Podcasts about toray

Something to Say? Send Us a Message!Ever wondered what it takes to disrupt an industry and create the perfect running  and lifestyle gear? On this episode of Choose to Endure, we bring you an exclusive conversation with CEO Scott Bailey and  Co-Founder Floris Gierman, two of the driving forces behind PATH Projects apparel company.  Frustrated by the lack of quality running shorts, Scott took matters into his own hands to design gear built specifically for ultra runners.  Learn about their journey and evolution, their meticulous attention to detail, and the sustainable design philosophy that fuels PATH Projects, ensuring every piece of apparel meets both the high standards of endurance athletes AND discerning lifestyle customers.Discover the cutting-edge technology that sets PATH Projects apart from other brands. We discuss innovative fabric selections like Primeflex from Toray of Japan and Tencel derived from eucalyptus trees, chosen for their superior properties. Scott and Floris give us a sneak peek into their just-released Wadi product line featuring Toray's Fieldsensor fabric and share insights on other technological advancements such as micro dot laser welding and Karushi bonded fleece yet to come. Listen in to find out why these materials and techniques are game-changers for ultra running apparel.Finally, we dive into practical tips for long-distance races, covering essential topics like pacing, nutrition, hydration, and the importance of thoroughly testing your gear before race day. Scott and Floris share their strategies to prevent chafing and blisters, ensuring you stay comfortable throughout your run. We also explore the brand's focus on men's products and the playlist music that keeps us moving during those grueling miles, especially The Cure! Whether you're a seasoned ultra runner, new to the sport or just looking for the best new clothing around to hit the trails or relax in at the coffee shop, this episode promises valuable insights to elevate your experience.  Listen/Rate/Review!PATH Projects:https://pathprojects.comWebsite:https://www.choosetoendure.com/YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@ChoosetoEndureInstagram:https://instagram.com/choose_to_endure?utm_source=qr Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61552757049526

AquaMembranes is a company that develops novel water treatment technologies, specifically focusing on enhancing the efficiency of reverse osmosis (RO) membranes. Their technology is designed to use less energy and improve the lifespan of membranes, thereby providing both environmental and economic benefits to communities and industries in need.The podcast features a deep dive into how water technology, particularly the innovations by AquaMembranes, plays a pivotal role in both safeguarding environmental sustainability and bolstering economic performance. Craig Beckman discusses the company's approach to improving reverse osmosis membranes which significantly reduces energy consumption and extends membrane life—key factors in reducing operational costs and enhancing water availability. The conversation also covers the broader economic impacts of water management, investment trends in green technologies, and the challenges in scaling and adopting new technologies. Insights into the dynamics between financial goals and sustainability objectives offer a nuanced view of the water tech industry's future.I hope this teaser makes you crave for more! If you dive into this week's full release of the podcast, you'll learn how:

Amigos, este es un program con el que me he tropezado y que prácticamente junto a otros 5 o 6 de la primera y 2 temporadas del Podcast Annavalaina tenía olvidado. En este caso el programa es un que había preparado en la Temporada 4 sobre dos colecciones de libros de la Editorial Toray, la Colección MINICLASICOS y la Colección PÉNDULO (esta última con cuentos de Enid Blyton), ambas ilustradas por Maria Pascual. Este programa además tiene bien para pedir a ver si sacar estas colecciones de libros infantiles tal y como en el pasado sacaron la colección de Cuentos.

Today, we have the privilege of engaging with Toray's experts, Sales Director Sean Carter and Product Line Manager Ben Freeman. The show kicks off with an in-depth look at Toray Membrane USA, underscoring its commitment to USA manufacturing. Explore whether Toray's innovative solutions are manufactured in the USA, as we delve into the technological landscape and advancements that define Toray's industry presence. Click here to watch Mining Now Partner

Timestamps:0:00 - Intro0:46: - jibbitz4:00 - Top 5 favorite paddles8:15 - Scorpius discussion13:46 - Best paddles for the price26:57 - Thermoforming rant31:50 - Paddles that flopped37:40 - Toray has become a buzzword 44:36 - What companies are doing well53:00 - What are companies doing poorly?58:15 - Kevlar and nomex1:05:31 Will's announcementChris Socials:Instagram: https://bit.ly/3GO6s5OFacebook: https://bit.ly/3x5pRMAWill Socials:YouTube: https://bit.ly/3znyPHSInstagram: https://bit.ly/3H1qriN

Mike opens the show saying Toray failed them that day.Apparently she knew of a road closure and didn't speak up.This leads to a long discussion about how people they encounter do some dumb things. Examples include people driving down the safety lane on the highway to get around traffic, only to cause more traffic.

“Los esclavos de Silón” es una historia de ciencia-ficción, guerras interplanetarias y aventuras espaciales de Red Arthur, cuyo auténtico nombre era Arturo Rojas de la Cámara, y se corresponde con el número 56 de la colección Espacio El Mundo Futuro, editado por Toray, nada menos que en 1957, y reeditado por la editorial Andina a través del número 338 de la colección de bolsilibros EASA – Galaxia 2001 en el año 1984, en la portada podemos ver un viajero espacial dentro de una nave en la que reina el caos y alguien está activando una palanca de la que surge un destello amarillo.

Today we have the incredible honor of interviewing a design and brand building rockstar! Reinhard Pascher has 30 years of experience in product innovation and brand building. He is the co-founder of the brand agency Pascher + Heinz in Munich Germany. He works for both clients and agencies at an executive level and he has developed concepts and strategies for upcoming and leading sports brands like Nike, Odlo, Adidas, Volvo, Dynafit, Atomic, Head, Salewa, Toray, Red Bull and many many more. Reinhard is also a jury member in some of the world's best design and innovation awards like Ispo brand New, Volvo Sports Design Forum and Award, and the German Design Award. Listen to Reinhard's fascinating stories where we cover topics like what makes for great design, Innovation, design awards, inspiration, motivation, and what makes brands succeed (or not…) This interview is such a goldmine for everybody interested in outstanding design, innovation, and brand building. And if you really enjoy the interview, pls rate and review the podcast on the platform you are using, to help spread the word so more people can enjoy and learn from it! We appreciate you! Happy listening! Show notes Pascher+Heinz Design Agency: Visit them here! Sign up for the AE Summer School: Register Here! ISPO Brandnew Awards: Visit the website. German Design Award: Visit the website.

