Latest news with #Constantinople
Forbes
29-07-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Steve Jobs And Jeff Bezos Used History As A Powerful Tool. You Should Too.
Steve Jobs studied fallen giants like Xerox to avoid similar mistakes a Apple. History was a source ... More of inspiration for him. When executives face big decisions, they usually try to gather data. However, they know that forecasts are often flawed. Hence, they rely on their own experience and the experience of others. History is a great way for them to expand their field of vision, drawing from a much wider pool of experiences. Steve Jobs, for example, referred to Leonardo da Vinci when he explained why great ideas emerge at the intersection of art and science. And he extensively studied the rise and fall of giants like Xerox to prevent Apple suffering a similar fate. His Amazon counterpart, Jeff Bezos, was inspired by Walmart founder Sam Walton's obsession with customers and hands-on-approach. When you recognize patterns in history, they can inspire new ideas, help you to avoid mistakes, and become a powerful way to communicate your ideas. Pattern Recognition In the mid-fifteenth century a gunner named Orban offered his services to the Byzantines who ruled Constantinople. The use of cannons was still relatively new and the benefits less obvious. As the Byzantines had high walls that nobody had toppled before, this innovation seemed unnecessary. So they offered Orban a rather meagre salary. Unimpressed, he decided to seek out Mehmed II of the Ottoman Empire instead. The Sultan was more desperate as the Empire's previous attempts to take Constantinople had failed. So the gunner got his chance. Sixty-nine regular cannons and dozens of catapults started their bombardment on April 12th 1453 and the city fell just 47 days later. This story features in Scott Anthony's captivating new book on 11 disruptive innovations that shaped the modern world. It's a powerful reminder that incumbents often miss the benefits of disruptive new innovations—in this case gunpowder. The broader lesson from the book is that looking at history we can find patterns that often seem less obvious if we only consider current developments. Learning from Mistakes In 1964 Shell hired McKinsey to develop a new organizational structure. One of the recommendations was to install an American-style CEO. Shell declined, remembering the potential downside of having a powerful leader like Henry Deterting, the architect of the 1907 merger between Royal Dutch and Shell Transport and Trading. Later in life, Deterting saw Adolf Hitler as the only politician capable of stopping Communism. Luckily, he retired in 1936 and moved to Germany, before making any commitments that would have embarrassed the company later on. The company had learnt that in a politically sensitive industry, having a board of executives building consensus is often advantageous. For decades it kept this rather unusual arrangement. In a study of companies surviving and thriving for over a hundred years, I found that one of their characteristics was this ability to remember past mistakes. Obviously, this kind of learning is not restricted to your own mistakes. Follow Steve Jobs' example and pick a fallen giant in your industry. It's an effective way to avoid some of the pitfalls awaiting you. Communicating Plans History can also help executives to rally the troops. Current Apple CEO Tim Cook does this frequently when he invokes Steve Jobs' legacy. This way he can frame new innovations as a continuous journey started by the firm's legendary founder. Many companies with legendary founders—think HP or Walmart—use history in a similar manner. Another occasion when history comes in handy is in moments of crisis. Politicians do this frequently, knowing that painful reform is hardly popular. In the corporate world, Chrylser CEO Lee Iacocca, drew analogies to the Great Depression during one of the most dramatic turnarounds in US history. Learning from history History might seem stuffy and irrelevant but smart executives like Jobs and Bezos understood that the lessons they can pick up helps them to avoid similar mistakes.
