Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella is a keen student of business history, so he would know what a rare thing it is for a faded corporate giant to regain its old eminence.

Mr Nadella was the guest at The Australian Financial Review’s Chanticleer Lunch in Sydney yesterday. He was there as the boss of a company that was co-started by archetypal geek-billionaire Bill Gates, and has now run the entire cycle: from world-beating innovator, to evil empire, to has-been, and under Mr Nadella’s leadership back to corporate wunderkind.