Well, after yet another long, long absence finally an update. Old friends of BRINQ may have already noticed that there have been a few changes around here. BRINQ.com is now sporting an updated look (for the technically minded, I dumped html tables in favor of stylesheets… and forever hereafter say phooey to Microsoft and IE 6). There’s an updated front page, a new Photo Gallery, content tags for articles on the BRINQ Bloq, as well as updated content on the information pages: the About BRINQ and What is the BoP? pages in particular.

The About BRINQ page describes what may have been obvious for some time now, BRINQ’s change in focus. Although I started this site around my attempts to create business models to promote toy innovation in the BoP, I haven’t been pursuing that effort for well over a year now. And although I originally intended BRINQ to become a company, most of the BoP consulting work I do is through Enterprise for a Sustainable World. So BRINQ.com has instead become more of a site to talk about my own work (and the work of my friends) in the BoP. As now described in the About BRINQ page:

BRINQ focuses on the role of business in the so-called Base of the Pyramid - the world’s four billion poor - developing and writing about on-the ground methodologies and knowledge needed to re-imagine this intersection of business, poverty and innovation. BRINQ has three main focus areas:

• Partnering - creating and enacting partnerships between poor communities and business
• Play - the role of education and play (and toys!) in entrepreneurship and innovation
• Innovation - Re-imagining technology (particulary IT) for, with, and by people in the BoP

Most of my recent efforts have been on the first bullet, Partnering, but I’m exploring ways to focus more on the other two. Play, because I still believe it’s critical and that’s where this all started, and Innovation and IT because that’s where I personally started. The stories here on BRINQ focus on experiences and lessons from on-the-ground activities in the BoP

Be on the look out tomorrow for a new section here on BRINQ, BoP Book Discussions, as well as new stories about experiences here in Rio, in the Amazon and in India, and more lessons and strategies for working with MNCs and poor communities.

abraços,
Patrick Donohue

p.s. Yes, the BRINQ blog is now called the BRINQ Blog… the BRINQ Workshop didn’t make sense after the move away from toy innovation (and it’s questionable if anyone picked up the toy workshop reference even back then). The web address will stay the same though, http://BRINQ.com/workshop/

We’ve added a few new sections and pages here at BRINQ. The BRINQ Network: Friends, partners and mentors at BRINQ, there are a lot of great people and organizations who have helped make BRINQ possible and who continue to influence our work everyday. Come read about the organizations and individuals who help guide BRINQ, including Stuart Hart, Mark Milstein, Salim Mohamed, Alan Hassenfeld and many more! Discussion about BRINQ and the BoP: We’ve been getting a number of emails and calls about BRINQ and the BoP, so we started a discussion thread of our responses on the BRINQ Forums. Come take a look or chime in! [Edit: Forums are no longer available] BRINQ’s New Front Door: We’ve finally replaced our old front page with something a little more dynamic. Check it out! What’s Up Next - Updating the Base of the Pyramid Protocol: Patrick’s heading out this weekend to Racine, WI and the Wingspread Conference Center with the rest of the BoP Protocol Pilot team to report on their work in Kenya and to help design the next version of the Base of the Pyramid Protocol. A diverse set of forty professionals, business leaders, and social entrepreneurs will be participating in the intense 3-day workshop, including representatives from SC Johnson, Tetrapak, Dupont Solae, Natura, CARE, WRI, Carolina for Kibera, Ashoka and more.

It’s been another busy travel time for BRINQ, as we get ready for the Base of Pyramid Protocol field test in Kenya, watch Carolina regain its college basketball throne, make the leap to Apple, and build a bridge in Viet Nam with hundreds of spring rolls. Sheri Willoughby and I headed out to Cornell for the Sustainable Enterprise Symposium, hosted by the Center for Global Sustainable Enterprise and the local Net Impact club. We got to spend quality time with people whose work I respect the most, old friends Stu Hart (Cornell), Mark Milstein (World Resources Institute), Monica Touesnard (Cornell), Erik Simanis (UNC), and Valerie Cook-Smith (Citibank). New friends Claire Preisser (Aspen Institute) and Rubens Mazon (Fundacao Getulio Vargas in Brazil) also made the trip a wonderful one.

Of course, we also had to take a break in New York to watch Carolina’s Final Four victory over Michigan State, which prompted another break to watch their NCAA Championship victory over Illinois. It’s great to see how far the Tar Heel boys have come over the last 3 years, and to know that Dean Smith was in the crowd. I got to meet coach Smith briefly last year when he came to promote his new leadership book the Carolina Way, and what I remember most was how proud he was that so many of his professional players returned to finish their degrees. Go Heels!

Another distraction was the death of my main computer, an old HP Omnibook 6100, which prompted a replacement by this lovely 12" Apple Powerbook. Yes, I finally made the jump to a Mac, and only ten years after I worked at Apple (no, I didn’t own one then either). I wish I still had those discounts, but I got a pretty good deal, and Apple’s OS X is a beautiful example of great design in action.

And the final small distraction, my mother Mai Donohue threw a fundraiser to build a bridge in Duc Pho, our family’s village in Viet Nam. The current bridge gets washed away every year, which can make travel difficult and dangerous for the kids on their way to school. So we prepared a menu of grilled lemongrass chicken, fried spring rolls, chicken noodle stirfry and more, a full dinner for the fundraiser’s 300 some odd guests in Barrington, RI. "Her food is unbelievable", said fundraiser coordinator Joe Lombardi. Even when I’m a part of these mammoth marathons, even when I can see it happening, I can never understand how our mother pulls it off. A tiny 4′10", 95 lb, Vietnamese dynamo, she’s a huge inspiration to anyone that meets her, she certainly is to me. Go Mom!