Portfolios portfolio rationalization

Another gemstone in the portfolio of rational carbon synthesis is nitrogen-doped carbons. Recently, they became the subject of particular interest to researchers due to their remarkable performance in applications such as C02 sequestration [22], removals of contaminants from gas and liquid phases [23], environmental protection [24], catalysts and catalysts supports [25], or in electrochemistry as supercapacitors [26], cells and batteries to improve stability and the loading capacity of carbon. 

Some diversified players (e.g., BASF, DSM) thrived as a result of rigorous portfolio rationalization which allowed them to concentrate on segments where they could be major players while avoiding overpaying to rush into specialties. At the same time, other... 

Major advances in the knowledge of biochemical pathways and the establishment of computer-based predictions of three-dimensional structures of proteins led to the development of new microbiological methods, such as rational protein design or directed evolution, giving scientists the possibility to provide tailor-made biocatalysts [15-19]. These methodological works on the disclosure of new efficient biocatalysts are not explicitly mentioned in this review unless they were applied in natural product synthesis. Biotransformations do not always compete with known chemical syntheses, but rather complement the portfolio of catalytic methods in organic chemistry. 

The specialty chemicals industry is estimated to have an annual turnover of 200 billion worldwide, with production scattered among a great variety of suppliers. Consolidation of that industry was to be expected owing to the pressure of shareholders and to management eager to rationalize their portfolio of products. Some corporations like Ciba Specialty Chemicals, Clariant, ICI, Rohm Haas, Crompton, and Great Lakes... 

By determining these indices for drugs and excipients a portfolio of material properties can be assembled, and by using these indices, excipients can be rationally chosen to overcome an undesirable characteristic of the API. In other words the indices of the individual components and the final formulation can be u.sed to assess the mechanical properties thus, providing an important tool to predicting the quality of the final formulation. 

The rationale behind the minimum-variance portfolio was introduced in the 1952 when Harry Markowitz presented the Modem Portfolio Theory. It suggests that rational investor should choose the optimal portfolio which will be developed from the trade-off between risk and expected return. The idea is to maximize the expected return for given level of risk (where risk is denoted as standard deviation of the portfolio). 

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