Have you enjoyed a hanami or cherry blossom flower viewing party this year.  One of the great Japanese traditions I have to say. Today we are talking about when the system fails you, what do you do?  Creativity isn't part of the Japanese education system and how to think is being replaced with how to do.  We need innovation though and we need creative people.  Today we are going to look at what we need to be doing, given the government has dismantled liberal arts curriculums in favour of hard skills.  How do we get ideas from our teams so we can win the battle for innovation in business.  Welcome back to this weekly edition every Tuesday of "THE Cutting Edge Japan Business Show" I am your host Dr. Greg Story, President of Dale Carnegie Training Japan and best selling author of Japan Sales Mastery. We are bringing the show to you from our High Performance Center in Akasaka in Minato-ku, the business center of Tokyo. Why the Cutting Edge?  In this show, we are looking at the critical areas for success in business in Japan.  We want to help advance everyone's thinking so that we be at the forefront, the Cutting Edge, of how to flourish here in this market.   Before we get into this week's topic, here is what caught my attention lately. The number of Japanese farmers shrank  fifty  six percent since nineteen  ninety five  to one  point eight  two  million.  Their average age rose to sixty  seven from fifty  nine  in the period since nineteen  ninety  five. To cope with the issue the Agriculture Ministry adopted a “smart agriculture” policy in two  thousand and fourteen  to promote robotics and information technology to boost farm productivity.  Machinery maker Kubota developed self driving tractors that cost eleven million yen or around one hundred thousand dollars.  They also sell pesticide spraying drones to automate some of the field work.  The smart agriculture market is expected to grow by fourteen  percent to  fourteen  point seven  billion  yen or one  hundred  and  thirty  million dollars, this year and double in the next five  years according to the Yano Research Institute. In other news, US food company Just and Japanese meat producer Toriyama Chikusan Shokuhin have forged a partnership for the development of lab grown wagyu beef, with the aim of distributing it globally.Just will culture cells taken from Akagi brand wagyu cows in order to v=create the same quality as real Akagi beef. The US Food and Drug Adminstration and the Agriculture Department have agreed to jointly introduce regulations on lab grown meat in anticipation of its expected commercialization.  Finally, in  two thousand  and  sixteen social security expenditures including public pensions, medical insurance and other benefits reached  one  hundred  and  sixteen point  nine  trillion yen or over one  trillion dollars.  I wonder how much a trillion dollars is?  Too many zeros.  Anyway, it's a lot.  In twenty  twenty  five all of the post war baby boomers will be seventy  five  or older, further pushing up the cost of social security benefits.  Expenditures are expected to hit one  hundred  and  ninety trillion yen or one point seventy  two  trillion dollars.  The population of over sixty  five year olds will peak in twenty  forty  two  at thirty  nine  million. This is episode number seventy five and we are talking about  War Declared On Soft Skills In Japan     Soredewa ikimasho, so let's get going.The road to innovation in Japan has been a long one.  The “yutori” or relaxed education experiment started in the late 1980s didn't last very long.  The idea was that the focus on rote memorization needed to be changed to include more emphasis on creative thinking.  School days were reduced to five from six days a week.  Homework burdens were lightened.  The idea was a good one, yet as soon as Japan started to sink in international rankings for tests that favour rote memorization skills, the Japanese establishment panicked and threw the whole experiment straight out the window.    Fast forward to 2015, when then Education Minister  Hakubun  Shimomura told Japanese universities to take “active steps to abolish (social science and humanities departments) or convert them to serve areas that better meet society's needs”. There was no wiggle room on interpreting the message – he clearly said do what we say or we will cut your funding. Japanese universities were weak in the face of the new policy position of the Japanese government and meekly complied.   The justification was that this was needed  “in light of the decrease of the university age population, the demand for human resources and the function of national universities”.  Abenomics declares that the role of national universities is to produce “human resources that match the needs of society by accurately grasping changes in industrial structure and employment needs”.  Abe himself declared in  2014 in his OECD speech that “rather than deepening academic research that is highly theoretical, we will conduct more practical vocational education that better anticipates the needs of society”.   This was pretty curious stuff coming from Abe's Cabinet.  A couple of years ago, for the first time, we started to hear from our clients about their interest in having  more liberal arts aspects to their company in-house education programmes. They told us they need people who can think, can articulate their thoughts and they are looking to encourage more diversity of views.  They wanted to encourage innovation as a direct result of this effort.   Was this another part of the political thrust to the right under Abe?  Was the objective to create a technocrat population of docile people who can toe the line and follow orders?  The Japan Times noted, “Without exception, totalitarian states invariably reject knowledge in the humanities and states that reject such knowledge always become totalitarian”.  Was this a Sputnik moment for Abe, when his answer to Japan falling behind was to ape the America of the 1950s and stress mathematics and science subjects, to produce more engineers to solve Japan's problems?   The vocational relevancy of Abe's attack on “soft skill” subjects is in serious doubt.  Companies we deal with are stressing the development of people who can communicate, think, share ideas and be creative.  The Japanese industry peak body, the Keidanren, was at complete odds with the Abe Cabinet over just what are relevant vocational skills.  Then Keidanren Chairman  Sadayuki  Sakakibara, from Toray, made this point, “Some media reported that the business community is seeking work-ready human resources, not students in the humanities, but this is not the case”.  He also noted that Japanese business people desire the “exact opposite”.  They want students who can solve problems based on “ideas encompassing the different fields” of science and humanities.   The Science Council of Japan at the time weighed in as well backing the importance of the humanities. In cooperation with the natural sciences they are there to solve “contemporary problems domestically as well as internationally.  So what does this all mean? Find out more when we come back from the break   Welcome backAre we setting ourselves up for failure?  The population of students is set to decline by one third from  650,000 students in  2018  to 480,000  in 2031.  Abe was correct to identify the critical importance of a diminishing human resource for business, but his antidote seems completely at variance with what business needs in Japan.    As many companies make the move overseas, technical abilities are needed but dealing with diversity as a leader becomes even more critical for the success of the enterprise. It is well recognised that soft skills are the keys to successfully leading an international business.  The supply of humanities graduates will disappear in line with government policy. Therefore, the pressure on companies to compensate becomes much greater.  Companies however are not liberal arts colleges where students have the luxury of time, to sit around thinking and pontificating on philosophical matters.   What can be done within companies to encourage more out of the box thinking?  Creating a safe environment for idea generation would be a good start.  Most brainstorming methodologies used in Japan in firms tend to kill ideas at the generation stage by critiquing them as they emerge.  Better to allow a thousand flowers to bloom, to get out as many ideas as possible, before any cutting is done.   Bosses constantly yelling orders to their staff, need to ease up on that and instead ask questions. These will get their staff thinking rather than just doing.  Inviting staff ideas on what needs to be done, as well as how to do it makes a lot of sense if your want to create a creative environment.   The hardest thing in Japan will be how to deal with errors and mistakes.  This whole country is a mistake free zone.   Understanding that the innovation process is messy is a good staring point.  Expecting that people won't do new things perfectly from the start is also a necessary shift in thinking.  Some “yutori” injection is needed inside companies to encourage people to step outside their comfort zone.   If you haven't started looking at these issues now would be a good time to start.  The educational system will continue to put forth robots, who will be passive and wait for instructions.  It will be like a nation of Siris and Alexas will be produced, hanging around to be told what to do.   Start with some regular brainstorming activities for the teams.  These creative muscles need regular than infrequent exercising. Instead of beanbags and electronic games, give the team something concrete and interesting to work on. Also implement the results because this is highly motivating and where most companies fail.  Get those great ideas off the paper stuck to the walls and get them into plans with names, dates, and measures attached to them. THE Cutting Edge Japan Business Show is here to help you succeed in Japan.  Subscribe on YouTube, share it with your family, friends and colleagues, become a regular. Thank you for watching this episode and remember to hit the subscribe button. Our website details are on screen now, enjapan.dalecarnegie.com, it is awesome value, so check it out. Please leave me some feedback on YouTube, I would love to know how this show helped and what other topics you are interested in for me to cover.  Remember I am here as a free resource to help you, so just tell me how I can help you best. In episode seventy six we are talking about Your Own Leader Voice. Find out more about that next week. So Yoroshiku Onegai Itashimasu please join me for the next episode of the Cutting Edge Japan Business Show We are here to help you and we have only one direction in mind for you and your business and that is UP!!!

