death. The daily events that happen to us continually confront and test the quality of this faith and at times seem to want to overwhelm and crush it. I find that faith is about Love or Trust – that has to be affirmed and reaffirmed and treasured. Faith represents the building blocks with which to construct that one edifice of Love that towers above all others.
The poems on Faith epitomize my struggle to recapture, deepen and hold on to this gift. These poems seek to capture my struggle even when I fall, to not give in to despair but to summon up a cheerful determination to rise above fear, and to take that one step that will re-energize me on the march of life; it is a faith that gently explains courage as being not the absence of fear but right and constant action despite fear; it is a faith that finally urges an absolute trust needed to flow with the tide of life, believing that by God's grace, joy and relief are around the corner.
It is for these reasons that the short story "The View from Above – Resurrection" holds a particular appeal for in it are subsumed the core principles that have guided my life. The construction of the story helped to clarify and synthesize themes that run like a thread through many of the poems as well as philosophical concepts that have haunted me for a number of years – such concepts as life and death, God and the After-life, my Catholic Faith and the place of the human Self in the cosmic scheme of things. Its writing still excites me because it is a fictional exercise which enabled me to experiment with plot, dialogue and above all Surprise as a narrative trope.
Family has always been an indispensable base of operation. Children, husband, parents, relatives, friends, country and people of the world make up our universe and without these, there is no world, no life. Several poems speak of the pain of separation, homesickness, unspeakable anguish at the prospect of near-total loss, gratitude to Almighty God for the miracle of survival, a daily invocation of vigilant angel guards for constant protection. The spiritual poems include also my homage to that holy man of prayers, Pope John Paul II, an inspiring model for all the aged and all sufferers of illnesses as, stooped with years, constantly in pain, he soldiers on for Christ, courageously, despite criticisms, performing his official duties.
My family home, Akwuosa represents a haven always. In the essay and poems that speak of this abode of love, Akwuosa assumes a human character because I feel for this hallowed space in which I raised my children as I would feel for a loved and absent family member. Anyone familiar with the kind of love Russians feel for their native soil will understand my homesickness at being away from Akwuosa.
Politics and the state of the nation both in the United States of America and in Nigeria — two countries that are both home to me — equally preoccupy my waking thoughts. Problems infesting the world — especially these two countries — in form of devastating wars, all forms of social injustice, increasing juvenile violence, the importance of the Vote in the democratic process, the threatening extinction of the traditional Family structure as we know it. Also, poverty and global racism receive their share of attention. Equally important is my love / concern for the African race, for a needed understanding and an ideological if not geographical rapprochement among peoples of African descent.
The misconception, the distrust and at times the cultural discrimination that exist amongst Blacks are explored and it is my hope as we struggle to teach, write, lecture and interact with one another that in time Black people will re-discover what earlier Black nationalists knew and suffered for: that the fate of all Black peoples is inextricably linked irrespective of geographical location and cultural specificity. La lutta continua and this verbalized poetic effort to keep peoples of African descent together remains my individual contribution to the ongoing struggle for an equitable and dignified existence. This Black Nationalist Ideal also informed the Conferences and the Writers' Forum I founded and organized at Morgan State University known as Writers of African Descent Speak on Black Creativity and the State of the Race (1996 – 99).
In the end, every piece of writing boils down to Character or who we are as persons. The English novelist and poet, Thomas Hardy believed that character is fate. Any lover of his novels, be it The Mayor of Casterbridge, Tess of D'Urbervilles, Jude the Obscure or Far From the Madding Crowd, et al, will easily agree to the truth of his assertion that character is fate. And writing is the one tool that enables us to dig and delve into the deepest recesses of our very being to drag out the reality of who we are, the stuff of which we are made (character). Writing as a thinking activity enables us, to clear the forest of impediments, to resolve confusion and frustrations that cloud our sojourn in this life; writing empowers us to crystallize our personal qualities and show how our character has determined our actions and therefore our fate.
Some of the poems thus represent the steps of my growth and the nectar and ambrosia of success at achieving things which I hitherto believed I could not do. Those are my motivational poems of which the creation reassured me that nothing is ever impossible. Their composition convinced me of the truth that one succeeds at anything to the degree that one believes that the specific endeavor is worthwhile and achievable. As the cliché goes, "nothing ventured, nothing gained!" This belief is woven like a delicate thread through the fabric of these poems.
All of these endeavors culminate in the expression of Me as a Woman, as a Black woman and as a black African woman. These different aspects of Me have become a limitless quarry of scriptive materials helping me to achieve authenticity, subjectivity and transcendence. Given the historic devaluation of the woman and even more pertinent, the global denigration and marginalization of the Black (African) woman, writing empowers me to courageously and without apology listen inwardly and define my essence as a thinking woman. The ability to wield words emboldens me to brazenly verbalize and give utterance to my thoughts and feelings as possessing intrinsic beauty and worth. Manipulating ideas enlivens me to affirm the grace and magic of writing as a boon from a higher Divinity. Writing represents the Truth as I see it, no one else's but my own Truth, my own philosophy and my own vision du monde, so to say.
Evidently then, this collection has a lot to do with Words: the construction, the use, the beauty of words. As expressed in the opening lines of the essay "The Power of the Word (Nommo) and Social Change," words have a life and a power all of their own, in themselves and over all else. Words have infinitely more power than the physical brains that conceive them. Words cause things to become; they give life. New Testament Christian theologos by declaring that "[i]n principio erat Verbum, et Verbum est cum Deus, et Verbum est Deus — In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" – expands even further the potent force of the "Word [which] became flesh and dwelt among us" (The Gospel according to St. John).
Similarly, African traditional folklogos reinforces the New Testament Christian theologos that life can be said to also spring from the thunderous potency of "Words" — a fact that is made clear in the excerpt of a Wapangwa Creation myth from Tanzania quoted below:
The sky was large, white and very clear. It was empty; there were no stars and no moon; only a tree stood in the air, and there was no wind. This tree fed on atmosphere, and ants lived on it. Wind, tree, ants and atmosphere were controlled by the power of the word. But the word was not something that could be seen. It was a force that enabled one thing to create another.
Since "the power of the word . . . was not something that could be seen . . . [but] a force that enabled one thing to create another," to command with words is indeed to practice "magic" so to say. To practice "word magic" is literally and figuratively to write poetry. Who then has more power to change negative realities, to effect social change for the betterment of the world than the writer, the poet who is griot or wordsmith creating and empowering with words, erecting verbalized edifices of peace and harmony with the building blocks of words, causing change to become with words expressed as ideas which in turn move the hearts of people and transform the world. In the final analysis, writing is all about the authentic Self.
