Your brain on a microchip – Cool research from U of Calgary

Professor Naweed Syed, head of University of Calgary’s department of cell biology and anatomy, talks about his latest cutting edge “neurochip” research in the following YouTube video. Have a look of my previous entry for references to two newspaper articles about the research.

After watching Prof. Syed talks about the “neurochip” (polymer microchip capable of monitoring neuronal activity with high-fidelity) in the video, I think I have much better appreciation of what this research has achieved. This is really impressive stuff. [HT UofCMedicine tweets]

List of approximate time codes:

0:39 Record activity in day 1, put it back into incubator, then record again in day 2, etc.

0:54 Ability to look for longer term effects

1:22 brain cells when they fire, they have a very unique firing frequency

1:45 block pain before it gets to your brain

2:20 re epilepsy …

2:35 What an amazing first inch in conquering the brain !

P.S. The video is really nice since it provides a nice way to understand the various implications without jumping real deep into the technical research paper “High-fidelity patch-clamp recordings from neurons cultured on a polymer microchip“.

Aug 12, 2010 Update: Here is a clip of Dr. Syed interviewed on Discovery Channel posted in Oct 2009,

How Clement & Harper just dug a deeper hole – How not to fix the census change mistake

David Eaves has written and excellent post “How not to fix a mistake: How Clement’s just dug a deeper hole” about the Harper government’s latest census changes (with videos). Have a read of the insightful post. I will quote three points in Dave’s post (emphasis added),

b) That the only way to be heard by this government is to take legal action

c) That the government is willingly ignoring the innumerably other stakeholders like the federal ministries, the provinces, cities, plus 300+ NGOs, business groups, religious organizations, etc… that are negatively impacted by this decision

d) That their goal is to destroy the census and that the actions today were about accelerating that process, not consulting or listening to Canadians

It is a sad day in Canada that Canadians have to resort to suing our own government to get them to do something right as simple and basic as census. Yes, the census! Something governments from different parties have been doing over hundred years!

P.S. I am putting Harper’s name on this one. There is no way, I mean NO WAY, Harper himself hasn’t personally cleared what Clement is doing today. So his name is on this one.

The first door on the left changed her life

“Words by Radiolab” is one of the best radio shows I’ve heard in a long time. Highly recommended.

“It’s almost impossible to imagine a world without words. But in this hour of Radiolab, we try to do just that. We speak to a woman who taught a 27-year-old man the first words of his life, and we hear a firsthand account of what it feels like to have the language center of your brain wiped out by a stroke. Plus: a group of children invent an entirely new language in Nicaragua in the 1970s.”

A bonus video. Beautifully done.

[HT BMD]

Census and good government

I hope the MPs will stand up for Canada and send a strong message to Prime Minister Stephen Harper to tell him he is wrong about the census change and to reverse his decision. Sadly, I know my Calgary SW MP won’t.

Stand up for good government, MPs – It’s up to Canada’s opposition leaders to defend the long form’s integrity (emphasis added)
by Mel Cappe, Pierre Fortin, Michael Mendelson and John Richards
Published on Globe and Mail, Wednesday, Aug. 11, 2010 5:00AM EDT

Section 91 of Canada’s Constitution states, “It shall be lawful for the Queen, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate and House of Commons, to make laws for the Peace, Order, and good Government of Canada.”

If there is one overriding shared value among Canadians, it is a desire for good government. This does not mean we are indifferent to the Americans’ concern for “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” It does mean we are prepared to incur certain obligations to enable good government. Among them is a willingness to accept mandatory participation in a census able to generate reliable information about Canadian social conditions. Information provided is confidential, and this confidentiality has never been violated.

For many decades, the census generated detailed information by way of a “long form” that a random 20 per cent of households are required to complete. The average family can expect to complete the form twice in a lifetime. In June, with no prior consultation, the government substituted a voluntary National Household Survey. As former chief statistician Munir Sheikh said at the time of his resignation, the data arising from the proposed voluntary survey will not be reliable.

Good government means different things to Canadians across the country.

It means the New Brunswick government must deliver high-quality school programs in two languages across Canada’s only officially bilingual province. Premier Shawn Graham has repeatedly said the census information is necessary for evaluating these programs.

