Latest news with #Zeus
Forbes
6 hours ago
- Business
- Forbes
Rerouting Supply Chain Inefficiencies With AI
Clemente Theotokis is the Cofounder of Zeus, a London-based startup transforming logistics with data, AI and automation. The logistics industry is no stranger to complexity. It requires a delicate balancing act and urgency, with little room for error. Today's volatile supply chain environment only adds to the challenge, especially with customers who want next-day deliveries that strain supply chains. As profit margins shrink, the pressure to do more with less intensifies. Frequent disruptions are exposing deep inefficiencies in supply chains, reinforcing the urgent need to rethink and fine-tune every link in the chain to ensure long-term resilience and profitability. One of the most persistent and costly inefficiencies in freight logistics is waste, particularly when trucks aren't filled to capacity. This leads to higher fuel consumption, increased carbon emissions, and drivers left waiting idle for their next load. Estimates suggest that 20%-35% of truck miles worldwide are driven empty, and even "full" trucks often carry less than capacity. While pinpointing a definite number remains difficult in such a fragmented sector, one thing is clear: progress has been remarkably slow. You can often see it yourself: A raised fourth set of wheels on trucks signals they're running empty or unloaded. As AI begins to reshape the traditional operating models relied upon by the logistics industry, data-driven transformation is propelling those companies that are planning ahead. Hesitations around adopting new tech remain, including concerns about implementation costs, limited in-house expertise, poor data quality and a growing skills gap in an aging logistics workforce. Without the right training, even the most advanced tools risk being underused or misapplied. I have seen firsthand that the real challenge is reshaping how teams think and operate. The most meaningful gains come when companies commit to a deeper cultural shift, and those that succeed will be the ones willing to challenge legacy thinking, upskill their teams and embrace change as a continuous advantage. AI gives us the power to see and solve problems faster, but it will be leadership that sets the pace. According to a report by McKinsey, AI has the potential to generate $2 trillion in value across the supply chain and manufacturing sectors by the end of 2025 via smarter, more efficient logistics. Real success hinges on the effective use of the tools at our disposal. It's no use having all the gear and no idea. So, where to begin? Start With Smarter Data First, identify the inefficiencies and gaps AI can help address. Pinpointing these specific issues early lays the groundwork for a clear and effective AI implementation strategy. But you need to dig deeper into your data to really understand what's going on across your supply chain. AI is only as good as the data it's fed, so start with a thorough audit, honing in on key areas where things tend to go off track. For example, in freight management, are delays common? Are spot-market rates overused? In the warehouse, how often do stockouts or overstocking occur? Are fuel and driver costs high due to poor route optimization? From a customer's perspective, are shipments often misplaced or delayed, or lacking real-time updates? If your datasets are messy or incomplete, predictions will be inaccurate and unreliable. Therefore, it's imperative to gather, clean and standardize data across your operation. Start with the fundamentals: shipment records from your TMS, carrier tracking updates, inventory levels and demand signals. By integrating data from transport, warehousing and fulfilment systems via APIs, create a unified view of operations. Once gathered, this data should be cleaned and standardized to remove inconsistencies and fill gaps. This helps ensure that performance metrics such as delivery time, cost per pallet and stock accuracy are reliable. With a solid data foundation, external factors like fuel prices or carrier availability can be incorporated into planning with greater confidence. As for fragmented data, using what's already available is a great place to start. Simulation and modelling help test and validate outcomes early, well before any widespread deployment or commercial commitment. It's a low-risk way to explore potential benefits and overcome early hesitation by reducing the fear of getting it wrong or wasting resources. You can't run before you learn to walk, so it's about making better use of what's already to hand. Turn Data Into Action Once a solid data foundation is in place, AI can start delivering real impact. Retailers, for example, can use AI-driven demand forecasting to better predict and manage spikes during seasonal promotions to avoid both stockouts and excess inventory. Haulers can optimise routes in real time to avoid traffic delays and cut fuel costs. Meanwhile, manufacturers can anticipate possible risks such as supply chain disruptions caused by severe weather or political events like new tariffs, and adjust operations accordingly to keep things moving smoothly. Consolidating operational data through AI enables real-time analysis across the entire supply network. Unlike traditional models that rely on fixed rule sets, simulation-based approaches can capture real-world complexity across multiple layers of the supply chain, such as demand and inventory shifts, route optimization and clustering fragmented deliveries into full-load journeys. By comparing current logistics performance with AI-generated scenarios, it's possible to identify opportunities for improvement such as reducing unused fleet capacity, resolving disconnected orders or streamlining network flows. These simulations can improve forecast accuracy, resource utilisation, and overall cost efficiency, often delivering double-digit percentage uplifts in performance. As AI matures, its power to transform logistics will only grow stronger. While it may not offer the perfect quick fix, it represents a long-term investment. Naturally, there will be bumps along the way, but a huge part of navigating those challenges is education. Companies are learning what the technology can do, why it matters, and how to put it to work in the correct way. While the industry is undeniably complex, with the right knowledge and tools, complexity can become a real competitive advantage, making way for a smarter, more efficient future. Forbes Technology Council is an invitation-only community for world-class CIOs, CTOs and technology executives. Do I qualify?