Join us as we discuss the myths and truths about base layer clothing options. What should I use in warm weather vs. cold weather? How should I dress for wet conditions and on backpack hunts? Jason Hairston shares all the secrets with us to help you be more prepared in the field this season!  Follow KUIU on Instagram at @kuiu_official or online at www.kuiu.com. Follow Jason on Instagram at @jasonmhairston.  Follow Huntin' Fool on Instagram at @builttohunt.  For questions and/or comments on our podcast, call 435-865-1020.

Randall Jacobs, Co-Founder of THESIS Bike drops in to talk about the development process and vision for the OB1 bicycle. THESIS Bike Online THESIS OB1 Specifications CRAIG: All right. Hello everyone. Today we've got Randall Jacobs from THESIS Bike here, live in person. We're going to talk to him about the THESIS Bike Company and what his inspiration was. We actually just got back from a sample ride here in Marin county riding the new OB1 bike and I'm really excited to introduce everybody to Randall. So thanks for joining us.   RANDALL: Thanks for having me.   CRAIG: I always like to start by finding out a little bit about your background as a rider. Did you start more on the mountain bike side or on the road side?   RANDALL: So I started racing mountain bikes as an undergraduate. I was playing football and broke my foot. Cycling was the first thing I could do and I took to the bicycle on the mountain bike side and did the collegiate series, found that I was reasonably good at it and stuck with it. It's become a real lifestyle ever since.   CRAIG: And did that lead you into other elements of the sport?   RANDALL: I went on to move overseas for a period and rode on and off. When I was 25, I had a life event where my father became sick. I was looking at where he was. He had a brain tumor at the time, so pretty bad prognosis. I said, what are the things I'd like to have accomplished in his position? Being a pro athlete was one of those things. So I started training full time. I was lucky to win a couple of national championships as an amateur shortly after he passed and then spent the subsequent couple of years living out of my Honda Element traveling around the country with a fleet of bicycles that was worth probably 5X what the car was worth.   CRAIG: So you're racing on the national mountain bike scene at that point?   RANDALL: Yeah. I was, you could say, pack fodder on the US Cup circuit, and then I'd have a few good results in the local circuits.   CRAIG: What a great journey. Spending that much time doing it. I think it's something that a lot of people aspire to just following their dreams of bike racing and going out there and doing it and it's certainly not without its sacrifices.   RANDALL: It's certainly is.  I was fortunate in my case in that I had started a career in international trade and supply chain architecture where I could work remotely anywhere in the world. So in that regard it didn't cost too much, but you definitely put certain other things on hold being on the road all the time.   CRAIG: So when you hung up your racing cleats, what was next for you professionally?   RANDALL: From there I started a product development company where we were working with the same set of Chinese manufacturers that I had cultivated during my period running product and market development for the Chinese trading and manufacturing company. I then sold that company to one of our partners and went to work for Specialized in 2013. At Specialized, the Diverge project was in its early days. I actually ended up naming that bike and was the product developer for the project, so doing all the bike builds and negotiating all the deals with the vendors and so on, and coordinating the product and supply chain sides.   CRAIG: So you were helping sort of spec out the supply chain and the specifications for the original Diverge bike while you were there?   RANDALL: Correct. And doing a lot of the field testing and component compatibility testing to make sure everything was fully dialed, which is where you see my obsessive attention to detail come in.   CRAIG: The Diverge bike, it was really one of the first production, quote unquote gravel bikes to hit the market from a big manufacturers that right?   RANDALL: For sure. The first bike that was called a gravel bike. I mean, there had been people riding such bikes for quite some time. When that bike came out, it was the early days of drop bar disc brakes, which really opened up a lot not just for braking power and modulation, but also for tire clearance. That was a key enabling technology that allows you to have the sort of bikes we have today, the other one being tubeless tires. And in today's world, tubeless tires with really wide rims allows you to have a bicycle, a drop bar bike, that is fast like a road bike on the road and as capable or more so than what a mountain bike would have been not too long ago.   CRAIG: Gotcha. So the Diverge, was it the end all be all?  Was it everything you wanted to make in a gravel bike?   RANDALL: No. Of course, there are constraints on what we were able to do at that time for a variety of reasons. When you work for a big company, there's always going to be product decisions that are more due to a cost structure or needing to support a certain margin and marketing story. So with the OB1 it was really something I had been incubating for quite some time and it's my opportunity to take an unfettered approach to product from the ground up. I've had to compromise on nothing: not tire clearance, not stick-on or bolt-on magic elastomers attached to the frame, nothing. I just went ground up with pure evidenced-based curation of the components and the setup.   CRAIG: Interesting. So we're here to talk about your new company that you cofounded, THESIS Bike, and you just referenced your first model, the OB1. Some of the motivation has already come out in the conversation about why you wanted to start this company, but why now? What are the trends you're seeing? You're doing some unique stuff at THESIS that we'll get into as far as the bike itself and the business model, but why now and why are you guys the people to do it?   RANDALL: If you look at what we're doing, the primary innovation here is this business model. But the product itself is really cool and one I've been thinking about for awhile, so let's start with the product itself. So you saw bikes like the Open UP come online, which really brought an almost monster cross capability in a form factor that is more akin to an endurance road bike that's slacked out a little bit.   We wanted to go a step further. So if you look, we don't do a frame set. We do a complete bike for the cost of a frameset from the companies were competing with, and that's enabled by the business model innovation.   On the product side of things, [we have] a flat top handle bar with a shallow drop and a 10 degree flare so you’re narrow and relatively aero on the hoods, but in the drops you have that additional control which has benefits not just in gravel but also when you're just doing a road descent. You just had that much more leverage. Or even like in a sprint. You see this on ENVE’s road handle bars. They have a model that has a four degree flair, a little subtle thing. And I think you'll see flare bars start to catch on across disciplines, even with roadies or at least the more progressive roadies who aren't so traditional in their equipment choices.   On the wheels, we do 650B and 700C wheel pack package options. In our case both wheel packages use a high end carbon rim. With the 650B we go really wide, 27.3 internal width, so 33.3 external. And what that does is it takes your tire, like the WTB Byway we have as standard, and it brings it out from 47 to almost 50 millimeters and changes the profile such that the side knobs engage a bit sooner and you can drop the pressure down and not have the tire flopping around. So I'll ride out to the trail chasing down roadies at 45 psi and then I'll drop it down to 30 and the rear in 27 in the front and ride it like a full on cross country bike. And I'm passing people on dualies. So that's another kind of small detail along with the flare bar.   