It means the Quebec government must evaluate the location of new community health centres based on reliable information about location of particular populations.

Secret documents show Clement & Harper gov misled Canadians on census

Thanks to an order by Commons committee (similar to those under ATI (Access to Information Act)?), there were a lot of census related secret documents between the Privy Council Office, Industry Canada, and Statistics Canada released yesterday that showed a clearer picture of what really happened behind the scenes. (note: the picture is still a partial one because of Harper government’s redactions under 21. (1)(a) and 69. (1)(a) & (g), etc)

StatsCan warned of poor census response rate” – CBC News (include a TV interview with Munir Sheikh)

Census Document Dump: Behind the scenes of a most unexpected public relations crisis – CBC Inside Politics Blog (contains raw ATI PDF docs, highly recommended if you like reading the sources)

Census Document Dump: Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold … – CBC Inside Politics Blog (contains raw ATI PDF docs, highly recommended if you like reading the sources)

Clement misled Canadians on census: secret documents – TorStar

“Large sections of the documents were blacked out. Liberal MP Dan McTeague, who requested the documents, said he has never seen such censorship of material for a Commons committee except on security issues. “This is a serious affront to democracy,” he remarked Tuesday.”

Feds tried to shape StatsCan census message – Canadian Press

“Liberal Industry critic Marc Garneau said it appears the Tories didn’t put much thought into their decision on the census until after the fact.

“It’s because of ideology. The Prime Minister or the prime minister’s office said I think I’m going to make a change here . . . and to heck with science,” he said in an interview.”

Clement tidied up census message for committee hearings, documents show – Montreal Gazette (emphasis added)

“Industry Minister Tony Clement was poised to admit to a parliamentary committee last month that Statistics Canada “recommended the status quo” on the controversial long-form census, newly released documents show.

But when Clement testified before the committee at the height of the controversy, he changed the draft “introductory remarks,” which had been prepared for him, and dropped direct reference to Statistics Canada’s opposition to the government’s decision.

Instead, under questioning, he said the agency “probably” would have preferred that the census remain the same.”

Ottawa was told of flaws in census plan, documents show – Statscan warned Tony Clement’s office that voluntary survey would yield low response rate [initial response rate of only 50 per cent] – Globe and Mail (emphasis added)

“Addressing his critics, Mr. Clement declared: “I would say to those who are the self-proclaimed experts on this, if you trust Statistics Canada why don’t you trust the option that they put forward to obtain the data that businesses and municipalities deem to be necessary.”

E-mails and memos also made public show Canada’s former chief statistician, Munir Sheikh, intended to publicly acknowledge shortfalls in the substitute voluntary survey on the day he ultimately resigned from the job. [...]

Mr. Sheikh, in an interview with CBC TV’s Power and Politics Tuesday, said the reliability of much of Statistics Canada’s work will suffer without a mandatory long-form census. “The census is a benchmark for a lot of the surveys we do at Statistics Canada. If we don’t have that benchmark, we really have no way of knowing whether or not the data produced even by those surveys is something we can trust.””

Alzheimer’s predicted by spinal-fluid test

CBC reports “Alzheimer’s predicted by spinal-fluid test“,

Alzheimer’s disease can be accurately predicted by analyzing biomarkers in spinal fluid, Belgium researchers have found.

A protein signature was found in the cerebrospinal fluid of 90 per cent of people with a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease and 72 per cent of people with mild cognitive impairment or MCI, a disorder that often progresses to Alzheimer’s.

Sounds like great news.

Travel Icons: Once-in-a-lifetime experience or tourist trifle?

My friend Daisann McLane occasionally writes essays for Singapore Airlines’ magazine Silver Kris. Have is a link to Daisann’s latest essay,

“Travel Icons: Once-in-a-lifetime experience or tourist trifle? Indefatigable traveller DAISANN MCLANE weighs in on must-see destinations – the Empire State Building, the Pyramids and more – and tells us why she went from naysayer to believer.“

Here is a paragraph from Travel Icons,

“I’ve always had a complicated relationship with travel icons. Like a lot of travellers, I bristle at being handed a list of places, buildings, works of art or things I ‘must’ do or see, especially when everything on the checklist is something that multitudes of people have already seen or done. Yet I worry. If I turn my back on the Eiffel Tower, snub the Mona Lisa, the Great Wall, the Taj Mahal, the Colosseum or any of the other travel icons that, year after year, draw throngs of dutiful pilgrims, will I end up overcome with regret? Icons, after all, are the superstars of travel. You don’t get to be a star unless you have that certain something.”