To the degree that one writes effectively, writing becomes an exercise not only in Self-discovery, but in Self-affirmation, validation and transcendence.
Tenderly, using words, I pay this homage of love to my people and to all peoples of our universe. And to you, Reader; come and journey with me on this odyssey of search and discovery, renewal and affirmation, validation and final triumph over limitations. At our journey's end, may You, I pray, find in this collection, the force and magic of the written word, discover the authenticity of Self and the joy of Faith recaptured!
Dr. Rose Ure Mezu, April 2001
What is in Time?
Close your eyes Open your eyes Behold what was not Become what is
Dark night gives way to sun rays Rain clouds yield to rainbows Dreams for which the heart pined Become the concrete Present
And so I ask, What is in Time?
Now is the present moment Now is the time of Becoming All that we're capable of being.
Yesterday is past, dead and gone And with it all the ills we've done. All unfulfilled plans merely seem Like memories of what could've been.
Tomorrow is pregnant with dreams unborn The future is a pot of Hopes yet unboiled – Dim visions only capable of Becoming.
But Now is the Real Moment To be all that we really can Building on the failures of Yesterday Buoyed by dreamed visions of Tomorrow All capable of becoming because of Now
For Now is the Only Time we have To make dreams be concrete action Now can seize Tomorrow by its horn Now can arise and make the Moment be:
More than memories of Yesterday Or dreamed visions of Tomorrow Now becomes the Best This Now can ever Be!
Source: Rose Ure Mezu. Homage to My People. Baltimore: Black Academy Press, Inc., 2004.
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#1 – Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable #2 – Confessions of a Video Vixen by Karrine Steffans #3 – Dear G-Spot: Straight Talk About Sex and Love by Zane #4 – Letters to a Young Brother: MANifest Your Destiny by Hill Harper #5 – Peace from Broken Pieces: How to Get Through What You're Going Through by Iyanla Vanzant #6 – Selected Writings and Speeches of Marcus Garvey by Marcus Garvey #7 – The Ebony Cookbook: A Date with a Dish by Freda DeKnight #8 – The Isis Papers: The Keys to the Colors by Frances Cress Welsing #9 – The Mis-Education of the Negro by Carter Godwin Woodson
#10 – John Henrik Clarke and the Power of Africana History by Ahati N. N. Toure
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#12 –The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander
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#17 – Brainwashed: Challenging the Myth of Black Inferiority by Tom Burrell
#18 – A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose by Eckhart Tolle
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Reawakening American Virtue and Prosperity
By Jeffrey D. Sachs
The Price of Civilization is a book that is essential reading for every American. In a forceful, impassioned, and personal voice, he offers not only a searing and incisive diagnosis of our country's economic ills but also an urgent call for Americans to restore the virtues of fairness, honesty, and foresight as the foundations of national prosperity. Sachs finds that both political parties—and many leading economists—have missed the big picture, offering shortsighted solutions such as stimulus spending or tax cuts to address complex economic problems that require deeper solutions. Sachs argues that we have profoundly underestimated globalization's long-term effects on our country, which create deep and largely unmet challenges with regard to jobs, incomes, poverty, and the environment. America's single biggest economic failure, Sachs argues, is its inability to come to grips with the new global economic realities. Sachs describes a political system that has lost its ethical moorings, in which ever-rising campaign contributions and lobbying outlays overpower the voice of the citizenry. . . . Sachs offers a plan to turn the crisis around. He argues persuasively that the problem is not America's abiding values, which remain generous and pragmatic, but the ease with which political spin and consumerism run circles around those values. He bids the reader to reclaim the virtues of good citizenship and mindfulness toward the economy and one another.
Sex at the Margins
Migration, Labour Markets and the Rescue Industry
By Laura María Agustín
This book explodes several myths: that selling sex is completely different from any other kind of work, that migrants who sell sex are passive victims and that the multitude of people out to save them are without self-interest. Laura Agustín makes a passionate case against these stereotypes, arguing that the label 'trafficked' does not accurately describe migrants' lives and that the 'rescue industry' serves to disempower them. Based on extensive research amongst both migrants who sell sex and social helpers, Sex at the Margins provides a radically different analysis. Frequently, says Agustin, migrants make rational choices to travel and work in the sex industry, and although they are treated like a marginalised group they form part of the dynamic global economy. Both powerful and controversial, this book is essential reading for all those who want to understand the increasingly important relationship between sex markets, migration and the desire for social justice. "Sex at the Margins rips apart distinctions between migrants, service work and sexual labour and reveals the utter complexity of the contemporary sex industry. This book is set to be a trailblazer in the study of sexuality."—Lisa Adkins, University of London
The White Masters of the World
From The World and Africa, 1965
By W. E. B. Du Bois
W. E. B. Du Bois' Arraignment and Indictment of White Civilization (Fletcher)
Ancient African Nations
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Negro Digest / Black World
1950 1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 ____ 2005
The Death of Emmett Till by Bob Dylan / The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll / Only a Pawn in Their Game
Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson Thanks America for Slavery /
George Jackson / Hurricane Carter
The Journal of Negro History issues at Project Gutenberg
The Haitian Declaration of Independence 1804 / January 1, 1804 — The Founding of Haiti
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Publishers of the Black World
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Educating our Children (13)
Education & History (35)
Films & Reviews (18)
Inside the Caribbean (21)
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Continuing expanding their customer base across the country, Ricoh India Limited recently marked their effective presence in eastern India, with inauguration of Ricoh Pro C751EX colour digital printer at Spectrum Artcomm Pvt Ltd in Kolkata; live demonstration of Ricoh Pro C751EX, Ricoh Pro 1107EX, and Ricoh Aficio MP W2401 in an open house event at a hotel in the city; and receiving another order for Ricoh Pro C751EX from Innovations, Kohima (Nagaland). Ricoh Pro C751EX provides print speed of 75ppm, with resolutions	up to 1,200 x 4,800 dpi.