The other thing is the dropper post, which you experienced today, which really transforms the bike. Anyone who's coming from the mountain scene knows that you'd probably rather give up a couple inches of suspension rather than your dropper. On the gravel bike gets that much more game changing because you're starting with no suspension.   CRAIG: It was certainly an interesting moment for me. Randall generously let me take the dropper post on all the descents today. So I had a good time doing that and it was interesting because I've obviously I've ridden the dropper posts on my mountain bike quite regularly for the last half dozen years or so. And I was quite familiar with the benefits to that with the gravel bike. It was interesting creating that sort of pocket of space underneath me because I simply wasn't familiar with it ever doing that on a drop bar bike. And I definitely appreciated the tight integration with the lever so that on the SRAM shifter, Randall has hacked it so that it controls the dropper post for you. So instead of having a front chain ring, a shifter, I can shift the dropper posts down right from the handlebars.   RANDALL: Yeah. And that's a pretty simple hack that we will be documenting with a video real soon. But essentially with SRAM’s modern hydraulic front shifters, there's a one minute hack that's fully reversible to remove the ratchet mechanism and allow that shift lever to swing freely and thus actuate the dropper post, which is really slick. I use it more than I ever used the front derailleur.   CRAIG: So that was interesting. As most people who listened to his podcast know, I tend to ride my gravel bike on more mountain biking style terrain than the kind of flow and fire roads that are often known in other parts of the country for gravel. So for me, this is something I've been thinking about for awhile, checking out a dropper post. So it was a lot of fun. And I definitely will say that if you're on the type of steep terrain that sort of characterizes the terrain in Marin County, it's definitely a value add. And there's a small weight penalty but not a dramatic weight penalty given that sort of benefits of speed going down.   RANDALL: Yeah. There is this common misconception I'll describe where you pick up a bike and you say, “Oh, that's really light. It must be fast”. But really there's a lot of ways in which you can make a bike heavier and faster. So as an example, with a dropper post, you're able to descend that much faster, not just on the super steep terrain that we were riding today, but even on less steep but really fast terrain with loose sweepers where you don't drop it all the way down. You drop it down just enough so that you have a little bit more control and you can shift your weight back and so on, and you go through with more confidence. The other thing is you can brake that much harder. So you're braking vastly more with the rear brake versus the front brake. And you can break with both of them in a “holy crap” sort of situation and have more traction and not be ready to go over the handlebars like you would be if you were sitting on top of a fully extended post.   CRAIG: Yeah, I think it's one of those things that we will definitely start to see more and more of. I think there is a somewhat of a sentiment in gravel to be respectful of our road brethren and then the changes maybe are slower to be adopted for more aesthetic reasons than anything else, but I can definitely vouch for the, the sort of performance benefits of the dropper post from what I've evidenced today in today's short ride. I do want to talk about a little bit more about the frame set too. It's a carbon frame set, correct?   RANDALL” Yup. Full carbon frame set.   CRAIG: And you've got a lot of mounts spec’ed down there, which I think is interesting. So let's talk about the mounts and some of the other things that make this bike essentially a quiver killer. Something that you can replace your road bike. And many other bikes in your garage.   RANDALL: The frameset [features] a full carbon frame and fork. I'm using the same Toray carbon fiber that everybody else uses. In our case it's T700 to T800 other people give it some fancy acronym for the same thing. It's all mostly coming from the same place.   We've done a few things that are common and few things that are unique. So on the common side, we have a full suite of bosses: cage mounts inside the frame, third cage on the down tube, a bento up top. But we've [added] to the fork blades more bottle cage bosses that are also sturdy enough to handle a front rack. We have rear rack mounts as well. So you could set this up as a full touring setup and put 10 kilos or more on the front and 15 on the back, plus a frame bag, and be on your way for your next epic adventure.   Some other smaller details that I think are really important are on the fork. Steerer tube failure has always been a big concern of mine or you've seen a bunch of recalls in the industry, some of them associated with improper manufacturing but some of them associated with the clamping force of the stem actually crushing the carbon. And so if anyone in the audience has built a carbon frame of the carbon steer before they'll see that you have this expansion plug that goes in. And we looked at all of them and none that can be found on the open market did a good job of fully supporting the steerer. So we actually bonded an aluminum tube with a built in star nut into our forks, which you can then cut and shorten. And that's a safety feature. You really have no way to install it improperly because you don't install it. It's already there. And if you're traveling a lot and you're removing your stem and reinstalling it, you can over-torque it, but it's still not going to crush the carbon. Carbon is a brilliant material in tension, but it's terrible in compression. So that was another small detail where we really paid a lot of attention.   The other thing that you noticed is we decided to forego the drop stay which you see on a bike like the Open or the new Ibis Hakka. Those bikes accommodate a slightly larger tire. I think they can go up to like a 2.2. Our bicycle is optimized around a 700C x 40 or 650b x 47, which has the same radius as a 700C x 30. And that [the 700C x 30) is actually what we use on the road.   For our [650B] wheelset, we went with a wide rim that expands the tire to almost 50 millimeters. And what we found is that’s kind of the sweet spot for maintaining a road geometry, look and feel while still giving you all the capabilities of a borderline monster cross or light XC bike.   CRAIG: Gotcha. And you're offering both a single chain ring and a double chain ring. Correct?   RANDALL: Yeah. If you're considering going with the 1x, go for it. I’m all in on 1x myself. We’re offering the double because there's a lot of people who want to go that route. We can talk about pluses and minuses here. With the 1x you get the clutch so the chain’s not slapping around. It also frees up the left shift lever for the dropper, which I think, once you've experienced it, you won't want to ride without it. I think it's really a game changer as much as anything else you can do. But yeah, we'll do a 2x as well.   In both cases you have a few different gearing options so you can really dial it in. If you're not super fit and you live in a really hilly area, go with a 38 or 40 in the front. If you're super fit and live in a flatter area, go with a 46 with a 10-42 in the rear to give you plenty of high end. Same with the double. We're working on 46/30 or 48/32 options. We're just doing the compatibility testing right now before we offer it.   