Matthew Talbot-Kelly “The Trembling Veil of Bones” interview

Matthew Talbot-Kelly (imdb), director & producer of the animated short film “The Trembling Veil of Bones” and creator of the “The Pedlar Lady of Gushing Cross” iPad app, is an animator that was trained in architecture. In the following Skype video interview, I chatted with Matthew about how his knowledge of architecture influences his animations, why he decided to find an actor to play Bones, the story’s protagonist, the meanings of some of the images in the film, and more. Enjoy.

The following are clips produced by the National Film Board of Canada.

THE TREMBLING VEIL OF BONES (MAKING OF)

THE TREMBLING VElL OF BONES: INTERVIEW WITH DIRECTOR MATTHEW TALBOT-KELLY

Bernard Callebaut’s financial details

From Calgary Herald “Bernard Callebaut determined to claw his way back from receivership” (emphasis added),

“Last Tuesday, Chocolaterie Bernard Callebaut was placed in receivership by ATB Financial, which alleges in court documents it is owed roughly $3.9 million by the company. [...]

Callebaut is candid about the issues. One crux is a $5-million land purchase west of Calgary made during the boom — a 78-hectare expanse Callebaut dreamed one day would house a factory and warehouse facility and would feature an organic dairy farm to round out his chocolate production.

He recently tried to sell that land, but was only offered $2 million.

The head office building on 1st Street by 13th Avenue S.E. was sold during the boom to raise capital, he says. It did that, but also saddled the company with an expensive lease signed with the new owner during the height of the market.

Then the economic downturn brought sliding sales. In June 2009, the company temporarily reduced its workforce to a skeleton crew. But Callebaut says when people saw the headlines, they believed the chocolaterie was closed, leading to an immediate 15 per cent drop in business.”

See also my previous article, “3 lessons as chocolatier Bernard Callebaut enters receivership“.

Oct 4th, 2010 Update: “Chocolatier Bernard Callebaut making final bid to regain company“

Apr 11th, 2011 Update: “unLovemark: Bernard Callebaut the businessman and the two brands“

iPad app interview: Matthew Talbot-Kelly “Pedlar Lady of Gushing Cross”

Aug 19, 2010 update: Pedlar Lady is Apple iPad App of the week for US & Canada

***

It was a lot of fun chatting with Matthew Talbot-Kelly (imdb), director & producer of the Apple iPad app “The Pedlar Lady of Gushing Cross” (see app review here).

Matthew got the idea to develop an iPad app right after watching Steve Jobs first demoed the iPad online (in late Jan 2010). After watching Jobs’ demo, Matthew concluded Jobs “didn’t really have the killer app” for iPad and demoed uses were things people could already do with their computers. Soon after the Jobs’ demo, Matthew took one of his animation projects (one previously pitched as a short film) and pitched it again, but this time as an iPad app. And Matthew was able to quickly find an interested Vancouver investor. A note to creative people out there: sometimes your prior creative ideas/efforts can generate result in unexpected places at a later time, you never know if you keep your eyes open.

Pedlar Lady is a story based on an 800 years old poem and this story has many variants around the world. Matthew turned to his partner Jacqueline Rogers and asked her to write and transform the story into a story telling text that is playful, magical, dynamic and alive at the same time. The time it took to create the iPad app is hard to determine because it included a long process of research & development to figure out what are possible or not possible in the current iOS software development kit 4. There are more technical discussions in the video interview.

The animation artists involved int app development are experienced 3D or 2D animators, so animated objects are 3 dimensional and are in prospective. Take a look of the included promotional clip to see what the animations in the app looks like.

