Student Opinions: Will bitcoin regulation undermine its value?

As HSBC completes the world’s first commercially viable trade-finance transaction using blockchain, we ask our students: Is this a huge step towards efficiency and reducing errors in the funding of international trade, or does this undermine cryptocurrency’s value and decentralised character?

Georgie Hazell, MBA Participant 2018: “The clarity offered by regulation would probably increase the perceived legitimacy of virtual currencies. My vote is for regulation [acting like a] speed-bump in the short term, but an incentive in the longer term, boosting value and offering protection for investors. Speculation around regulation will probably cause greater volatility in the bitcoin price than actual implementation. When investors are unsure about the legitimacy of their cryptocurrency and how they are going to be taxed when they sell it, they will probably avoid or at least hold it until clarification is given.

Regulation could come in a number of forms, from reducing anonymity through demanding real names on bitcoin holdings and transactions, to outright bans (as in India). The trends in South Korea, with an initial plunge followed by a levelling out as the effects were clarified, is likely to offer a framework for other regions. The UK could do worse than following Japan’s lead, developing regulations that support the healthy growth of the technology.”

Gana Alampalle, MBA Participant 2018: “Bitcoin’s value lies in being an anonymous, effortless and secure payment system…in theory. This is also true for the numerous ‘alt-coins’ that have cropped up aiming to penetrate the market, each with their own USPs. It’s hard to see what real value that cryptocurrencies would offer if they were to be regulated. Prices would decrease substantially if anonymity were to be taken away. To add to this, hard-line regulations could potentially push cryptocurrencies further underground into the dark web where they would inevitably be traded illegally and continue to promote illicit activities.

What could be key to keeping the value of cryptocurrency is to manage exchanges and initial coin offerings while protecting the security and anonymity of coins by design. Policy makers have historically been good at regulating and appropriating currency innovations that the private sector put out. Effective cryptocurrency regulation however could be a tall order given the amount of international co-operation needed.”

The Exeter MBA’s ‘Leading in the 4th Industrial Revolution’ immerses students in emergent technological innovations. Blockchain applications continue to make headlines as the biggest revolution since the internet, and this month the University welcomed a global leader in research and development of blockchain technologies, nChain Group, to field questions in a discussion panel. Watch it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fx2Cne2Vw9M

The sweet spot: Why spaceships can help us design for a circular economy

According to Dana Meadows (1992), to reach systems change, the most important element is to have the power to transcend paradigms.

This is hard to do with anyone, let alone MBA students.

This week, Adam Lusby, adjunct lecturer at the Exeter MBA and Delfina Zagarzazú, 2016 Alumni, piloted a 2 day workshop coined Generation Space, where 43 students worked on the mission:

“Scope and define the internal characteristics of a spaceship that can evolve to host 1000 people for 1000 years for generational interstellar space travel”                

By setting the context in a galaxy, students were allowed to enter a new paradigm without considering it, allowing re-design  to happen at many different levels of a system including food, water, manufacturing and health to meet the needs of life in space.

Using Design Thinking to guide the process, the exploratory phase of  it allowed students to push the boundaries of creativity whilst in ideation staying aware of the need to build a circular economy strategy for the underlying importance of closed loop design to keep resources in use through the voyage.

What is your strategy to ensure the continuous uptime performance of all your resources? In other words, how do you propose to keep products, components, and materials at their highest utility and value during the voyage?

Further inspiration for circular design was enabled by Chris Grantham and Arianne Orillac who lead Circular Economy at IDEO in London who guided the spaceships to consider reiteration of product design onboard using circular economy strategy cards.

After prototypes and definition of spaceship purpose, teams were judged by an all women panel to put their circular innovations forward.

  • Hege Saebjornsen, Country Sustainability Manager, IKEA UK & IE
  • Lynn Maxwell, Sustainability Developer, IKEA UK & IE
  • Emilie Sandberg, Creative Leader, IKEA UK & IE
  • Arianne Orillac, Circular Business Designer, IDEO London

This project is part of the Corporate Challenge 2018 in collaboration with IKEA and IDEO.

Blog written by Delfina Zagarzazu

The Global Challenges of our Times – Digital Connectivity

humans

In a digital age people still matter and connecting well to those that you lead certainly matters

A post by Jacqueline Bagnall

Even with the computing power to analyse huge datasets and the big data world of companies such as IBM, there is still the need for the human sense maker. The human ability to ask questions and make sense of the results, spotting inconsistencies and better defining the question at the core of the analysis.  As automation takes hold and we see the diminished need for low skilled manual labour, this calls for a better understanding of how the human mind can add value to the organisation. What is it that creates the difference between competing organisations when the slick precision of a wholly automated function delivers product perfection?

