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Biotech / Medical : Dean Kamen and Ginger ??? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: George the Greek who wrote (2)	1/11/2001 5:15:08 PM
From: Hank	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 377

I agree. I think the acronym "IT" refers to Individual Transporter. Probably a hover craft of some kind. At least I hope it is because I want one! My only questions are 1)Can I get on a waiting list to be the first guy on my block to have one and 2) who's handling the IPO? I want in on that one too! Of course, I could be frustrated when it finally gets revealed and I find out that it's actually a modified garbage disposal that converts waste into energy without emitting polution. That would be cool but not so much fun! By the way, the news articles never said that Bill Gates saw the device. They said that Kamen would become richer than Bill Gates in less than 5 years once the device is in production (according to Credit Suisse First Boston, anyway). Steve Jobs of Apple computer and Jeff Bezos of Amazon are the ones involved with the development. They apparently sit on the board.

To: George the Greek who wrote (2)	1/12/2001 2:55:51 AM
From: Dee Jay	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 377

as an aside, having been involved with a company that created a stairclimbing wheelchair quite a few years ago (it worked well but without the balancing act of the iBot) and also a whole lot of experience with conventional powered wheelchairs I doubt very much that a product with its complexity will RETAIL for $25K. Conventional powered wheelchairs now, with no stairclimbing or user-hoisting capabilities, retail for as much as $10,000 (or far more with complex control systems - $16K is not unusual) today. Just check out: invacare.com and quickie.com the leading mfrs. of power wheelchairs of the type you see on the sidewalks right now. Even J & J isn't going to be able to pull that off; the liability insurance delegated to each unit will likely be $200 in my estimation, given what it is supposed to do and where it is going to go. And if they're using MS anything to run on the Pentiums you can be sure a General Failure of any sort will cause an immediate shutdown wherever it may be; I'm sure the software will provide for the sensors to keep the balance but what then if you're a quadriplegic... As for Ginger my vote is some sort of power supply, that is a device that pulls power out of the air, but the power (of whatever nature it may be) will be of short distribution capability so that cities will have to be built around it. There are devices now that are called wireless fiber systems that blanket a metro area with data transmission at high rate capabilities; this may be on that order is my guess. A non-polluting power system... This device is not necessarily a medical item - Dean Kamen thinks outside the box and so should anyone who has any reason to speculate about Ginger. Dee Jay