The creation of the Pedlar Lady was the beautiful result of an international effort with Matthew and his partner based in Gibson, BC and other collaborators working from Ireland, New Brunswick, Vancouver, Toronto, Calgary, South Africa, London, Mexico, Peru, Finland, etc.

The following are the videos of my interesting Skype video chat with Matthew. Enjoy.

Here is a promotional clip of “The Pedlar Lady of Gushing Cross” iPad app

Stephen Harper should reverse census decision now

I’ve posted a few articles to explain why Stephen Harper should reverse his census decision now. Here are a few more reasons and views that I share.

“The government’s decision on the census, the debate flowing from this decision, and some commentary from the government on Statistics Canada’s independence and the free ride many users are alleged to enjoy are risking the quality of data from both the operational and trust perspectives. Operationally, the long-form census provides benchmarking for many surveys within Statistics Canada (and outside). These surveys will suffer. By making a decision on a technical issue – which the government has every right to do under the current legislation – the government risks the creation of a trust gap.

It takes ages to establish credibility. It takes much less to tarnish it. […] I urge the government to rethink its position on the census. We still have time to reverse the decision.” – Munir Sheikh, Canada’s former chief statistician

“Imagine. Every religious group opposed the Harper assault, as did business organizations representing everything from Bay Street to mom-and-pop stores, universities, trade unions, social groups, aboriginals, minority-language groups – the list goes on and on. Even international statistics experts, who recently gathered in Vancouver for a conference, condemned the Harper decision.

Canadians witnessed the disgusting spectacle of careerist ministers – Industry’s Tony Clement in the lead – tap dancing to the Prime Minister’s tune. Their justification for dispensing with the long form – the best chance of getting the most accurate data – was a mélange of distortions, misrepresentations and exaggerations of so gross a kind that Canadians recoiled in indignation.

To wit: Statistics Canada officials do not show up at people’s homes at 10 p.m. No one has gone to prison for failing to fill out the long-form census, despite ministerial assertions that jail terms await the recalcitrant. A voluntary form is not an acceptable substitute for a mandatory long form, a Clementism so offensive that it forced the head of Statistics Canada, Munir Sheikh, to quit. Canadians saw honour in Mr. Sheikh’s resignation, although he really had no choice, so distorted were the Clementisms.” – Jeffrey Simpson, Globe and Mail

“This is the fourth distinct reason that the Conservatives have given for cancelling the long-form census, and each one has been found wanting. First, it was too coercive (even though no one has evidently ever been charged for not filling out the census). Then, they argued that the replacement voluntary survey would be sufficient (even though it is more expensive, and more subject to bias). Then, misleading answers – too many people claiming to be Jedi knights – justified the change (even though StatsCan’s adjustments for the mandatory census make it more reliable than any other survey).

Now, in their disdain for the myriad groups that have opposed the decision, the Conservatives appear to be rallying anew, in defence of an idealized individual who needs government help to fight an “intrusive” government census. But ultimately, no such person exists. No individual is disconnected from society. The “they” Mr. Clement is condemning is, in fact, “us.”” – Globe Editorial, Aug 9, 2010

“We should first dispense with the zombie meme of “Many countries have dropped the census, so we can too.” This has been blown away any number of times, but it insists on lumbering across the political landscape in search of brains.

Yes, there are several examples of countries — especially in Scandinavia — that have abandoned the traditional census. These countries maintain databases that keep track of all interactions between the citizen and the State, so a census is simply redundant: the government already knows everything there is to know about you. For example, they know where you live, they know when you moved there (all movements must be registered with the police), and they know from the zoning registries just how many bedrooms and bathrooms you have. They even know your high school trigonometry marks — why bother with a census? If you’re concerned about issues such as privacy and state coercion, these are not counter-examples that you should be citing.” – Stephen Gordon, National Post

******* ******* *******

For the record and for completeness, I’ve included some of the full text of the above articles.

We still have time to reverse the census decision – It takes ages to establish credibility. It takes much less to tarnish it

by Munir Sheikh
Tuesday Aug 10, 2010, Globe and Mail

The Prime Minister, at a recent caucus meeting, took pride in Canada’s economic performance and said it is doing better than many other countries. On social outcomes, Canada is generally regarded as a world leader and a trendsetter.