ABC News
21-07-2025
- Politics
- ABC News
Richard Fidler: The Volcano That Toppled Two Empires
What does a volcano in Iceland have to do with the religious and political struggles going on across the world today? Well it turns out, a LOT… Back in 536AD, the skies turned dark and the world cooled. It was all thanks to a massive volcanic eruption in Iceland, that no one even knew had happened. It led to a mysterious plague, a pandemic, which swept through the Roman and Persian Empires. In the great Byzantine city of Constantinople, it was said that 10,000 people were dying every day. Between plague and war, the world's two 'superpowers' were too distracted to notice that something major was happening on the Arabian peninsula. The Prophet Mohammed had united the tribes and, when he died, his followers started pushing north. Instead of encountering resistance, they were able to take huge swathes of the Roman Empire and completely destroy the Persian Empire. Richard Fidler, host of ABC Conversations and the author of The Book of Roads and Kingdoms, tells Marc Fennell (Stuff the British Stole, Mastermind) the incredible true story of how the language of Arabic and religion of Islam spread across the world, thanks (in part) to a natural disaster and climate change. Get in touch: Got a story for us? We'd love to hear from you! Email us at noonesawitcoming@
Finextra
25-06-2025
- Business
- Finextra
10x Banking goes for growth in Apac with Constantinople tie up
10x Banking, the cloud-native core banking platform that powers some of the world's largest banking entities including Westpac and Chase UK, today announced a strategic partnership with Constantinople, the Australian banking software and operations provider. 0 The collaboration sees two major technology companies coming together to provide banks, mutuals, and financial institutions around the world with access to best-in-class banking technology architecture and solutions. Banks spend billions each year building duplicative technology, creating a tension between innovation and growth. Now for the first time, 10x Banking's modern core technology combined with Constantinople's comprehensive banking solutions will accelerate digital transformation, integrate AI and reduce cost-to-income ratios by up to 80% - giving banks and mutuals access to a best-in-class banking stack at a fraction of the cost of building it in house. Sydney-based Constantinople, backed by experienced investors such as Square Peg Capital, Airtree and Prosus, recently raised an A$50 million Series A funding round, following the largest seed round in Australia. Working closely with 10x Banking, Constantinople is already serving customers across APAC including Great Southern Bank, Australia's largest customer owned bank, with over 400,000 members. Dianne Challenor, Co-Founder and CEO of Constantinople, said: 'This partnership showcases our unique ability to bring tier-1 bank capabilities for financial institutions with an entirely software driven infrastructure to run operations and compliance. We can leverage best of breed architecture and tech stack to power retail banks, SME banks and provide embedded banking needs. With the technology we've built, we can now integrate AI into every aspect of banking. We're excited to be working with 10x Banking - which has helped us accelerate our engineering and delivery.' Legacy core systems and siloed business functions have long presented financial institutions with higher overheads and made it challenging to innovate at the pace today's market requires. Research commissioned by 10x Banking showed that 67% of bank executives believe they are losing business opportunities due to the slow pace of digital transformation, yet only 8% of banks are focused on improving their core banking capabilities. The partnership between 10x Banking and Constantinople means these banks can achieve the full core transformation that will enable them to deliver greater value to their customers by focusing on product innovation and greater customer experiences. Antony Jenkins, CEO at 10x Banking, said: 'When 10x was founded, our mission was simple: to make banking ten times better for our customers, their members and society. Achieving this requires building the strongest possible ecosystem of partners. In today's AI-first world, banks, mutuals, and financial institutions must rethink how they deliver value to their customers and members. By combining 10x's world-first meta core with Constantinople's comprehensive end-to-end banking platform and fully integrated operational stack, we take away the burden of managing the complexities of banking infrastructure and operations. Together, we're empowering institutions to focus on innovation, embrace AI and enhance customer experience.'
Yahoo
24-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Sacred Mysteries: After 1700 years, Nicaea is still worth celebrating
I was wondering whether to pay a visit to Nicaea (now Iznik, in Turkey) for the 1700th anniversary of a momentous event there, but I was a bit put off by its not having a railway station. Luckily the good fathers who gathered there in 325 were not so easily deterred. I suppose they travelled by horse, mule or foot from Constantinople, though a ship would have helped across the Sea of Marmara, or the Propontis as it was then known. Worth celebrating now is that the bishops at the Council of Nicaea decided that Jesus Christ the Son of God is as much God as is God the Father. He wasn't just of a similar substance or being; he was of the same substance or being – 'God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made'. That looks like the belief of the author of St John's Gospel, though the doctrine may not be easy to apply to a person who was also born and died, and, as Christians believed, rose again. The doctrine was important since, if Jesus was not fully human and fully divine, he would have been incapable of achieving atonement between God and humanity. We should have been left crushed by sin and death, unable to enter the gates