Posts

Key Takeaways 169% average cost overrun — Every Olympic Games since 1960 has exceeded its budget, with Montreal 1976 hitting a catastrophic 720% overrun 21-29% revenue coverage — Direct Olympic revenues cover less than a third of total hosting costs, leaving taxpayers to fund the rest Minimal economic benefits — Promised jobs and tourism often fail to materialize, with Vancouver 2010 delivering just 4,000-7,000 jobs instead of 244,000 predicted Infrastructure white elephants — General infrastructure costs dwarf sports facilities by 2-8x, creating abandoned venues and maintenance burdens Systematic optimism bias — Cities underestimate costs to win bids, then face unlimited liability, creating a death spiral of debt Each insight backed by data from academic studies and government audits. ...

Key Takeaways The Eternal Dialectic: Military and Logistics is defined by a perpetual arms race—when defense prevails, wars become attritional stalemates; when offense breaks through, empires are redrawn. Roman Systemization: The Roman road network (400,000+ km) combined with standardized castra created an integrated system where defensive strongpoints became launchpads for conquest. Archimedes' Genius: The Siege of Syracuse proved that localized, asymmetric defensive engineering could temporarily neutralize a conventionally superior offensive force. The Castle-Catapult Race: Medieval architecture evolved from square to circular towers specifically to distribute trebuchet impacts—engineering responding to engineering. The Tank as Thesis: The tank wasn't just an invention; it was a targeted engineering solution designed to dismantle the three premises of trench warfare: immobility, exposure, and impassable terrain. Military and Logistics is defined by a perpetual and cyclical arms race between offensive and defensive engineering. This enduring dialectic—the contest between the sword and the shield, the siege engine and the fortress wall—is the central pillar of strategic thought. ...

Key Takeaways The Paradox: Norway imposed some of the world's toughest terms on oil companies – and they kept investing anyway. The 78% Take: Norway captures ~78% of oil profits through taxes and ownership, far above the global average. Staged Escalation: Norway started with generous terms, then tightened as expertise grew and investments became sunk costs. Technology Transfer: Every foreign contract required training Norwegians and using local suppliers – building domestic capability. The National Champion: Statoil (now Equinor) gave Norway inside knowledge of what was actually profitable, preventing industry bluffs. When multinational oil companies arrive in a developing country, the script is familiar: “Give us favorable terms, or we’ll invest elsewhere.” The implicit threat works. Countries compete to offer the most attractive deals, racing to the bottom while oil majors capture the lion’s share of value. ...

Key Takeaways Two Minds: Your "gut feeling" system makes most decisions before your rational brain even wakes up. Loss Looms Larger: The pain of losing $100 is psychologically 2.5× more intense than the pleasure of gaining $100. Ownership Distorts Value: You'll demand more to sell something you own than you'd pay to buy the identical item. More Choice = Worse Outcomes: Shoppers presented with 24 jam varieties bought less than those offered just 6. Cash Hurts: You spend more with cards because the "pain of paying" is psychologically muted. You think you chose that phone rationally. You compared specs, read reviews, weighed the price against features. A deliberate, logical decision. ...

Key Takeaways 2.6× Return: The Swedish Gripen program generated civilian spillovers worth 2.6× its development cost – Sweden got the jet "for free" plus additional growth. The Customer as Co-Inventor: Military procurement agencies don't just buy – they actively drive innovation by setting demanding requirements. Off-the-Shelf = Missed Opportunity: Buying foreign equipment looks cheaper but sacrifices the domestic innovation benefits entirely. From Missiles to Maps: Apple's 3D mapping came from missile targeting systems; your dental implants came from cannon manufacturing expertise. Invention ≠ Business: Creating technology is only half the battle – commercialization infrastructure determines whether spillovers become growth. When a new military jet screams across the sky, it’s easy to see it as a symbol of immense public cost – a black hole for taxpayer money. The price tags on advanced defense systems dominate headlines and fuel debates about national priorities. ...