CRAIG: In addition to designing the frame, you've also designed the wheel set and some of the other components. Is that right?   RANDALL: Well, so this word designed. We started with a frame set that had all of the characteristics that we wanted. The same is true for the rims. And that's true in wheels in particular. Almost nobody is designing their own rems or if they do, they just spec a profile and they say to an engineer at the factory, please do the layup for me. So we started with a frame that met the vast majority of our criteria and then worked with the factory on over 100 different line item changes to bring it up to where we thought it needed to be. So simple things from additional chainring clearance, to adding 3K carbon reinforcement under every single boss and cut out in the frame to give it that much more strength and fray resistance, to adding fiberglass at all the interfaces with metal so you don't get galvanic corrosion. All these little granular things that you don't think about until it's a year down the road and you're trying to remove your seat post and it won't come out because it's bonded to the carbon. We did all of those things.   CRAIG: Presumably you were traveling overseas to work directly with the factory.   RANDALL: Oh yeah. Yeah. So I've spent a couple of weeks in the factories and then quite a bit of time late at night on calls. That gives us a big advantage.   I've been working in supply chain since I started working. This was back when I was 21. I'm approaching 36 now. I'm a fluent mandarin speaker, so that allows a degree of relationship and interaction that's just not possible if you're an English speaker. So I go into a factory and I don't just speak English with the boss, I am speaking Mandarin with a line worker to understand the process that they're going through as they're making that part, what are the common failure modes as they're doing that so we can then work the engineers to design around it. And this is something that's really important to me and that I enjoy doing tremendously.   CRAIG: For those of our listeners who aren't that familiar with the bike industry, how different is that process from what a major manufacturer goes through? Are you dealing with the same types of factories, the same types of materials that you would be at a Specialized or a Trek?   RANDALL: Everyone's using from the same subset of factories, using the same materials, the same manufacturing techniques. There's almost nothing new in our industry. It’s rare that you come across something new, which is why you see quite a bit of odd looking “innovation”. It's really just a way of trying to stand out in some way. So part of our thesis is that we innovate only where that innovation provides a genuine benefit to the customer. So as an example, on our wheelset, we didn't design a custom profile. We went and found one of the best manufacturers in China, who's manufacturing rims for all the big players. They had an off the shelf rim. We worked with them to modify the layup slightly to make it optimized for a gravel application. So in our case, that meant taking a mountain bike rim with a mountain bike width that gives you that tire stability on the 650B set, and lightening the layup because it doesn't need quite as much of a burly build as it would for, say, the enduro application for which it was designed.   CRAIG: Gotcha. So in addition to the sort of manufacturing processes of the bike, you're reinventing how you're going to sell to customers. Obviously selling direct is not something totally new, but for the bike industry and customers purchasing a bike, it is a relatively new experience to go direct to a smaller brand and buy online. Can you just talk a little bit about that decision and the type of relationship you want to foster with the customers and why you thought it was important to direct?   RANDALL: Sure. From a product standpoint, it allows us to offer a very granular degree of customization. When you buy a traditional bike, you're buying a complete bike. If the handlebar width isn't right, the crank length isn't right, the gearing isn't right, you're then spending money after the fact to swap that out or you're just dealing with it. And that's unfortunate given how many times that bike has been marked up and what you're paying for it.   The other thing is, our price point is $2999, and for what we offer, that is, I mean, there's nothing else that approaches that. You can buy competing frame sets that cost that much or even slightly more. The way that we're able to accomplish that is by being as close to factory direct as you can get.   And it's actually better than factory direct because when you go factory direct, first off, no factory is going to sell you one handlebar, right? So you need a certain amount of buying volume to get that pricing. Additionally, component compatibility.  You'd have to deal with “how do I high spec my bike with all these components that I've curated”. You don't have the same access to information and resources that say somebody on the inside like myself is fortunate to have.   We took a model where we work directly with the same factories who are supplying all the big brands. We work with the top of the line, open components. So we have a hollow forged crank from Samox that is lighter than Rival and comes with a spindly chain ring, and it's a really stiff and bomb proof package that can take a rock strike.   That’s one example. It’s the same with our frame set, same with our wheel packages and so on. We do assembly of the wheels and bundling of certain components in China and ship those out. And then we bundle all the components from Taiwan and we ship those out from there. So you receive two boxes of components that have been validated to work really well with each other and that you've been able to customize to your particular body, your use case, and even to your style if you want to. If you had a baby blue car with little metallic flecks in the paint when you were in high school or something like that, and you want to replicate it, send us a Pantone number and for a small up-charge we’ll get you exactly the color that you want.   CRAIG: Wow. So you mentioned two boxes are going to get shipped. The bike is not assembled correctly when it arrives. That's a little bit different than some of the other direct to consumer brands who are touting [that] all you need is an allen wrench and we'll be ready to go in five minutes. Let's talk a little bit about that.   RANDALL: So there are some brands that I've heard do a pretty good job there. Canyon is one that stands out, they do a pretty good quality build is what I've heard from mechanics, but that is not the general standard. So if you talk to many who work in shops, the really good ones tend to disassemble a factory built bike and then reassemble it to make sure it's done right. It's just hard to get that attention to detail on a mass assembly line and furthermore, they're not fit to the rider. And so you're still having to do a bunch of tweaking and so on.   So going back to why we named the company THESIS, we saw a way to both have the net cost to the rider be lower and get them a product that fits them and their riding style much better. A frame up assembly at Sports Basement [a Bay Area retailer] is 280 bucks. And now you have a local mechanic who did that build to your standard, helped you tweak it and fit it and so on. Obviously a full on custom fit is going to be a little bit more money, but that's the case with all of these bikes. Nobody's bundling in a fit, and furthermore, it would cost us more to ship everything to a single facility, have it assembled poorly or not as well as it could be done locally, and then put it in a big box with yet another bit of packaging, and put everything in a big box and then ship it with higher tariff codes to some location where you receive it and still have to finish putting it together. And it's probably not dialed in and tuned properly. Right? So we looked at the experience and quality of product and the net cost to consumer all having a big advantage with this type of model.   