How do we know this? Because of our statistics. Statistics produced by Statistics Canada, an organization that is respected all over the world, an organization whose advice and leadership is sought by many, including international statistical agencies. I know this because I have heard it with my own ears. I was there. And this reputation exists because of the high quality of its data, Statistics Canada’s hallmark.

There are two distinct parts to producing quality statistics.

Skype estimated US$100m offering

Skype’s offering document at the SEC contains some interesting financial info, risk factors, etc about the company. Enjoy. [HT G&M]

For example, here is an interesting excerpt that helps understand Skype as an operating business, (emphasis added)

“Many of our products are free. As a result, we have generated nearly all of our historical revenues from our paid communications services products, which are purchased by a small minority of our users. During the three months ended June 30, 2010, we generated on average net revenues from calls made by approximately 8.1 million paying users to landline or mobile phones. These paying users represented less than 7% of our average connected users during this period. If even a small percentage of our paying users cease paying for our products, this could have a significant impact on our net revenues.

In addition, we have historically derived a substantial portion of our net revenues from a single product—SkypeOut. For the pro forma year ended December 31, 2009 and for the six months ended June 30, 2010, 86% and 87% of our pro forma net revenues and net revenues, respectively, were derived from the use of SkypeOut. Due to this dependence on SkypeOut as our primary source of net revenues, we are subject to an elevated risk of reduced demand for our SkypeOut product.”

****

Aug 13, 2010 Update: Check out this interesting blog entry, “What the Skype IPO Filing Says About Facebook“.

UC scientists’ ‘neurochip’ to monitor neurons in high-fidelity

Professor Naweed Syed, head of University of Calgary’s department of cell biology and anatomy, is leading some really cool research: “High-fidelity patch-clamp recordings from neurons cultured on a polymer microchip (technical research paper)“, or “neurochip” research. Although I suspect “the possibility of neurochip implants that can operate artificial limbs, help restore sight or language after a stroke” may still be decades away, _if_ it is possible at all.

Calgary scientists to create human ‘neurochip’ – Technology allows researchers to monitor brain-cell activity in powerful detail over several days (emphasis added)

by Carolyn Abraham

From Tuesday’s Globe and Mail

Published on Monday, Aug. 09, 2010 7:07PM EDT

by Carolyn Abraham

From Tuesday’s Globe and Mail

Published on Monday, Aug. 09, 2010 7:07PM EDT

The science fiction of melding man and machine has played out for decades onscreen, from The Six Million Dollar Man to The Terminator.

But the bionic hybrid age may well be flickering to life – real life – in the Calgary lab where scientists who made history fusing snail brain cells to a computer microchip six years ago are poised to try the same feat with human cells.

Researchers at the University of Calgary’s Hotchkiss Brain Institute are to announce Tuesday that they have made a key advance in connecting brain cells to a newly designed silicon chip, crafted with the National Research Council of Canada, that allows them to “hear” the conversation between living tissue and an electronic device as never before.

“It used to be like seeing two people talking at a distance. … You didn’t know what they were saying or even what language they were speaking. But now it’s like putting a microphone beside them,” said Professor Naweed Syed, head of the university’s department of cell biology and anatomy, who has led the work on the so-called neurochip.

Published online this week in the journal Biomedical Microdevices, the latest Calgary work makes it immediately possible to use a neurochip to screen drugs for patients with brain disorders and determine which ones are likely to work based on what the brain cells “say.”

Dr. Syed said his team plans to run the first drug-screening experiment within the next few months on brain tissue taken from a patient undergoing surgery for epilepsy.

Being able to monitor the dialogue between cell and silicon chip is a crucial step toward one day manipulating it, raising the possibility of neurochip implants that can operate artificial limbs, help restore sight or language after a stroke, or repair neurons that malfunction in a wide range of brain disorders, from Parkinson’s disease to Alzheimer’s.

Cinematic iPad storytelling app review: “The Pedlar Lady of Gushing Cross”

Aug 19, 2010 update: Pedlar Lady is Apple iPad App of the week for US & Canada

***
“The Pedlar Lady of Gushing Cross” is a beautifully designed cinematic iPad storytelling app published by Moving Tales. Make sure you check out the enclosed promotional clip of the Pedlar Lady app so you can see some samples of the beautifully rendered images/animations.