50%+ The Boeing 787 Dreamliner: Revolutionary aircraft with 20% fuel efficiency gain and a remarkable grounded fleet recovery story. Introduction: The Aircraft We Thought We Knew For millions of travelers, the Boeing 787 Dreamliner is a familiar part of the modern marvel of air travel—a sleek, quiet vessel that connects continents. We see it as an advanced mode of transport, but it’s easy to overlook the complex story of its creation and the revolutionary engineering hidden just beneath its skin. ...

Key Takeaways Failure is the curriculum: Engineers spend more time studying bridges that collapsed than bridges that stand. The pathology of failure teaches more than the celebration of success. Walls kill innovation: The "over-the-wall" method—where marketing throws requirements to engineering, who throws specs to production—reduces quality by up to 350%. Questions beat answers: Einstein was right: formulating the problem is more important than solving it. Design Thinking starts with "what do they need?" not "what can we build?" Nature already solved it: From Velcro to submarine hulls, the most innovative designs are often borrowed from millions of years of evolutionary R&D. Nothing is ever finished: The paper clip has been "perfected" and patented hundreds of times since 1899. Design is iteration, not invention. Beyond the Blueprint When we think of “design,” we imagine one of two extremes: the polished aesthetics of a luxury car, or the cold precision of an architectural blueprint. Either it’s about making things beautiful, or it’s about following a rigid technical checklist. ...

Key Takeaways The Logistical Wall: After the Dieppe raid proved capturing a port was impossible, Allied planners faced an insurmountable supply challenge—until they decided to bring their own harbor. Mulberry Harbours: Two floating ports, built from 10 modular components by 45,000 workers, were towed across the Channel. Mulberry B landed 2.5 million troops, 500,000 vehicles, and 4 million tonnes of supplies. Bailey Bridges: Engineers built 55 miles of prefabricated bridges in months, allowing tanks to cross destroyed river spans in hours instead of days. The Red Ball Express: An 83-day emergency truck convoy system moved 12,500 tons of supplies daily to fuel the Allied advance—staffed predominantly by African-American soldiers. The Information War: Alan Turing's Bombe machine and the cavity magnetron radar made the Channel crossings possible by defeating the U-boat threat. For centuries, military triumph has hinged on brute force and strategic genius. Yet, World War II proved that victory often belongs to the quiet revolutionaries: the engineers, the logisticians, and the scientists who fought their battles not on blood-soaked beaches but over drafting tables and in secret workshops. ...

In 2014, while Tesla sold 35,000 cars and the world debated whether electric vehicles would ever go mainstream, China quietly achieved something extraordinary: 200 million electric two-wheelers on its roads. No subsidies. No government mandates. No involvement from any major automaker. The traditional car industry didn’t notice. They were too busy perfecting a business model that hadn’t fundamentally changed since 1914. That blind spot tells you everything about why the automotive industry’s $3 trillion transformation might fail. ...

Key Takeaways Failure Breeds Success: The AK-47 wasn't the most accurate rifle—it was designed by obsessively studying weapon failures, creating the most reliable killing machine ever made. Ancient Smart Materials: Roman concrete contains "lime clasts" that dissolve when water seeps into cracks, then recrystallize to heal the damage—a 2,000-year-old self-repairing material. Toys Become Weapons: The bouncing bomb that destroyed Germany's dams was inspired by Barnes Wallis watching marbles skip across water in his garden. Genius Has No Morality: Wernher von Braun built Hitler's terror weapons using slave labor, then became America's hero who sent men to the moon. Math Beats Metal: Alan Turing's Bombe machine and the cavity magnetron proved that mastering information and physics was more decisive than bigger guns. When we picture warfare, we often conjure images of soldiers clashing on blood-soaked beaches or generals poring over maps in candlelit tents. We think of grand strategies and heroic charges. But behind every great battle, every turning point in Military and Logistics, there is a quieter, less visible force at work: the engineers. ...