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Iconic London Venue for One Planet MBA Event

20 Fenchurch Street – perhaps better known as the Walkie-Talkie Building – was the venue for the latest showcase event organised by the One Planet MBA on the 28th April.

walkie talkie

The ‘walkie talkie’ building at 20 Fenchurch Street

Business Challenges (and developing the talent to solve them)” was the title of the event – kindly hosted by specialist insurance providers Markel International and aimed at exhibiting the talent on offer from the University of Exeter Business School’s flagship programme.

With representatives from a host of organisations in attendance (including Accenture, PwC, Marks & Spencer, The Fairtrade Foundation, Barclays, IBM, Canon, Flock Associates, WWF and BT) – along with One Planet MBA alumni, current staff and students from the programme – the event showcased the One Planet MBA, its achievements and talent and included a keynote speech from Peter Lacy, Global Managing Director, Accenture Strategy, on the Circular Economy – a topic fundamental to the One Planet MBA.

markel

Arriving at Markel

Peter Lacy gave an address (described as “sensational” by one attendee) outlining his vision of how “…incentives and initiatives are needed to rethink economic structure and encourage circular economy…”, thus negating “wasted capacity and under-utilised assets”.  His lecture was followed by a panel discussion involving Govia Thameslink Railway, Coca-Cola Enterprises and IBM on the value they have got out of engaging with the MBA. Continue reading

FT Preview – Teaching the Impact of Climate Change to the Leaders of Tomorrow

What happened yesterday had been anticipated for a long time. The opening of the United Nations’ 21st Conference of the Parties (or COP21 in a nutshell) in Paris yesterday evidences how urgent the need to tackle climate change has become. A recent paper in Nature shows how horrendous the economic and human cost of climate change would be – with about a quarter of the world’s GDP wiped off by 2100 and the burden of the cost falling onto the world’s poorest countries left to pay the price for it.

Teaching the Impact of Climate Change to the business leaders of tomorrow

While the Financial Times gave editorial prominence (subscription req’d) to its coverage of the opening of COP21, it also features an article more focused on MBA programmes that that deliver a more sustainable approach to business and management education.

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Thomson Reuters support One Planet MBA participants develop their reputation through thought leadership

The One Planet MBA programme is designed and shaped by our network of corporate partners who contribute to the planning and delivery of many modules and MBA activities. Thomson Reuters are sponsoring our MBA’s Personal Transformations module which

The answers company

equips our participants with the skills to advance their careers and explore new opportunities for themselves. As part of our partnership, Thomson Reuters supports the development of our MBA participants in their quest for reputation through thought leadership.

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Launching the MBA’s Business Insights 2020 Workshops for Business Professionals

The One Planet MBA is all about helping professionals and business leaders reinvent Business Insights 2020themselves and thrive in a world that is increasingly volatile, risky, complex, interconnected, resource-constrained and digital. And it is precisely for that reason that we have partnered with Devon and Cornwall Business Council, the South West’s premier business organisation to launch our forward looking and cutting edge series of Business Insights 2020 workshops specially targeted at business professionals threatened by disruption. Each workshop link with individual modules on the MBA programme, and act as an introduction to the topic.

The series kicked off on Wednesday evening and focused on the theme of business model creation.
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Welcoming the Class of 2016

After months of anticipation we finally welcomed our new Full Time and Executive MBA Hello worldparticipants to the Business School. A truly international group once again, we have over 40 students from 17 different countries, ranging from Australia and Canada to the USA, Uganda and Vietnam. With an average of 11 years work experience, the Class of 2016 comprises of promising business professionals with expertise in a range of industry sectors including engineering, IT, marketing, education and law. Throughout the year you will read their stories on this blog as they share their expectations, enthusiasm and challenges as they go through a life changing experience. Continue reading

Getting Ready for Another Year!

Ever since its creation back in 2010 our One Planet MBA has always had that “cutting

Our new website... coming soon online near you!

Our new website… coming soon online near you!

edge” feel to it. Complete with a new visual identity and a strapline, our 2015/16 programme is yet again at the forefront of innovation: both our Full Time and Executive programmes benefit from curriculum enhancements through new modules, masterclasses, new corporate partnerships, more practitioners’ involvement and an integrated approach to the personal development of its participants.

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Being at the Spearhead of the Fintech Revolution

By Tico Altahona,
MBA student 2014/5

Too big to fail”, is how the importance of banks has traditionally been defined, as they are so large and interconnected that if they collapse, there would be a chain reaction that would affect the whole economy. They are the link that connects the economy and lets everything happen: from government policy (expand the circulation with credits) to buy groceries (payment services).

We are living in exciting moments because a revolution is happening right now. There are serious threats to the banks foundations, and I am happy to announce that I am part of it. The Financial Technology (Fintech) revolution has been made by start-ups that use Internet and mobile applications to side step banks. Companies like Droplet are now able to replace the traditional services offered ONLY by banks, in this particular case: payments with cards.

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