ZAGREB, Aug 22, 2020 - Dubrovnik Mayor Mato Frankovic has told the London-based national phone-in and talk radio station LBC that British guests are not fleeing this Adriatic city, underlining that Dubrovnik is a safe city in terms of epidemiological situation.

During his interview on Friday evening with the LBC radio station with an audience of more than 2.2 million, Frankovic said that earlier in the day, a number of British holidaymakers arrived in that southern Croatian city aboard several flights provided by different air companies.

On Thursday, Britain added Croatia, France and Austria to the 14-day quarantine list with less than two days notice.

The mayor admitted that definitely this would make some of the British guests cut short their stay in Croatia or cancel their plans to visit Croatia.

However, if we manage to maintain flight services, Britons will definitely come to Dubrovnik, he said.

The mayor underlined that Dubrovnik had a low number of infections with coronavirus.

Since the British decision on adding Croatia to the quarantine list, the Dubrovnik mayor has been giving interviews with British media outlets, including Sky News, ITN, LBC, CNN Travel London, to inform the British public that his city is safe for the Brits as well as for all other foreign tourists.

For the latest travel info, bookmark our main travel info article, which is updated daily. 

Read the Croatian Travel Update in your language - now available in 24 languages

Join the Total Croatia Travel INFO Viber community.

Close cooperation between Britain and Croatia as Cambridge University students join forces with the Fortenova Group.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 18th of April, 2019, consultants from the University of Cambridge are working on a project to find the best solutions in the field of artificial intelligence and automation for Fortenova's operative companies. It seems that Croatia's Foretnova, the former Agrokor, is entering a new era indeed.

Fortenova Group's values ​​also include a leading role in the implementation of new technologies and cooperation with leading educational institutions in Croatia and across the world. Within this direction, Collaboration with the University of Cambridge, whose team of consultants, presented selected solutions in the field of artificial intelligence and automation to the management of the operative companies of the Fortenova Group. At the same time, companies with great potential to be partners of Fortenova in this area were presented.

Today, artificial intelligence and automation are used in 40 percent of large retail chains and consumer goods manufacturing companies, and it is expected that by 2021, their share will grow to as much as 80 percent. Since these solutions have a significant impact on both revenue and company operating costs, their implementation is totally unavoidable in any company that wants to really be competitive and a have a chance at being a market leader.

Therefore, Fortenova's management has started collaborating with the esteemed British Cambridge University in order to find proper solutions in the field of artificial intelligence and automation that have the greatest potential.

The collaboration of Fortenova's management team and a team of consultants from the University of Cambridge resulted in a detailed review of the international ''ecosystem'' of artificial intelligence and automation and a short selection of potential solutions, and after that, a meeting with the management teams of Fortenova's operative companies and an attempt at identifying the solutions with the greatest potential for application in those companies in the future took place.

Preferred solutions come from the field of image recognition, frameworks, image optimisation, shop-based optimisation on customer-led shopping, advanced customer analytics, which are focused on personalised access and micro segmentation, an extensive insight into market trends and the needs of consumers, and finally, inventory management optimisation. The team of consultants from the University of Cambridge will elaborate business cases for selected solutions in the next stage, followed by the implementation of the chosen pilot project.

Dragan Mrkajić, Fortenova's strategy director said on this occasion: "This cooperation supplements Fortenova's values, which wants to be a leader in the implementation of new technologies and to broaden its cooperation with educational institutions both in Croatia and the rest of the world. As leaders in its business areas, we're privileged to be able to cooperate with Cambridge University's MBA study consultants, as this business management study is considered to be the world leader in education. I consider this cooperation to be extremely productive and useful to our company, as it will definitely bring added value to our way of selling our products and the services we offer to our customers, as well as our supply chain.''

Ivan Babić, director of Fortenova's transformation, expressed his satisfaction with selected solutions: "The quality of final solution choice largely depended on the fact that consultants from the MBA study at the University of Cambridge were able to gain a comprehensive understanding of the way Fortenova does business. This was of crucial importance to the success of the project, including its organisational structure, its business objectives, its operational business and its product portfolio. The project has brought significant benefits to both sides in understanding key global trends, players, and case studies where artificial intelligence has improved business performance in the retail and food industry.''