Apple iPad app:  ”The Pedlar Lady of Gushing Cross“

Price: US$ 4.99

Star rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

Pros:

* Beautifully and cinematically 3D rendered moving images that go along well with an engaging story. Matthew Talbot-Kelly, producer and director of the iPad app, is also a very experienced animator and you can totally tell from the stunning animations. Even the “cover” of the story app contains a 3D fly through to the Pedlar Lady’s house. (see clip)

* Beautifully recorded sound effects and narration.

* Users can also select the Spanish text and Spanish narration option. And the Spanish narration also sounds great. Potentially a great tool to teach children Spanish.

* The narration can be turned off so the story can be read by a parent or grandparent out loud with the sound effects playing in the background.

Cons:

I subtracted 0.5 star for the following:

* At the moment, the app doesn’t have interactive elements. Some of the pages (e.g. one page has many bottles hanging on the tree) are perfect candidates for adding interactive elements for user to touch/move and make sound or interact. (According to Moving Tales, this combination is technically not possible yet.)

* As part of this review, I discovered and reported a bug that stops the animations. Restarting the app may fix the problem, and rebooting the iPad should fix it. I’ve reported the conditions that can trigger this bug to Matthew, he has promised a bug fix and possibly some additional enhancements in the next update. (see my Skype video interview with Matthew).

[latest update from Matthew: a bug fixed version (v 1.01) was submitted to the app store last week, they are now waiting for Apple to approve it.]

[Aug 16, 2010 Update: version v 1.01 has been approved by Apple. The above identified bug has been fixed. Added new sound effects. Improved application stability.]

Recommendation:

Highly recommended. Great experience for much less than the price of almost all children books. Moving Tales, a Gibson BC based Canadian company, has done a wonderful job in creating a Cinematic iPad storytelling app for all to enjoy. Of local interest, the iPad app programming for the Pedlar Lady is done by a Calgary based programmer.

The official site of Moving Tales says it well, “How does Moving Tales bring stories to life?

• sophisticated 3D animation on every page
• original music, voice over and sound effects
• animate the text using the iPad’s accelerometer
• Cover Flow-like navigation
• page swipe or tap for page turning
• auto page turning option
• sound effects only sound option
• compelling narrative
• randomly selected alternate views and extras to ensure no two viewings alike
• sophisticated and dynamic typographic layout
• evocative poetic language
• Spanish option—choose to hear and display the story in Spanish as well as English”

Durian fruit for $6

English (英文): Bought our first Durian yesterday for less than $6 at Superstore. (Never opened up one of these monsters myself before.) It tasted like fresh ice cream as hoped. We plastic wrapped those we couldn’t finished and put them in the fridge. Ha ha, unfortunately, the plastic wrap is no match for the strong smell of the Durian and its smell is now all over the fridge.

中文 (Chinese): 昨天第一次自己買了榴蓮開來吃(只要五元多)。好吃得像雪糕。吃不完的放進雪櫃，但紙包不住火，保鮮紙也包不住榴蓮的氣味。哈哈。

Mr Chrétien, get well soon

I want to wish former prime minister Jean Chrétien a speedy recovery from a successful brain surgery yesterday. Get well soon Mr. Chrétien.

P.S. Since Mr Chrétien left the prime minister office, I had more good things to say about his time as prime minister. I wish I can say something good to say about Mr. Harper when he leaves office, the sooner the better as Mr. Harper is accelerating his campaign to destroy the Canada I love in recent months.

An Apple iPad dilemma

After resisting for a few months, I finally went out to buy an Apple iPad last Friday despite my stated reservations about Apple. A friend and I both originally had reservations about missing features in the iPad (e.g. not having two cameras) but we both ended up buying it. Another friend actually bought 3 fully loaded iPads (32G & 3G) one for each member of her family and later her dad received another as a gift so there are four iPads!

My excuses for buying an iPad are that I really want to try out many of the apps, and trying to discover its business potentials (may be even creating an app or two) and also review some iPad apps.