CRAIG: Interesting. So the bike, the OB1 really can be quite a versatile chassis, if you will. It can be almost a platform for every type of riding that you want to do. As we've talked over the day that we've talked about road riding. So talk about the OB1 as a road bike.   RANDALL: Gravel bikes in general are just the road bikes that the industry should have been selling regular people all along. So you look road bikes and generally they’re race replicas. The head tubes are short. The steering is more aggressive. The tires are really skinny. People are still riding 23mm tires at 130 PSI, which not only is not comfortable, it's actually slower than a higher volume tire. Not to mention the braking on carbon rims in the wet and all these other issues. The OB1 we designed to be...the one bike for every road.   So as a road bike it's got an endurance road type geometry and the road wheel package that’s a 44 depth, 22 internal, a 30 external rim that we pair with a supple 30 millimeter tubeless tire from WTB that rides super smooth and super fast. So I'll take that bike and go out and hammer with the local hammerheads on Scotty's ride or do some of the longer road rides that we see out here and keep up just fine. There's no deficit., and actually with the dropper, I'm descending faster than they are because I can do it more confidently and more aero because I can get into that crazy tuck.   You get a lot of questions on the gravel side. We spoke about the advantages of the flare bar and the dropper and swapping in the 650B wheelset. In my case, on my road we'll set I run an 10-42 [cassette] to give me a little bit taller gearing on the high end. And then on the gravel set I run an 11-46, which gives me a little bit more low end so I can climb up all the dirt walls here in Marin. For touring. the geometry is long and stable enough where you can do light touring, which with today's gear makes it entirely capable. It’'ll take 10 plus kilos in the front and the rear. It has all the bosses for that. If you’re bike packing, it has plenty of room in the front triangle and again, has all the mounting points for anything you'd want to take.   If you look at the actual differences between these types of bikes, it's mostly tire clearance, mounting points, and marketing. Those are the primary differences between a road bike and gravel bike and a cross bike and all these other bikes. Some might add geometry, but that's more at the extremes. With the OB1, we have a geometry that is at the overlapping point in the Venn diagram of all these different sub-niches. So you really can have one bike for everything. And with this bike, we wanted to demonstrate that the myth of N+1, which is used to sell more bike, is false… At most, you need one bike with two wheel sets.   CRAIG: Yeah, it's interesting. I'm going to think that's a realization that many cyclists will come to in time. And it's, it's fascinating to me. And for those of my listeners who have listened for a long time, they know my journey to gravel riding came from this notion of bike packing that I never truly realized. But having a bike in the closet that enabled me to ride on the road, ride on gravel, which is my primary pursuit, and occasionally get out there and do some light touring or bike packing really was a revelation. And the realization that one bike really could do it all. And frankly when I'm in a group road ride, it's not my bike that's the limiting factor. It's generally my legs which goes to show [it’s not] the bike I'm riding. And I think your bike...can do it all. When you're really honest about the type of rider that you are and can be like, neither one of us are on the pro tour, so we're not looking for marginal gains that on the extremes.   RANDALL: And those marginal gains are very marginal. 80% of aerodynamic drag is your body. A good chunk of what remains is the wheels, and we have an aerodynamic wheelset that's paired with the wide tires so you really can get very close to the bleeding edge and still not have a machine that is compromised for every other application. If you're gonna go out and do the local crits, you might want to get a road bike. For all the rest of us, get one really good bike that you'll have a much better time on. You'll probably be faster with that one good bike versus spreading those same resources over several mediocre ones.   CRAIG: Yeah. Well it's a really interesting bike. It's a beautiful bike. I encourage everybody to go to the website. I'll put that in the podcast notes. So people can check it out and I think it's a bike that begs to be looked at. I think you show a lot of the different ways in which the bike can be used on the website, which is great. I think it gives our listeners a lot to think about. So what's next for THESIS bike? When can we order one? How can people find you? How can they learn more about the philosophy and just get to understand the brand and you as a designer?   RANDALL: By the time you broadcast this podcast, we will probably have sales live or be approaching it. We have a waitlist currently that is getting increasingly long. We've done a few sales with friends and family at this point just to run them through the buying process and work out all the kinks before we open it up to a general audience. But yeah, we're expecting within the next couple of weeks, so by the time this podcast goes out.   As far as what's next for THESIS, we mentioned that the bike comes 90 percent unassembled. We have some very interesting partnerships in the works for local assembly and are hoping to have that as a checkbox option at checkout when you buy your OB1.   A part of the vision here, in addition to wanting to make a great product and an innovative business model, is to really provide an opportunity for the unsung heroes of the bike industry, your mechanics and fitters as well as the factories that are actually producing and increasingly engineering things...for them to have new and better opportunities to be compensated for the work they do. Having a model where a mechanic can get paid for their expertise in helping you with your curation and fit, and then make money on the assembly experience as well. And have, instead of an oppositional relationship between mechanic and customer where the customer doesn't know if the mechanic is just trying to sell them something, to have a relationship. We work with those parties to provide the rider with the best experience possible, whether it be with equipment or maintaining that equipment.   The single best return on investment that you can get in cycling is not equipment. It may be diet, but after diet and training it is definitely a professional build and fit. You'll be more comfortable. Your equipment will last far longer. And we want to have a model that provides the right incentive structure where people take advantage.   CRAIG: Interesting. Well we definitely look forward to learning more about that. If people have questions for you are there social channels they can connect with you on, or an email address, website and the like?   RANDALL: You can find us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. You can contact me at randall@thesis.bike. or if you just have general questions, hello@thesis.bike.   CRAIG: Okay, great. Well best of luck with the brand. I look forward to riding with you again and continuing to spend a little bit more time on the bike. As I said, my initial ride shows it's a lot of fun, so I'm looking forward to that and I wish you guys all the best. For my listeners, definitely check out the website. I'll put it in the notes, put that in the media podcast notes so people can find you easily. And yeah, I hope you have a great summer with this.   RANDALL: Yeah, thanks a lot. Looking forward to that next ride.   CRAIG: Awesome.