Antonija Kožul, senior project manager at Fortenova, said: "The gathering together of the best talent and the most advanced technologies together with the enthusiasm of Fortenova's operative companies in their adoption make up the fundamental values ​​of our group. This project is about just that and this is precisely why I consider it to be a privilege that I'm the head of it."

Chayanika Ranasinghe, an MBA consultant from Cambridge University, described the collaboration as follows: "I was very interested in participating in this unique transformation which the Fortenova Group has begun to work on, with a highly motivated and dynamic team.''

Shuntaro Horiuchi, an MBA consultant from the University of Cambridge said on this occasion: "The Fortenova Group's project is striving to introduce new value in established and sophisticated work based on the latest technologies. I'm excited to have had the opportunity to take part in this ambitious project and I expect that this opportunity will accelerate further increase of value for buyers.''

Slaven Štekovic, an MBA consultant at the University of Cambridge, also stressed the regional impact of the project: "The focus of the Fortenova Group's introduction of state-of-the-art technologies in its business to enhance value for its customers was a key factor which motivated me to join this dynamic and intellectually stimulating environment. Along with the experience I've gained at the core of some of the leading high tech innovation projects, I recognise the tremendous value of cooperation with such an influential company in building a pilot project for the entire region of Central and Eastern Europe, and South East Europe.''

This project is the beginning of collaboration between Croatia's Fortenova Group and Britain's University of Cambridge, which will continue in the future through the transfer of knowledge, experience and the best business practices.

Make sure to follow our dedicated business page for much more.

At the Croatian Maritime Museum in Split, the most valuable specimens of torpedo weapons have been being exhibited from the world's first torpedo factory, in Rijeka. This British-Croatian invention took the world of naval warfare by storm, and its two creators, one from Rijeka in Croatia and the other from Bolton in England, are being honoured.

As Morski writes on the 30th of March, 2019, the museum's curators Petra Blažević and Ljubomir Radić formed a new museum exhibition of the torpedo collection back in 2016. The occasion was the 150th anniversary of the emergence of torpedoes, which was once the most prominent weapon to have existed in naval warfare, the prototypes of which were created by Giovanni Biagio Luppis Freiherr von Rammer, sometimes also known by the Croatian name of Vukić, a Croat born in Rijeka, who served in the Austro-Hungarian Navy.

We often hear that the torpedo was entirely invented in Croatia, but in terms of international recognition, that honour goes to the the British public, more specifically to Robert Whitehead, an English engineer born in Bolton in northern England, who gained his fame for the development of the very first effective self-propelled naval torpedo.

Luppis, born in Rijeka with family ties to the southern Dalmatian region of Pelješac, had the desire to create the so-called "coast guard,'' which was a self-managed ship loaded with an explosive to protect the coast from attacks coming from the sea. Since he had no funds for the development of such a project, nor did he have the proper engineering knowledge for the task, he connected with the manager of the Rijeka metals factory, Robert Whitehead, a Brit.

From their friendship and cooperation there came a weapon called a torpedo, and how frightening it was to gaze upon this newly-made weapon, French travel writer Victor Tissot testifies, who, after his stay in Rijeka, referred to it as "the most terrible of all sea monsters".

Soon after the ''birth'' of the torpedo, Luppis went to live in Italy and sold his share, production remained in the hands of his friend Robert Whitehead, who was still across the Adriatic sea in his factory in Rijeka. By the end of the 19th century, most of the world's navies started to acquire the Rijeka-made torpedoes and warfare at sea became unthinkable without the use of this weapon, at least until the end of the second world war.

As a natural continuation of the valorisation of this truly outstanding torpedo collection, which has been inherited by the Croatian Maritime Museum in Split, the authors of the exhibition have created a book with a catalog of the collections.

''Both the exhibition and the book bring out the historical context of the torpedo's creation, the biographies of both Luppis and Whitehead, and a series of interesting uses of torpedoes on torpedo boats. The bilingual book, which in honour of the torpedo's British and Croatian creators, has been published in Croatian and English, was promoted to the public back in February at the Nikola Tesla Technical Museum in Zagreb and then again in March in Split,'' said Radić.

Make sure to follow our dedicated lifestyle page for more on Croatian history, inventions, heritage, and much more.