India Today
10 hours ago
- Science
- India Today
This gift was offered to the gods 2,500 years ago. We now know what it is
A 2,500-year-old mystery from southern Italy has finally been solved: the sticky residue found inside a set of bronze jars at an underground shrine in ancient Paestum, which was intended as an offering to the breakthrough ends decades of debate among archaeologists and chemists, who, using less advanced techniques, had long assumed the substance was merely an animal fat or mysterious object was honey. Scientiests had long excluded the possibility of honey despite its cultural importance in the ancient bronze jars, six hydriae and two amphorae, were unearthed in 1954 within a sixth-century BCE Greek sanctuary, where they surrounded an empty iron bed deep below ground. (Photo: Journal of the American Chemical Society) A strong waxy aroma emanated from the vessels, which contained a paste-like residue thought to be remnants of a sacred libation. Since then, three separate analyses repeatedly failed to detect sugars, instead identifying fats and pollen, and rejecting honey as their original a modern re-examination, led by chemist Luciana da Costa Carvalho and colleagues from the University of Oxford, has yielded entirely different results. Leveraging advanced mass spectrometry and gas chromatography, the team detected clear biomarkers: degraded sugars, hexose compounds, and major royal jelly proteins, all consistent with aged honey and chemical fingerprint closely matched that of modern beeswax and honey, while the acidity and sugar breakdown were exactly what scientists would anticipate after millennia in metal revered in Greek and Roman culture, honey's religious symbolism was deeply entwined with immortality and divinity, as myths said even Zeus was nourished on honey as an infant. The jars' original contents confirm written and artistic evidence of honey's role in medicine, ritual offerings, and burial rites throughout now believe the Paestum shrine jars once held honeycomb, purposefully sealed and left as gifts to a now-unknown deity, offering a rare, direct link between ancient beliefs and modern archaeological study showcases the power of modern biomolecular tools to re-examine and reinterpret historic finds. It also delivers the first definitive chemical evidence that ancient Greeks truly offered honey—'liquid gold'—to their gods.- EndsMust Watch
Yahoo
a day ago
- Science
- Yahoo
Mysterious 2,500-Year-Old 'Gift to The Gods' Finally Identified
A mysterious, orange gunk found in a bronze jar uncovered some 70 years ago at an ancient shrine near Pompeii, Italy, has finally been identified as honey. After several failed attempts over recent decades, researchers from the University of Oxford unraveled the strange substance's chemical degradation to reveal a sweet offering to an ancient Greek god 2,500 years ago; an appropriate gift, given honey is said to be what Zeus ate as a child. Archeologist Luciana da Costa Carvalho and colleagues were able to detect a chemical fingerprint nearly identical to modern honey and beeswax using advanced gas chromatography and mass spectrometry techniques. It was more acidic though, as would be expected from long-term storage where the sugars degrade into furans over time. Related: This also happens to beeswax, which was identified in one of the previous analyses, but the residue had a much more complicated composition to just be wax, the researchers argue. While previous analyses were unable to detect any carbohydrates, the new analysis picked up the simple sugar hexose and the products of decomposed saccharides preserved in the corroded copper of the jar. Excavated in 1954, the shrine at a Greek settlement in Paestum, Italy, was dedicated to an unknown deity. Inside, bronze jars surrounded an empty iron bed accompanied by six hydriai and two amphorae. "The empty bed and the inaccessibility of the shrine signify that the deity was there," da Costa Carvalho and team describe in their paper, explaining honey is a "symbol of immortality". Honey was also well known for its use as a sweetener and in medical preparations, cosmetics, and rituals in ancient Greece. "Ancient residues aren't just traces of what people ate or offered to the gods – they are complex chemical ecosystems," says da Costa Carvalho. "Studying them reveals how those substances changed over time, opening the door to future work on ancient microbial activity and its possible applications." This research was published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society. Related News 4,000-Year-Old Handprint Discovered on Ancient Egyptian Artifact Markings on Strange Stonehenge Boulder May Not Be Natural After All Stomach-Churning Theory Could Explain Mystery of Neanderthal Diet Solve the daily Crossword
RTHK
3 days ago
- Sport
- RTHK
HK scores an ace with Ultimate Tennis Showdown