Spectrum Artcomm Pvt Ltd is the first company from this region, who installed Ricoh Pro C751EX printer, which was inaugurated by Tetsuya Takano, managing director & CEO, Ricoh India Limited, accompanied by Avijit Mukherjee, chief operating officer and Anjana Saha, marketing manager, production printing business group, Ricoh India. Established in the year of 1997, Spectrum has now emerged as a full fledged designing and print provider agency, serving around 50-60 clients, including educational institutes, real estate developers, etc. "We never lost a single client during the last fifteen years of our operation providing efficient services to all our customers," claims Mridul Kotriwal, managing director of Spectrum, who was engaged in exports business prior to printing business.
Meanwhile, Ricoh India also organized an open house at a hotel in Kolkata for presenting live demonstrations of their three printing machines – Ricoh Pro C751EX, Ricoh Pro 1107EX, and Ricoh Aficio MP W2401, in the presence of a good number of invitees, including well known industry personalities, printing press owners from Kolkata and eastern India.
On the occasion, Tetsuya Takano also gave brief of Ricoh's operations in India and worldwide. Founded in the year 1936 with headquarter in Tokyo (Japan), Ricoh today is featured among the prestigious Fortune Global 500 corporations. Its business spans 150 countries with 1,08,500 employees including 18,000 highly qualified service engineers worldwide. With Ricoh (73.6 percent) and public (24.4 percent) partnership, Ricoh India Limited was founded in the year 1993, while Ricoh production printing in India started in Sep 2010. With its national head office in New Delhi, Ricoh India continue spreading their operations in the country, having 21 offices across the nation, and a staff of 800 individuals. National logistic centers with a full fledged back up support – after sales services to their clients – service engineers, smooth supply of spare parts and peripherals, always enable them to perform better.
As per Avijit Mukherjee and Anjana Saha, "We are expecting to have ten installations of colour digital printers in eastern India by end of this financial year, reaching close to fifty installations across India within a year." During this event, Jonathan Doulo of Innovations, Kohima (Nagaland) also confirmed the booking of Ricoh Pro C751EX colour digital printer.


With a stay at Gakyil in Thimphu, you'll be a 4-minute walk from Clock Tower Square and 7 minutes by foot from Coronation Park. Featured amenities include complimentary newspapers in the lobby, dry cleaning/laundry services, and a 24-hour front desk. A roundtrip airport shuttle is provided for a surcharge (available on request), and free self parking is available onsite.


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Hosted CRM Cost Analysis
Responding to Siebel's entrance into the hosted CRM market, META Group released a META Practice report earlier this month called "Hosted CRM: A Great Debate or Much Ado About Nothing?" The report, written by Steve Bonadio, an analyst at META Group, focuses on whether a hosted-CRM solution is tenable for companies. The bottom line, according to the report, is that "enterprises must not be swayed into choosing a hosted-CRM solution based on market hype or perceptions of it being less expensive. Several factors--including application best fit, growth, and migration; IT maturity and constraints; and cost of ownership must be explored prior to making a deployment decision," Bonadio stated in the report. The report shows a chart comparing the cost of a hosted solution versus the cost of a licensed solution over a five-year period. A hosted solution, the chart shows, will cost roughly $650,000 per year for 300 users; an on-premise solution will run close to $1 million for the same amount of users for the first year. However, over five years the chart shows the hosting solution totaling roughly $2.4 million, creeping past the on-premise solution at around $2.2 million over the same time frame. This includes an upgrade of the on-premise solution after the fourth year. Zach Nelson, president and CEO of NetSuite, one of the companies mentioned in the report, says the numbers don't add up. META Group's calculations, Nelson says, are too vague, citing the research underestimates the customization, maintenance, and salary costs associated with on-premise solutions. "The cost analysis takes into account customization, maintenance, and salary costs associated with on-premise solutions," Bonadio says. "In fact, the assumptions listed under the cost analysis chart clearly reveal maintenance and salary costs details (18 percent annually and three FTEs, respectively, for on-premises implementation). The model also takes into account customization/configuration costs for both hosted and on-premises." Traditionally, companies like NetSuite don't compete for 300 seats. The report acknowledges that while Salesforce.com has already landed some 1,000-plus-seat implementations, hosted solutions were initially designed for small and medium businesses. If, after five years, a 300-seat implementation is comparable in price to an on-premise solution, then it stands to reason that a hosted solution would be less expensive for companies implementing fewer than 300 seats. Bonadio disagrees. "Even if we halve the number of seats to 150, the model still holds water," he says. "Additionally, I ran several scenarios, even going down to 30 seats, with very similar results throughout." Another point of contention, Nelson states, is the definition of hosted. He maintains that companies like PeopleSoft and Siebel have single-tenant architectures, meaning one server is used per customer company. In a true hosted environment, he says, there exists a multitenant architecture where many companies share one server, effectively lowering the TCO by sharing the costs of hardware, backup, maintenance, application upgrade costs with other companies.
Megatrends in Customer Experience: Near-Term Adjustments and Long-Term Structural Changes
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Description: These are big burly trails in the vicinity of the Mission Ridge Ski & Board Resort in central Washington state. The GranDuro mountain bike race on June 25, 2016, features a big 47-mile loop — perfect for your favorite all-around bike — with a total elevation gain of 9,000 feet. Trails to be utilized include Pipeline, Beehive, Devil's Spur, Mission Ridge, Devil's Gulch and Red Devil. The trail run on June 25 is 15 miles long and over beautiful high mountain single-track trails, including Pipeline, Mission Ridge, Devil's Spur.
As for GrandDuro, organizers say they've ridden every type of mountain bike on these trails and wouldn't pass up any chance to ride this loop no matter which bike option they had. The intent is to offer the best combination of trails, vistas and terrain for the ultimate ride and/or run.
The field limit for both the bike race and trail run is 200 participants each.
Views and features: You are in the North Cascades — 'nuff said. Well, actually there is more to say: In mid-June, the area is full of wildflowers and greenness. Temperatures are typically in the 40s and 50s in the morning, climbing into the high-60s and 70s by mid-afternoon.
Premiums: Commemorative t-shirt for those who register by May 17 (note: pre-registration required for the event), finishers awards, post-ride meal, special awards for the fast folks and quite possibly the slow folks and even some folks in between.
Start time: 9 a.m. for the bike race; 9 a.m. for the trail run.
Essentials: Several aid stations will be located along the courses.
Stewardship: Leave no trace. Be kind to our beautiful mountain environment and clean up after yourself. Please don't abandon trash.


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Energy Solutions - Heat Recovery
Steam management brings major savings in condensate recovery
Steam is a major utility and, as Sean Ottewell reports, its proper management is bringing substantial savings to users.