of heaven. Since mankind has an unquenchable appetite for the infinite, we'd be in the most tragic of positions. The religious party that wanted the bishops at Nicaea to regard the Son of God only as a creature like us were followers of Arius, an influential priest born in the 250s. An anniversary issue on Nicaea has been printed by Communio (a learned theological journal founded in 1972 by Hans Urs von Balthasar, Henri de Lubac and Joseph Ratzinger, who became Pope Benedict XVI). In it, David M Gwynn considers how much Arius taught the errors attributed to him and how much his opponent St Athanasius should be regarded as the champion of orthodoxy. Dr Gwynn is reader in Ancient and Late Antique History at Royal Holloway in the University of London. Athanasius, he points out, was only a young priest of about 30 when he attended the council as assistant to Alexander, the patriarch of Alexandria. But he suggests that Athanasius might have drafted Alexander's circular letter denouncing Arius. Dr Gwynn writes that the teaching of Arius could not be called heresy then, as 'there were no established orthodox answers to resolve the questions under discussion'. Perhaps not, but if it contradicted points of doctrine held by Christians, it could have been seen as false. Dr Gwynn quotes a summary by Athanasius of the doctrines of the Arians. 'Not always was the Son, for he was not until he was begotten… He is not proper to the essence of the Father, for he is a creature and a thing made… The Son does not know the Father exactly… He is not unchangeable, like the Father, but is changeable by nature, like the creatures.' Dr Gwynn finds all these assertions in Arius's writings except for the last, for Athanasius's opponents repeatedly insisted that the Son was 'unchangeable and set apart from all other creatures'. I don't know that this got the associates of Arius out of trouble. To be sure, being created is not being changed, since there was nothing to be changed from. But creation adds a new thing to the world of creatures, all susceptible to change. And to class the Son as a creature, even if set apart, distinguishes him from God in a way fatal to human salvation. Anyway Dr Gwynn argues that over-simplifying Athanasius's story 'understates the scale of his contribution in defining and securing the orthodox faith'. I certainly wouldn't want that either. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
Telegraph
24-05-2025
- General
- Telegraph
Sacred Mysteries: After 1700 years, Nicaea is still worth celebrating
I was wondering whether to pay a visit to Nicaea (now Iznik, in Turkey) for the 1700th anniversary of a momentous event there, but I was a bit put off by its not having a railway station. Luckily the good fathers who gathered there in 325 were not so easily deterred. I suppose they travelled by horse, mule or foot from Constantinople, though a ship would have helped across the Sea of Marmara, or the Propontis as it was then known. Worth celebrating now is that the bishops at the Council of Nicaea decided that Jesus Christ the Son of God is as much God as is God the Father. He wasn't just of a similar substance or being; he was of the same substance or being – 'God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made'. That looks like the belief of the author of St John's Gospel, though the doctrine may not be easy to apply to a person who was also born and died, and, as Christians believed, rose again. The doctrine was important since, if Jesus was not fully human and fully divine, he would have been incapable of achieving atonement between God and humanity. We should have been left crushed by sin and death, unable to enter the gates of heaven. Since mankind has an unquenchable appetite for the infinite, we'd be in the most tragic of positions. The religious party that wanted the bishops at Nicaea to regard the Son of God only as a creature like us were followers of Arius, an influential priest born in the 250s. An anniversary issue on Nicaea has been printed by Communio (a learned theological journal founded in 1972 by Hans Urs von Balthasar, Henri de Lubac and Joseph Ratzinger, who became Pope Benedict XVI). In it, David M Gwynn considers how much Arius taught the errors attributed to him and how much his opponent St Athanasius should be regarded as the champion of orthodoxy. Dr Gwynn is reader in Ancient and Late Antique History at Royal Holloway in the University of London. Athanasius, he points out, was only a young priest of about 30 when he attended the council as assistant to Alexander, the patriarch of Alexandria. But he suggests that Athanasius might have drafted Alexander's circular letter denouncing Arius. Dr Gwynn writes that the teaching of Arius could not be called heresy then, as 'there were no established orthodox answers to resolve the questions under discussion'. Perhaps not, but if it contradicted points of doctrine held by Christians, it could have been seen as false. Dr Gwynn quotes a summary by Athanasius of the doctrines of the Arians. 'Not always was the Son, for he was not until he was begotten… He is not proper to the essence of the Father, for he is a creature and a thing made… The Son does not know the Father exactly… He is not unchangeable, like the Father, but is changeable by nature, like the creatures.' Dr Gwynn finds all these assertions in Arius's writings except for the last, for Athanasius's opponents repeatedly insisted that the Son was 'unchangeable and set apart from all other creatures'. I don't know that this got the associates of Arius out of trouble. To be sure, being created is not being changed, since there was nothing to be changed from. But creation adds a new thing to the world of creatures, all susceptible to change. And to class the Son as a creature, even if set apart, distinguishes him from God in a way fatal to human salvation. Anyway Dr Gwynn argues that over-simplifying Athanasius's story 'understates the scale of his contribution in defining and securing the orthodox faith'. I certainly wouldn't want that either.