HK scores an ace with Ultimate Tennis Showdown Michael Cheng, third left, says the UTS format is a perfect match for Hong Kong. Photo: RTHK Ultimate Tennis Showdown (UTS) will make its Asian debut in Hong Kong. The international individual tennis league tournament will be held at Kai Tak Sports Park on October 14 and 15. Chief operating officer Baptiste Kern said fans had been asking for the tournament to expand to Asia and that Hong Kong has great venues like the new Kai Tak Sports Stadium. "What we are trying to create with UTS is a form of NBA of tennis, where it's very serious tennis, very high-quality matches [and] very high intensity and at the same time a very fun and fan-friendly atmosphere," he said. UTS has a slightly different format than most typical tennis matches, with timed matches and players playing quarters rather than sets. "Basically you have 45 minutes of packed tennis as opposed to longer matches with long breaks," Kern said, adding that fans are encouraged to cheer and players can talk to coaches and fans during changeover. Eight players, including Chinese tennis star Zhang Zhizhen, will be competing for the Zeus trophy and an estimated price money of more than US$300,000. Hong Kong, China Tennis Association president Michael Cheng says the UTS format is a perfect match for Hong Kong with its corporate, entertainment, cultural and fashion fusion. "I think there's a lot of significance in bringing something which is novel to Hong Kong and creating, building and shaping Hong Kong as a tennis hub, a mega-event capital in the region and in Greater Bay." Cheng says he expects the event to sell out quickly in Hong Kong, emphasising the need to build tennis novelty and brand for Hong Kong and the Greater Bay Area. "It also sends a very clear signal that every financial hub around the world there are tennis events, and so does Hong Kong, and we are able to provide very good events." Ticket prices will range from almost HK$400 to almost HK$1,600, with public sales starting on August 4 via HK Ticketing.
Forbes
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Forbes
The View From Mount Olympus: What The Greek Gods Ate And Drank While Partying
|Medium: Fresco|Creation date: 1518-1519|Located in: Palazzo Farnese, Farnesina, Italy, circa 1518. ... More (Photo by David Lees/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images)Rare is the Greek god or goddess who is not a cosmic annoyance to human beings. They are immeasurably flawed, vindictive, irrational, self-serving, mean-spirited and use their powers to outwit each other and mankind. They were also gluttons: According to Homer, the gods lounging atop Mount Olympus 'feasted all day until sunset and ate to their hearts content,' then they would put up their feet and listen to music and poetry. Bacchanalia, before 1659. Found in the Collection of Art History Museum, Vienne. (Photo by Fine Art ... More Images/) Dionysus was a god the Greeks most happily imitated. Called Bacchus by the Romans, he was the privileged son of Zeus himself and god of agriculture, who showed men how to grow wine grapes and make wine; he was also a comic sower of decadence, though he was never depicted as obese by Greek sculptors. He would conduct his conquests surrounded by a retinue of Bacchii that included drunken satyrs and mad women known as maenads who wore crowns of snakes and would tear animals and enemies to pieces. The feasts celebrating Dionysus date to Attica, where a yearly wine festival was held during the winter solstice and grew into raucous, sexually charged, raunchy scenes in which masked men dressed in goat skins, giant phalluses were carried about and flaunted and dances tended towards the obscene. ITALY - CIRCA 2002: Symposium scene, ca 480-490 BC, decorative fresco from the north wall of the ... More Tomb of the Diver at Paestum, Campania, Italy. Detail of the so-called lovers. Ancient Greek civilization, Magna Graecia, 5th Century BC. Paestum, Museum (Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Archaeological Museum) (Photo) Drinking parties held in Dionysus's honor, called sympósions, became very deliberate gluttonous events, despite Dionysus's own dictum that a man should drink only three cups of wine at dinner: toasting the first to health, the second to love and pleasure and the third to sleep, after which a guest should go home to bed. Few paid much attention once the party got Red-Figure Psykter, about 510 BC. Wine Cooler with Athletes. Additional Info: The psykter is a ... More vessel used for cooling wine at a symposium. Placed in a large bowl of ice-cold water, the bulbous upper section - decorated here with youths in the gymnasium - would be visible to drinkers. Creator: Smikros. (Photo by Heritage Art/Heritage Images via Getty Images) Such banquets were all male, with the exception of naked dancing girls, and the manners and rituals of inviting guests, making the menus and deciding on the entertainment were very involved. During a sympósion guests arrived, their feet would be washed by slaves, then they reclined on couches; a communal cup called a psycter of aromatics was passed around, and the eating part of the banquet began. But the serious drinking came after dinner. The meal would consist of an enormous number of dishes. A poem written around 400 BC called The Banquet describes a feast well appreciated by its enthusiastic author. In came a pair of slaves with a shiny table, and another, and another until they filled the room. They fetched in show-white barley-rolls baskets, A casserole— no bigger than that—call it a marmite, full of a noble eel with a look of the conger about him. Honey-glazed shrimps