With oil and gas prices remaining unpredictable, controlling the cost of the energy used during processing is especially challenging. Rising energy prices can quickly eat into the cost base of any process, damaging profitability and competitiveness. As a major utility supplying many processing applications, steam is a highly effective heating medium and many companies have invested in improving their steam system efficiency over the years. One area of focus has been condensate recovery. Energy from condensate is widely used to pre-heat boiler feed water, lowering fuel costs and increasing boiler efficiency. In fact, each 6°C temperature boost achieved by condensate recovery will knock one percent off a typical boiler energy bill.
However, some condensate recovery systems are so effective that too much energy is sometimes captured. With the boiler feed tank running at atmospheric pressure feedwater is usually maintained at just 85°C or 90°C. Higher temperatures risk cavitation in the boiler feed pump, causing significant damage. This places a natural limit on the amount of heat that can be injected into the feed tank. For some plants this can mean that all the recovered heat from condensate cannot be used and often the only option is to let it drain away.
An innovative heat recovery system from Spirax Sarco solves this problem by creating a completely sealed steam system and transferring the heat from the flash steam and recovered condensate into the high pressure side of the boiler feed pumps. The water entering the boiler can be raised to well above 100°C without causing pump cavitation.
The benefit is a significant lowering of steam-raising costs and an increase in boiler efficiency. The Spirax Sarco flash recovery energy management equipment (FREME) system also recycles all water through the system, reducing water and chemical treatment costs.
With concerns about rising energy costs Abbey Corrugated, the UK's leading corrugated board sheet feeder, commissioned Spirax Sarco to project manage the installation of a FREME system as part of its energy saving campaign.
Before the project, water entered the boiler at around 68 or 70°C. It now arrives at between 138 and 142°C, according to facilities manager Paul Gale: "There was a lot of work going on at the time, but it's fair to say that the savings from this project were in the region of 25 per cent of the gas used by the boiler."
The FREME system passes condensate from the steam distribution system through a flash steam separation vessel. The separate flash steam and condensate streams each travel through a dedicated plate heat exchanger, where they heat the pressurised feed water before it enters the boiler. The two returning streams are then recombined and sent back to the boiler feed tank. At this point the combined stream is sub-cooled, so it is sufficiently warm to begin heating the cold feed but not hot enough to cause cavitation in the feed pump.
A great advantage of the FREME system is that it can be supplied as a pre-engineered, skid-mounted system, taking the stress out of designing, specifying, building and installing steam, hot water and other systems (Fig.1). Buying a complete package from a single supplier also ensures that all the components will be perfectly matched. This results in a system that is more efficient, reliable and accurate. And with less work to do on-site, the installation process is simpler, safer and speedier.
It is a similar story at Smurfit Kappa UK's corrugated board factory in Weston-Super-Mare, England, where steam system improvements delivered by Spirax Sarco have cut boiler fuel costs by 21 per cent.
Recycling condensate and flash steam back to the boiler has also halved the amount of water treatment chemicals needed and reduced the site's water bill by between EUR334 and EUR445 a month. The biggest single contributor to this success is a FREME system. The project also included improved temperature controls for the Smurfit Kappa's process steam and the installation of automatic pump traps to clear condensate from key items of plant reliably, even if the traps sometimes have to work against significant back pressure.
According to Andy Bale, Smurfit Kappa's engineering manager, the project was part of a wider initiative to save energy at the factory: "We are working with the Carbon Trust to improve the energy management in a number of different areas, including compressors, steam and electrical equipment. Spirax Sarco was very professional and managed the whole process for the steam system while keeping me up to date with every single detail. We're very pleased with the results."
The new FREME system was supplied as a prefabricated, skid-mounted rig, comprising a flash separation vessel and two plate heat exchangers. Pressurised condensate from the production process enters the separator where it splits into separate streams of condensate and flash steam. Each stream passes through a separate heat exchanger, where it heats the boiler feedwater. The two streams are then recombined and sent back to the boiler feedtank.
Crucially, FREME systems are typically positioned downstream of the boiler feed pump. This allows feedwater temperatures to be elevated well above 100°C, without pump cavitation. In the case of Smurfit Kappa, this has enabled the company to have heated feedwater entering the boiler at 130 and 140°C, rather than the 85 or 90°C that was previously possible.
On 3rd November, FREME technology won the energy category at the prestigious annual Institution of Chemical Engineers' awards event which rewards excellence and innovation in chemical engineering.
Steam traps and calorifiers too
Steam trap management is another important way of saving energy. Heinz expects to cut more than four percent from its energy consumption over the next three years at its Wigan factory in Northern England after signing up for a steam trap management contract with Spirax Sarco. The decision to opt for the new contract followed great success with a previous, one-off steam trap survey, which saved enough energy and treated water to pay for itself in less than nine months.
The Heinz factory in Wigan is the largest food factory in Europe. The 55-acre site produces canned soups, baked beans, pasta and puddings for the UK and European market, and its on-site energy centre generates up to 140 tonnes of steam per hour to keep the canning lines running.
Under the new deal, Spirax Sarco engineers will survey the site every six months, highlighting any traps that need maintenance from teams at Heinz. Spirax Sarco specialists will spend around ten days on site each year, checking, tagging and recording the condition of each steam trap.
"When Spirax Sarco carried out the original survey they put in a conservative estimate of savings and we ended up saving much more," says Barry Aspey, the utilities manager for Heinz. "That helped us decide to opt for the three-year contract. If the new savings estimates are correct, the contract offers excellent value for money and should help us reduce our carbon emissions by 200tonnes a year."
Catalent Pharma Solutions is also reaping the rewards, thanks to its decision to swap old shell-and-tube calorifiers for compact Spirax Sarco EasiHeat steam-to-hot water systems. Spirax Sarco calculated that Catalent could save EUR7200 a year in energy costs by replacing a single 540kW calorifier with an EasiHeat.
Catalent has been gradually replacing its old heat exchangers over that past five years, and now has nine EasiHeat systems in place. The biggest saving for Catalent is in downtime and maintenance costs, according to engineering manager Arthur Burnett: "The main thing is that we now have no summer shutdown, when it used to take two weeks. Also, we can look after the heat exchangers with one utility engineer instead of four, so it frees up time for our maintenance team. Previously, there was so much work involved with the calorifiers that we sometimes had to bring in contractors to service them, which was obviously another expense."