Stay tune for my first iPad app review.

3 lessons as chocolatier Bernard Callebaut enters receivership

Dec 9th, 2010 Update: Bernard Callebaut returns to market as Papa Chocolat, Calgary Herald. I am not sure what to make of Papa Chocolat as I can’t quite see pass the failed business mess in “Bernard Callebaut”, the business.

***

Many people were shocked and saddened by the news that Calgary-based chocolatier Bernard Callebaut went into receivership yesterday. (CTV & CBC news with videos) The following are three possible lessons from this sad story.

Lesson 1 – Cash Flow:

Cash flow is one of the most important thing in keeping a business alive. Without a healthy cash flow, one cannot keep a business viable. Leo Donlevy at the University of Calgary’s Haskayne School of Business made a valid point (emphasis added),

“… it appears that growing the business got Callebaut into trouble.

“Many businesses … bought very expensive real estate assets and other assets when times were good,” Donlevy said. “And times went bad, and being the maker of a luxury product, sales probably went down and cash flow dried up, and [Callebaut] got in trouble with his lenders.“

The important thing is to strike a balance on how much to borrow without hurting the viability of a business in the long run. Incidentally, for companies with solid businesses and steady cash flow, the current economic downturn can actually be a good time to renegotiate some long term loans to more favourable rates and terms. And this may also be a good time to establish credit facilities at reasonable rate for future needs when the economy inevitably gets back on its feet. The best time to get a credit line for your business is, paradoxically, when you don’t need the money.

The lessons here are: pay close attention to your cash flow, don’t over extend your borrowing, setup credit facilities/line of credit when you don’t need the money.

Lesson 2 – Investing:

I originally wanted to write a more in-depth article about two chocolate bonds including the Callebaut three series of Participating Notes. I went as far as requesting the term sheet for the Callebaut Notes so that I can review the notes for their investment quality. Unfortunately, because the Callebaut’s audited financial statements are not part of the investor package, I was unable to determine how good/bad Callebaut as a business so I wasn’t able to evaluate its notes.

The fact that the minimum offering for the Callebaut Notes was $3,500,000 with $3,150,000 going to debt repayment, $150,000 to working capital, and $350,000 to debt commissions, also raised some concern in my mind. In hindsight, it is clear why $3.15 million of the $3.5 million was planned for debt repayment.

The lesson here is you shouldn’t feel bad if you don’t understand some investment opportunities and don’t feel comfortable enough in investing in them. Because sometime these “opportunities” may not be good investments at all.

Lesson 3 – Brand

Bernard Callebaut is a loved brand/Lovemark of mine. I wrote this in 2006, and here is an excerpt from a 2007 article,

My personal Lovemarks in chocolate are See’s Candies (my childhood favourite) and Bernard Callebaut by the award winning Belgium chocolatier (“a mischievous boy“) living and headquartered in Calgary. I once bought a small bag of Bernard Callebaut chocolate to share with my better half. Ah, when I got home, I think I only left one or two to her. I don’t think I mentioned there was a bag of them.

I don’t know how close I can or should compare Bernard Callebaut with See’s Candies, but I know See’s Candies has been an exceptionally good investment over the years for Warren Buffett. With Bernard Callebaut now in receivership and possibly available at a fire sale price, a really great investment deal may be available.

So if Bernard, the creditors, Deloitte, and potential investors can work out a reasonable deal for all, the Bernard Callebaut brand should survive. And it is very possible that a new owner and management team can turn the company around and keep the Bernard Callebaut brand going for years to come.

More news from: Calgary Sun, Calgary Herald

Crossed posted as an examiner.com article.

Rookie Blue – First 6 episodes

If you haven’t seen the new Global/ABC show Rookie Blue yet, go check it out and you can watch it online in Canada. After watching the first 6 episodes, I am totally loving it. Very well made. Watch it.

When Ricky met Arlene: the unlikely story of a football star and a midwife

Lovely TorStar story, “When Ricky Williams met Arlene Vandersloot
In 2006, an NFL celebrity moved next door to a Toronto midwife and her four kids. It was the beginning of an unexpected but lifelong friendship.“