1. Sandymount Draft
You might remember seeing a video last year of Sandymount’s draft dispense technology, allowing beer or non-alcoholic beer to be dispensed at a bar from a tiny keg of concentrate, by adding CO2 and filtered water. Over the last months the Sandymount team has been working hard to develop a user interface that allows operators (and soon also consumers) to see the temperature, alcohol % and carbonation of the beer (or non-alcoholic beer) being poured in real time. Stay tuned for a video update.
2. Point5Brewing.com – Non-alcoholic Beer
Point 5 continues to sell online for home delivery – and now at a significantly reduced price point. Point 5 non-alcoholic beer is designed for an easy-drinking real beer taste and, if it is to make a dent in people’s lives as regular refreshment, it became clear that a lower price point was necessary. Much of what will allow this price improvement is a move to a canned format in the autumn, which will significantly reduce the weight and size of packages to be delivered. Until then, we’ve dropped the prices on bottles anyway, so pricing should stay consistent through the transition. www.Point5Brewing.com/shop is where you can find it.
3. ShopRespond.com – Hand Sanitizer Business
From the end of March until the end of June, the ShopRespond team managed to pull together a supply chain from scratch and produce over 1.5 million bottles of hand sanitizer. Over the last weeks, we have been winding down operations and are almost done with donating the proceeds from this initiative. Well done to Anton Hunt, Adam Weiner, Dana Hemmert, Gina Brooks-Zak, Chris Lazarte, John McGovern & Barry McGovern. Press release to follow shortly.
4. Risk Savvy – A book by Gerd Gigerenzer
A practical book on the benefits of keeping things simple when making complicated decisions.
5. You can now use a Quantum Computer
Why would you want to do this? Quantum computing is apparently still in its early days in terms of being useful for anything, so the best reason to do it is probably for the craic. IBM is making available a few quantum computers to mess around on (remotely). I’ll let ye know how trying it out goes. You can too here: https://quantum-computing.ibm.com/docs/guide/iqx/the-quantum-world
6. Rockets look like fun
Lovely technical video here on rocket design from Tim the everyday astronaut.
7. Internet may come from the sky instead of cables?
SpaceX and OneWeb are lobbing satellites into low orbit – low meaning close enough that they could send internet down to earth without it being too slow. One of the problems right now is how to cost effectively build receivers. There’s a decent article from CNBC.
What does this mean for Ireland’s broadband plan? Could we end up laying a ton of fibre only to find internet will come to us from the sky?
As per usual, I’m keen to chat or learn more on all of the above, reach out. Cheers.
Footnote: What happened to the Desalination Barge Concept? It’s still there lurking in the background for right opportunity/timing – and may continue to do so for years 😉