Shell-and-tube heat exchangers are pressure vessels and must therefore be dismantled annually for an insurance inspection. EasiHeat systems instead rely on stainless steel plate heat exchangers (PHEs), which eliminate the need for stripping down. PHEs are also extremely compact and energy efficient.
Catalent's Swindon factory encapsulates various products in soft gel capsules. Between them, the new heat exchangers serve two hot water systems, one at 80°C for process water and air conditioning, and the other at 60°C for hand washing.
"The old calorifiers were over 20 years old," says Burnett. "They were not very efficient, slow to heat up and caused a bottleneck in the process." In contrast, he says that the EasiHeat units are more than equal to the task: "We used to run three large calorifiers for one application and replaced them with two compact EasiHeat systems. Although we always have one on permanent stand-by, for safety and maintenance precautions, we've never even had to use it for an application because they're so efficient."
Accurate gas analysis drives process efficiency
Microchannel technology applied to intensification of distillation
Microchannel technology intensifies distillation process
Actuators must withstand high humidity, salt, wind and rain
Development of specialist quality materials will dominate in 2009


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BELLEVILLE, Ill. (AP) — Firefighters had to rescue a southwestern Illinois man from deep mud after he became stuck while trying to reach his pet parrot.
The man was in mud up to his waist when crews arrived. Video shows that firefighters had to extend ladders across the mud to help him out — as the parrot remained perched on his shoulders.


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Mirblouk, Kaz
Careless By Contrast
***"L.A. native Kaz Mirblouk has played and toured with Hooveriii and Numb.er, released music as a solo artist and gone off to college, graduated and returned home. None of which quite prepares you for the arresting intensity of his new single 'Borderline.' The song is the lead track on his forthcoming album Careless by Contrast, a record that figures to find a home among fans of sophisticated, genre-blurring guitar rock. Written in 2017 and '18, co-produced by Louis Cohen and self-recorded by Mirblouk around tours in 2018 and '19, the album dives into psychedelic krautrock and angular post-punk. A stylistic leap from his 2016 album Imitate, Intimidate, it's the sound of an artist shedding his old skin."—buzzbands.la. Edition of 250 copies on golden haze colored vinyl.
MCK 041


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Home » Coarse grains
Coarse grains
By Chris Lyddon
Ample coarse grains supplies and competition for feeds business from wheat have put prices under pressure. Harvesting is under way in the southern hemisphere, with South American production forecast lower on reduced area and South African supply affected by a reduced crop, triggered by adverse weather, and a reduction in opening stocks estimates.
"Reflecting bearish fundamentals and strong competition for business, export prices at the major origins were lower during February," the International Grains Council (IGC) said of maize (corn) in its Grain Market Report. "With broadly similar declines in the U.S., South America and the Black Sea, the IGC maize sub-Index dropped by 6% to its lowest level in more than four months."
"Up River basis offers in Argentina were lower on seasonal pressure and favorable crop prospects," it said. "With weak nearby demand from some large buyers in North Africa and Asia, exporters were also keen to uncover some buying. Export prices were around 6% lower, at U.S.$170 fob. Due to fairly large availabilities and sluggish export demand, Black Sea prices were down by around 7%, at $168 fob."
Barley was also down. "The IGC GOI barley sub-Index fell by a net 5% during February, with pressure from ample global grain supplies more than offsetting support from firm international demand for feed barley," the report said. "A favorable outlook for 2015 crops also weighed, with major buyers in Near East Asia and North Africa seen likely to import less in the year ahead.
"Declines were particularly notable in the E.U. (France), under pressure from competition in livestock rations from wheat and a good 2015 production outlook. At U.S.$201 fob (Rouen), feed barley export values were down by $15 month on month, with the decline also partly linked to currency movements."
Quotations in the Black Sea region weakened by U.S.$9, to U.S.$205 fob, it said.
"In Australia, a weaker local currency weighed on U.S. dollar denominated export quotations, although losses were capped by firm export demand; feed barley export prices declined by $7, to $242 fob (Adelaide).
"Malting barley values were down by U.S.$6, to U.S.$279 fob (Adelaide), as falling beer production in China was seen contributing to weaker third country buying interest," it said. "Amid sluggish exports, prices in Argentina softened by U.S.$15, to U.S.$200 fob (Up River)."
In its March World Agricultural Supply and Demand Situation Report, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) cut its figures for coarse grains supply and raised its consumption forecast.
"Global coarse grain supplies for 2014-15 are projected 2.4 million tonnes lower, mostly on reduced corn beginning stocks and production for South Africa. Global coarse grain consumption for 2014-15 is raised 2.7 million tonnes, mostly on higher barley use for China with larger imports and higher millet use for India with larger production."
It also raised its figure for barley consumption and imports for Iran.
"Partly offsetting the increases in barley imports for China and Iran is a reduction for Saudi Arabia," it said. "Barley exports are raised for the E.U. and Australia. Corn imports are raised for Saudi Arabia and Israel. In addition to the United States, corn exports are raised for Argentina and Brazil, more than offsetting a reduction for South Africa."
In its Crop Prospects and Food Situation report, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization noted that the season in the Southern Hemisphere is well advanced.
"In South America, coarse grains production in 2015, mostly constituting maize, is forecast to decrease from the above-average output of the previous year but remain at a high level, reflecting lower prices and ample supplies that instigated a decrease in plantings," it said. "In Brazil, harvesting of the first season maize crop is under way and preliminary forecasts point to a small increase, as higher yields are expected to offset a contraction in the area planted."
However, a sharp reduction in plantings for the second season is forecast to cause a fall in aggregate production by 3% compared to 2014, it said. "In Argentina, an 11% decrease in plantings is forecast to result in an 8% fall in maize production."
In Southern Africa, official forecasts are not yet available for all countries. However, preliminary indications point to a decline in the aggregate 2015 maize production from last year's bumper output.
"In South Africa, the largest producer in the sub-region, maize production is expected to fall sharply by 33% on account of reduced yields. Elsewhere in the sub-region, including in the two second biggest producers, Zambia and Malawi, production is also forecast to decrease, but remain above average," it said.
Chris Lyddon is World Grain's European editor. He may be contacted at: chris.lyddon@ntlworld.com.
Grain market review: Coarse grains
Grain market review: Coarse grains prices mixed


Globespan has terminated operations as of December 16, 2009. Information on this page is for historical purposes only.
Globespan was based in United Kingdom, serving 28 airports in 12 different countries.