Join Jason Hairston as he shares with us the story of how he came up with the idea for KUIU after his success in creating the Sitka brand. Jason has deep roots in the hunting industry and has created a special market segment for hunters who demand technical apparel and gear that keeps them safe, comfortable, and successful in the field. Learn more about Toray fabrics and what drives the future of KUIU Ultralight Hunting. Follow KUIU on Instagram at @kuiu_official or online at www.kuiu.com. Follow Jason on Instagram at @jasonmhairston.  Follow Huntin' Fool on Instagram at @builttohunt.  For questions and/or comments on our podcast, call 435-865-1020.

Jay Scott and Jason Hairston discuss the following topics:  Public Lands, KUIU staff, Toray, Fabrics, Primeflex, DWR's, Affordability, Retail Model Restrictions, Direct to Consumer, transparency, Future products, problem solving, gear testing, issues while in the mountains that create solutions, development team, testing your mind, body and soul, Why Sheep Hunting in Necessary for KUIU to be successful, Homegrown talent, overachieving staff, importance of each and every customer, brand buiding, slow build, competition, no pro staff, outsourcing credibility, word of mouth, KUIU World Tour, cuffs for taller guys, wholesale pricing, quality control standards, the best is yet to come, sewing lines, overseas production, Zinke, conservation, Synthetics vs. Merino Wool, Nuyarn technology, creating lightweight performance, workout gear line, youth line, Invetory levels, Business lessons learned, New color choices, Verde 2.0 and much more. www.JayScottOutdoors.com Instagram @JayScottOutdoors http://gouldsturkeyhunt.com/ http://www.colburnandscottoutfitters.com/ For more on KUIU http://www.kuiu.com/ https://www.instagram.com/kuiu_official/ https://www.instagram.com/jasonmhairston/ Sponsors of the JSO Podcast goHUNT.com/Insider Get $50 KUIU gift Card when signing up by using "jayscott" promo code  www.goHunt.com/jayscott http://www.kuiu.com/  http://www.phoneskope.com/ Use "jayscott16" promo code to get 10% off all products  http://outdoorsmans.com/ Use "jayscott" promo code to get 10% off all Outdoorsmans Products