besides, my love, Squid sprinkled with sea-salt, Baby birds in flaky pastry, And a baked tuna, gods! What a huge one fresh from the fire and the pan and the carving knife. Enough steaks from its tender belly to delight us both as long as we might care to stay and munch. . . . . Then the same polished tables, loaded with more good things, sailed back to us, 'second table,' as men say Sweet pastry shells, crispy flapjacks, toasted sesame cakes drenched in honey sauce, Cheesecake, made with milk and honey, baked like a pie; Cheese-and-sesame sweetmeats fried in the hottest oil in sesame seeds were passed around. At that point, with only small bites called tragemata to nibble on, the guests began to drink as much as they liked of wine cut two-thirds by water. If a man protested that he'd had enough wine and refused another cup, he had to perform some silly entertainment, like dancing naked or carrying the girl flute-player around the room. Parasites was the name given to those who arrived late to the party and mooched off the remains. Only around 500 BC were women invited to join the fun, but they were largely courtesans, prostitutes and female artists. Epicurus (ca.341-270 BC). Ancient Greek philosopher. Bust. Marble. From Villa Casali, Rome (1-160 ... More AD). British Museum. London, England, Great Britain. (Photo by: Prisma/Universal Images Group via Getty Images) How such a gentle philosopher named Epicurus became equated with the term 'epicureanism' as a license to excessive indulgence, particularly in food and drink, is a unfortunate because he actually advocated 'katastematic pleasure' that is experienced through a harmonious state of mind free of mental distress and pain achieved through a simple life rather than by activating unnatural pleasures like gluttony that take hold of the mind's free will. Ulysses and Circe, ca 1580-1585. Found in the collection of Art History Museum, Vienne. Artist : ... More Spranger, Bartholomeus (1546-1611). (Photo by Fine Art Images/) In Homer's Odyssey, the poet insists that while heroes need proper nourishment, mostly meat and bread, it would be foolhardy for them to indulge in gluttonous behavior. Nevertheless, in The Iliad the hero Odysseus is called by an opponent 'wild for fame, glutton for cunning, glutton for war,' while Odysseus uses the word 'glutton' to describe King Agamemnon as a 'dog-faced' glutton' and 'people-devouring king.' When Odysseus sails into the clutches of the breathtakingly beautiful goddess Circe, she turns his men into swine with a drugged drink (she turns them back, too) and persuades him to feast with her and her maidens on 'enough food and drink to last forever.' And then to bed. Odysseus and his men gave in to her seductions and stuck around the island 'day after day, eating food in plenty, and drinking sweet wine' for an entire Marotti, from Rome, 2nd century. Statuette of naked Herakles in Boston-Oxford type, with ... More club, and lionskin. Copy of work of c460 BC. Dimensions: height: 57 cm. (Photo by Ashmolean Museum/) But the candidate for Super Glutton is the god Herakles (Hercules to the Romans), a bastard son of Zeus whose wife Hera tried to abort him and afterwards tried to make his life miserable. Herakles is, of course, a person of inhuman strength, but he emerges as a comic figure among Greeks who regarded his gluttonous antics as human foibles. From the earliest days of Greek drama Herakles is ridiculed for his brutish way of eating his food, his preference for a good meal versus a good woman and, in Aristophanes's The Bird, even his reluctance to leave a barbecue in order to help save his own father. In an earlier play, The Frogs, Aristophanes had also portrayed Herakles as a god led around by his nose at the thought of food, describing how in a trip to the underworld he had gobbled up sixteen loaves of bread, 20 portions of beef stew, a mess of fish and a newly made goat's cheese—baskets included—then, bellowing and drawing his sword, skipped out on the bill. Though sometimes depicted in terracotta figurines from the 5th and 4th centuries BC as pot-bellied, overwhelmingly Herakles was sculpted in marble and bronze by both Greek and Romans as a male figure of daunting musculature with what today are called 'killer abs.' Alexander the Great on his Sickbed, 1806. Creator: CW Eckersberg. (Photo by Heritage Art/Heritage ... More Images via Getty Images) Alexander the Great was a mere mortal and a big drinker who on 'on such a day, and sometimes two days together, slept after a debauch.' ALexander's soldiers, named Promachus. won the prize after knocking down four gallons of wine (unmixed with water). But not everyone, especially the local people, was used to drinking so much wine, resulting in 41 deaths from alcohol poisoning. Never defeated in battle, Alexander's demise came at the age of thirty in 323 BC, in Babylon. The earliest reports say that after nights of excessive drinking, the young king fell ill with fever and died two weeks later. Others contend he was poisoned by his viceroy Antipater, while more modern conjectures propose the weary conqueror had picked up typhoid fever or meningitis or was done in by his over-use of the medicine hellebore, then prescribed as a purgative as well as for gout and signs of insanity.