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January 30, 2018 January 30, 2018 The Prigs LifeLeave a Comment on 1st step towards Positivity #THE SECRET.
1st step towards Positivity #THE SECRET.
Like i already mentioned i was a very negative person..and a overthinkier.
I have read many books.. but the one book that is super close to my heart is the serect. i always knew about this book i had it also.. but never read it because I never found it interesting by the cover of the book.. so i gave it someone who wanted to read.
One day i was very depressed and very negative about my life I was jus talking to my friends sister generally and she told me 'why don't u read the secret book' by Rhonda byrne.. she told me how her life changed and she explained drastically and she got what she wanted.
Its been more thn 5 years.. but i still rememeber each and everything that i hv to do.. i hv seen so many changes in me.. i still change for my betterment and still discover positive way and get positive changes in me..
I hv become so strong after reading this book that i can smell negativity from far and cut it before it reaches me..
I know how distant myself from negative people and negative vibes positively.
I have got everything that i wanted from the universe.
The Gratitde rock always reminds me to thank.
Universe always listens to me.. and also tells me if i am going on the wrong track, and then i am back on track.
I never forget to thank the universe before I go to sleep and when i wake up in the morning.. my day is full with energy, love and positive vibes and people..
I am really grateful for each and everything thing in my life..nad grateful for my health .I am the most happiest and positive person that i was ever in my life..and it changes you inside out.
I am so possesive for this one book that i use to carry it everywhere and keep it under my pillow in the night. and who ever wanted it to read i use to give them n make sure i get it back.. or buy a new one for them.
MUCH LOVE TO RHONDA BYRNE AND UNIVERSE.


Doing analytics, data science and business intelligence in either type of company can be extremely rewarding, but there are critical differences to understand. At its most basic, think of it as the difference between racing in the Formula 1 and racing in the Mongol Rally. You can go mind-blowingly fast when you're on a paved track, with a specially made car. But that car can't even drive itself to the competition, much less find an exciting shortcut on the raceway.
In the end, a Grand Prix driver is also just one piece of a giant machine, that involves the sponsors, management and pit crew. A Mongol Rally vehicle sets off along whatever route the driver chooses, empowered (and required) to think up solutions novel to whatever opportunities and emergencies might arise.
In the startup context, it's unlikely you will run into issues between different departments. Often, entire departments will consist of one or two people. However, you're often working with much less complete data sets. Even if you're collecting a lot of data per day, it will not have very much historical evidence to reference. Often you will be leveraging third-party data to try to extend your visibility outside your company's limited experience. Third-party data can bring incredible insights, but it comes with its own challenges, particularly when you're trying to integrate two different outside data sources.
Government data can be some of the best and worst from this perspective, representing an incredibly deep data set, but it's often stored in bizarre file formats and with painfully dense reference material. For example, data.gov gives access to a dizzying array of sources (192,927 at the time of writing), but each is formatted differently and represents a considerable learning curve. That said, several UK companies have done impressive things with their government's data.
Vance Fitzgerald (blogger and expert on the Raleigh-Durham startup scene) points out that some startups are taking another route, building their business around data supplied by their customers. This presents fascinating opportunities and challenges. You're never going to find more relevant data than that supplied by the customers themselves, but you also have to contend with all sorts of formatting issues and exceptions, often on short notice.
It's not like enterprise data lakes are any less difficult to wade through. For an organization that's been around long enough, standards have evolved in different directions, like Darwin's finches, to the point that they can no longer interbreed and produce beautiful little data babies. At least in the corporate context, you have access to the experts behind the data, and they can help you understand where it came from and (if you are persuasive enough) even help you modify the data collection front end so that you're getting what you need to work with.
It's often said that work in an enterprise moves less quickly than in startups. That is true if you're looking at any one individual project, but in a large organization you're almost certainly working on several different threads at the exact same time. That means that the need for effective tools and efficient processes may be even greater within these types of organizations than they are at a nimble startup. In a startup, you're doing everything for the first time. You can't be expected to have all of your processes ironed out, or make all of your graphs gorgeous. That can be exhilarating, and certainly very educational, but there is something to be said for the joy of working at near 100% efficiency. There's nothing like craftsmanship with the sharpest tools.
On the other hand, startups have many fewer degrees of separation between the decision-makers, even at the highest level, and the analysts on the front lines. That leads to faster iterations between strategic decisions, new data, analysis and interpretation, and updated decisions. This means that projects may actually involve several analyses intertwined with action. This can be very exciting, but also quite chaotic and messy. Whether or not this sounds appealing may depend on your specific personality—the downside is that you can't often get deep into any one analysis because it has to be turned around so quickly. In these situations, it's the responsibility of a good manager to ensure that decisions are being backed up with facts and analysis, not gut feelings alone, as TextOre (an advanced text analytics technology firm) points out.
One of the biggest challenges of doing data in an enterprise environment is politics. If you're doing honest analysis, for some portion of the time you will be delivering bad news. Even more complex, the news might be good for some people in the organization and bad for others. This creates a difficult position, particularly if you're paid by the portion of the organization that is receiving the bad news. They should, if they're perfectly rational, be glad that you've flagged an issue before it got even worse. But ignorance is bliss, and too many people react to a necessary data alert like Looney Toons react to an alarm clock.
In startups, it can be easier to dispense with the politics. You're all on the same team trying to realize a common goal. However, even if your goals are clearly aligned, a small team may still find that their assumptions and therefore their preferred approaches can be quite different. Whether you call that politics or not, it can certainly lead to friction within the team. If your analyses become the scorecard on which the success of different people's strategic decisions are judged, you can expect extensive scrutiny and backseat driving as you develop and report on your metrics. Even things that feel like they should be simple can be surprisingly hard to define in an agreed-upon way. For example, the salespeople might want to report their "Monthly Recurring Revenue Gained" without subtracting refunds, on the argument that those represent a product issue. But finance would never stand for that, because you can't spend money that you've had to give back.
What can they learn from each other?
All this discussion of differences would be merely academic if these types of organizations didn't have so much to teach each other. Many of the most successful corporations in the world have taken Clayton Christensen's advice in The Innovator's Dilemma, a book in which he argues that successful companies will not be able to ride the innovation that propelled them to their size indefinitely. They need to be prepared to disrupt their own business models, or else they will be disrupted from the outside. To put it another way, the next big thing must come from inside, or it will surely come from the outside (probably from a startup). Many companies are tackling this issue head-on by sponsoring internal startup teams that are free of corporate constraints. Google started down this path with GoogleX and then proceeded with a complete corporate transformation that made its core business just one of several divisions within a larger holding company.