Join Western Big Game Hunting Guide Jay Scott as he talks with Jason Hairston, Founder of KUIU.  In this episode we discuss new KUIU products that will be hitting the market soon, KUIU Live Event, Growth at KUIU, Demand for the Brand, Brand Building, The small little things that matter, Carbon Fiber, Toray scientists, Last Hunt at Nahanni Butte, Storm Star Tent. Download and Subscribe to "Jay Scott Outdoors Western Big Game Hunting and Fishing Podcast brought to you by goHUNT.com Insider" on iTunes or Podbean.  It's FREE! www.JayScottOutdoors.com www.ColburnandScottOutfitters.com Instagram @JayScottOutdoors For More on KUIU Founder Jason Hairston http://www.kuiu.com/ Sponsors of the JSO Podcast goHUNT.com/Insider https://www.instagram.com/gohunt/ https://www.facebook.com/GoHuntDotCom/?fref=ts http://www.phoneskope.com/ http://wildernessathlete.com/ http://outdoorsmans.com/ http://westernhunter.net/ http://utahhydrographics.com/

PM Abe Deletes Soft Skills Development   On June 8th this year Education Minister Hakubun Shimomura told Japanese universities to take “active steps to abolish (social science and humanities departments) or convert them to serve areas that better meet society's needs”. There was no wiggle room on interpreting the message – he clearly said do what we say or we will cut your funding. So far 26 have gotten the message and have complied with the new policy position of the Japanese government.   The justification was that this was needed “in light of the decrease of the university age population, the demand for human resources and the function of national universities”. Abenomics declares that the role of national universities is to produce “human resources that match the needs of society by accurately grasping changes in industrial structure and employment needs”. Abe himself declared in May last year in his OECD speech that “rather than deepening academic research that is highly theoretical, we will conduct more practical vocational education that better anticipates the needs of society”.   This is pretty curious stuff coming from Abe's Cabinet. About 18 months ago, for the first time, we started to hear from our clients about their interest in having more liberal arts aspects to their company in-house education programmes. They told us they need people who can think, can articulate their thoughts and they are looking to encourage more diversity of views. They wanted to encourage innovation as a direct result of this effort.   What are we witnessing here? Is this another part of the political thrust to the right under Abe? Is the objective to create a technocrat population of docile people who can toe the line and follow orders? The Japan Times noted, “Without exception, totalitarian states invariably reject knowledge in the humanities and states that reject such knowledge always become totalitarian”. Is this a Sputnik moment for Abe, when his answer to Japan falling behind is to ape the America of the 1950s and stress mathematics and science subjects, to produce more engineers to solve Japan's problems?   The vocational relevancy of Abe's attack on “soft skill” subjects is in serious doubt. Companies we deal with are stressing the development of people who can communicate, think, share ideas and be creative. The Japanese industry peak body, the Keidanren, is at complete odds with the Abe Cabinet over just what are relevant vocational skills. Keidanren Chairman Sadayuki Sakakibara, from Toray, made this point, “Some media reported that the business community is seeking work-ready human resources, not students in the humanities, but this is not the case”. He also noted that Japanese business people desire the “exact opposite”. They want students who can solve problems based on “ideas encompassing the different fields” of science and humanities.   The Science Council of Japan weighed in as well backing the importance of the humanities. In cooperation with the natural sciences they are there to solve “contemporary problems domestically as well as internationally.   Are we setting ourselves up for failure? The population of students is set to decline by one third over the next 15 years, from 650,000 students in 2018 to 480,000 in 2031. Abe is correct to identify the critical importance of a diminishing human resource for business, but his antidote seems completely at variance with what business needs in Japan.   As many companies make the move overseas, technical abilities are needed but dealing with diversity as a leader becomes even more critical for the success of the enterprise. It is well recognised that soft skills are the keys to successfully leading an international business. The supply of humanities graduates will disappear in line with government policy. Therefore, the pressure on companies to compensate becomes much greater. If you haven't planned for this requirement, the time to start is now.   Action Steps   Plan for University graduates needing more company delivered basic education   Make internal company education a differentiator for recruiting and retaining a diminishing resource – young people   Promote more soft skill training, especially communication, problem solving and critical thinking   Educate Middle Managers to become more skillful at encouraging a more diverse range of views on solving problems

Hear the unedited audio from the April 2, 2014 Torah 4 Tycoons business ethics lunch and learn series, presented by the Denver Community Kollel. The topic was, "In the Eye of the Beholders: The Ethics of Public Relations." The panel was moderated by Daniel Woodrow and featured Rabbi Mordechai Fleisher, senior lecturer, Denver Community Kollel; and Dean Rotbart, co-host of Radio Chavura and Business Unconventional (710 KNUS AM in Denver). The questions discussed included: Is it okay to present a front that may be misleading? What are the ehtics of making contributions to make an impression of generosity when ulterior motives are the driving force behind them? Does the Toray actually obligate one to put on a good face for the general public? How far does Halacha expect one to go to avoid suspicion of wrongdoing even when nothing has been perpetrated? Radio Chavura is proud to be a supporter of the Denver Community Kollel. Photo (clockwise):  Actor, Ron Moody who played "Fagin" in the 1968 movie, "Oliver;" presenters Dean Rotbart and Rabbi Mordechai Fleisher; Fagin; participants in the Torah 4 Tycoons luncheon on April 2nd.