Startups, too, can learn from larger companies. Although people complain about bureaucracy and red tape, there is an undeniable efficiency in having processes in place, so that each new situation does not need to be handled through trial and error. The trick is having the right amount of structure, so that you don't miss innovative opportunities. But remember, time wasted reinventing the wheel on back-end workflows is time that is not spent innovating on core aspects of the startup's value proposition, even if it's not analysis paralysis. This is particularly true when it comes to data acquisition, storage and reporting. There are incredible tools out there for each of these tasks, many of which are designed to integrate seamlessly. Unless a startup is working with extremely big or unusual data, the right answer is probably not to develop a custom stack but to leverage tools like Hadoop and Tableau.
And, as Paul Carney (Deputy Managing Director of consumer insight agency Bonamy Finch) points out, there are ways in which businesses can get stuck, whether they are large or small. Lacking statistical rigor, even if they've nailed basic reporting, is certainly one. But even that rigor is useless without alignment with business goals. And none of that is going to help if a deep understanding of the customers is not baked into the process from the beginning.


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The Call of the Wild: How Storytelling Enriches the Meaning of Family and Helps Answer the Call
Jenn Fujiikawa
Searching for your calling in life doesn't just apply to humans. Adapted from the classic book, The Call of the Wild follows the story of Buck, a domesticated pet turned wilderness adventurer, who is suddenly uprooted from the lap of luxury in California and has to learn to adapt to the rugged wilds of the Yukon during the gold rush of the 1890s. Oh My Disney sat down with director Chris Sanders and actor Cara Gee (Françoise) to discuss bringing the legendary novel to life and how they follow their own call of the wild.
A live-action/animation hybrid, The Call of the Wild uses amazing visual effects to create life-like animals in the film. An acclaimed animation director and storyboard artist, Sanders took his first foray into live-action with this movie, but he felt well-prepared to take on Buck's journey. "He's an animated character in the best sense. That's one of the reasons I was interested in doing this, and felt that I could. It's my first live-action thing I've ever done, but there's such a tremendously large animated element to it, that I felt comfortable."
Sanders is known for being the creator and voice of Walt Disney Animation Studios' beloved Stitch from Lilo and Stitch. This insight was key to bringing animated animals to life on the big screen: "He has to look real. But the trick and the fun of this whole thing was that for the first time, our dog can act, and he's gonna be the lead. All these other versions of The Call of the Wild that have been done, the dogs are there to varying degrees, but there's only so much you can do with them."
"So with this Buck, we had a chance to have him act and be a real character from start to finish, and see his growth," described Sanders. "And he's definitely sort of a bouncy, irresponsible, silly guy at the beginning, and at the end, you can see he's really grown up — but we wanted to make sure that he grew up and got in touch with the things inside him, these gifts that he didn't know he had — and yet we wanted to have his gentle nature unchanged."
As a West Coast pooch, Buck had never experienced the cold before, let alone miles of snow banks. Once transplanted into the Northwest, he takes on a new adventure as a sled dog for mail carriers Perrault and Françoise. In the original book, the character of Françoise was a man, but Gee embraced the update, which was especially meaningful to her as an indigenous person. "It was really important to me to honor the novel, because it is so iconic and has such a place in American literary history," Gee said. "I am an indigenous woman. I'm Ojibwe. And the character is Tlingit — the people who are indigenous to that geography. So I worked with a cultural advisor from that region, which is something that I advocated for in the process. It was really important to me that we honor and respect the Tlingit people — they invented dog sledding — so that was really important to me to build those layers into the character."
"This is a really special moment. To be a lead woman in this film and to be a native woman is very meaningful and very powerful," shared Gee. "And I hope that inspires the next generation. I feel very proud to be a part of this."
In regards to a personal calling or inspiration, it all comes down to tales about family. "Stories. I always have stories in my head that I'm working on, that I'm putting together," revealed Sanders. "And I think my call of the wild would be to get as many of those out as possible while I can. I'm drawn to the gray tones of things — things aren't black and white in real life. Family stuff is complicated, but there's magic in that and there's surprise, and some great rewards, and I love those kinds of stories."
For Gee, being nine months pregnant while promoting the movie has changed how meaningful family is in relation to the film. "I wasn't pregnant when we shot the movie, and now, of course, that it's coming out and I'm about to give birth, it's taken on a whole new meaning. I am so excited to share this film with the next generation. It's a beautiful coming of age story, there's reverence for nature, there's a sense of awe and wonder, and magic and possibility, that is just so beautiful," she mused. "This film feels like such a beautiful story to offer the world."
Ready for an adventure of a lifetime? Get your tickets to see The Call of the Wild, now in theaters.
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Meritage Homes Corporation to Host Webcast with CEO Steve Hilton
May 31, 2006 06:00 ET | Source: Meritage Homes Corporation Meritage Homes Corporation
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz., May 31, 2006 (PRIMEZONE) -- Meritage Homes Corporation (NYSE:MTH) today announced that the Company will webcast a conference call with Chairman and CEO Steven J. Hilton on Thursday, June 1, 2006, at 10:00 a.m. EDT (7:00 a.m. PDT) to discuss recent organizational changes and future plans. The webcast and accompanying materials will be accessible on the Company's website at http://www.meritagehomes.com on the "Investor Relations" page, or by dialing 800-659-1942 and using passcode "Meritage."
The webcast replay will be available on the "Investor Relations" page of the Company's website, and through CCBN for two weeks at www.fulldisclosure.com. A replay will also be available by dialing 888-286-8010, and referencing passcode 55656157.
Meritage Homes Corporation (NYSE:MTH) is a leader in the homebuilding industry. The Company is ranked by Builder magazine as the 13th largest homebuilder in the U.S. and has been perennially included on Forbes' "Platinum 400 - Best Big Companies in America," the Fortune 1000 and Fortune's "Fastest Growing Companies in America" lists, and the S&P SmallCap 600 Index. Meritage operates in fast-growing states of the southern and western United States, including six of the top 10 single-family housing markets in the country, and has reported 18 consecutive years of record revenue and net earnings. For more information about the Company, visit www.meritagehomes.com. Meritage is a member of the Public Home Builders Council of America (www.phbca.org).
BUILDING CONSTRUCTION REAL ESTATE WEBCAST
Jane Hays, Vice President - Corp. Develop.


Biogen Idec CEO George Scangos is putting his stamp on the direction of the company, by making some bold moves to cut jobs, facilities, and drug development programs. It's all part of a bid to make a bigger impact in one area—neurology.
Weston, MA-based Biogen Idec (NASDAQ: BIIB), the world's largest maker of multiple sclerosis drugs, outlined a sweeping series of cutbacks and strategic moves in a statement this morning. The changes are designed to save the company $300 million a year, the company said.
—Biogen is cutting 13 percent of its workforce. About 650 people will lose their jobs, leaving the company with a staff of about 4,275 employees worldwide.
—The company is going to close down its San Diego site, and its eastern Massachusetts sites in Waltham, MA and Wellesley, MA will be consolidated in Cambridge, MA and Weston, MA. This is a big blow to the San Diego community, which has been a part of the company since the 2003 merger between Biogen and Idec Pharmaceuticals. "The closing of our San Diego site is especially painful, as it is the home of the original Idec Pharmaceuticals and has played a fundamental role in the success of the company," Scangos said in a statement.
—Big changes are coming to the organizational chart. Business development, venture development, and corporate strategy are being reorganized "to improve crispness and timeliness of decision making and execution." Layers of management will be eliminated, cutting back on bureaucracy. The company said it is now looking for a new head of its combined corporate development group.
—Biogen Idec is getting rid of the sales force that pitches the blockbuster drug rituximab (Rituxan) for cancer and rheumatoid arthritis. Biogen's partner, the Roche unit of Genentech, will be responsible for the U.S. sales and marketing of Rituxan.
Scangos, a scientist and former CEO of South San Francisco-based Exelixis (NASDAQ: EXEL), said that R&D at Biogen Idec had to improve from the minute he was publicly introduced as the new boss last June. The company has been repeatedly hit with critiques from billionaire activist Carl Icahn, who has complained about the company's lack of R&D productivity, noting that the company hasn't brought a product to market since the 2004 introduction of its MS therapy natalizumab (Tysabri).


130th St Station, as seen from the northwest corner. The landscaping between the sidewalk and the station will eventually be replaced by Spring Boulevard. Note the shaded multi-use building in the background.
Last Tuesday, Sound Transit held the final design open house for the Bel-Red segment of the East Link project. East Link is a light rail extension, which when open in 2023, will link Seattle with the Eastside cities of Mercer Island, Bellevue, and Redmond.
The first segment of East Link begins at International District Station and follows the alignment of I-90 from SODO to South Bellevue. Stations in the segment include Rainier Avenue, Mercer Island, and the South Bellevue Park and Ride. The middle segment continues from South Bellevue to Downtown Bellevue via Bellevue Way, 112th Ave NE, and a Downtown Bellevue tunnel. Only East Main Street and the Bellevue Transit Center will be served by this segment. The final segment is the Bel-Red corridor which connects Downtown Bellevue to Overlake in Redmond. Hospital Station, 120th Street Station, 130th Street Station (aka Bel-Red), Overlake Village, and Overlake Transit Center will be served by this segment.
Construction on the project is slated to begin next year. Sound Transit is in the process of developing the final designs for stations and right-of-way alignment. Bel-Red was the first of all stations to have reached 90% design completion. South Bellevue, East Main, and Downtown Bellevue are next up to complete this milestone.
The design for 120th Street Station, in the heart of the new Spring District neighborhood, has been put on hold while Sound Transit searches for a contractor. The open house focused on the 130th Street Station and the track around it.
Image: Art rendering of the platform railings and wave shadows.
A highlight from the open house were plans for station art. Patrick Marold, an artist from Denver, has been hired to develop art for the 130th Street Station. His pieces will consist of an offset in the station railing, which cast a shadow onto the platform. These offsets will change for every railing due to the height and sunlight position to create waves on the platform. Another interesting art feature will be located at the 130th Street and 132nd Street light rail crossings. Intersection pavement will be either painted black or red, as defined in the Bel-Red urban design criteria.
The station will be lighted with indirect lighting to prevent shadows and darker spots, similar to the Metrorail subway stations in DC. The hope is that lighting will discourage anti-social behavior. Station naming was also discussed. The top two station names from previous open houses were "Bel-Red" and "130th Street". A decision has yet to be made, but it will be determined in the following months.
Image: View of the bike facilities at the east end of the station.
130th Street Station is set to be both a commuter station and a catalyst for development. To supplement this, bike parking, a kiss-and-ride, and park-and-ride parking stalls will be provided. 300 stalls for surfacing parking will be constructed, which could be converted to mixed-use development at a later date. Three types of bike parking will be provided, including racks, lockers, and a pass-accessed cage. The station is also set to be home to major mixed-use development, much in the same way as the Spring District just to the west. Located in the median of the future Spring Boulevard, the station will only be bordered by the park-and-ride on the north side, leaving the south side for development.
The City of Bellevue has already rezoned the area surrounding the 130th Street Station for denser development, which includes density minimum regulations. (A feat for Bellevue planning given the city council's politics.) Bellevue has a vision to transform Bel-Red from a light industrial neighborhood to a dynamic, dense, and liveable neighbohood. Light rail will be key to the new neighborhood, but a number of new streets will supplement this. These will be constructed over the next few years to restore the grid block-by-block. Blocks will be people-oriented blocks as opposed to the superblocks found in Downtown Bellevue.
Many of the streets will feature multi-use paths and buffered bike lanes (much like on Seattle's Dexter Avenue) on Spring Boulevard from the 130th Street Station to Northup Way/NE 20th. Bellevue is also exploring the possibility of separating bike lanes from automobile traffic by using plastic bollards or a similar treatment. However, the City staff do have concerns about how such devices could interfere with street sweeping. Staff said that they would look into how this could be remedied by working with Seattle, which uses similar devices.
Image: Bel-Red grid repair plan. 130th St Station is the "T" at the farthest right along the light rail line.
130th Street NE north of the station will be turned into a neighborhood commercial street with on-street parking, a rare design for Bellevue streets (exceptions being blocks of Main Street west of Bellevue Way). Most of the streets around the 130th Station will be bidirectional with one lane each way, a design that limits speeding and the use of those streets as arterials. For the neighborhood, this is a great way to keep the streets safe and comfortable for pedestrians and cyclists alike while inviting people patronize and enjoy the area.
Great coverage! Would be awesome if you could say where you're getting these images.


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