He succeeded his father Bas on the throne in about 326 BC and reigned for forty-eight years, waging successful wars with Lysimachus and Antiochus, the son of Seleucus I Nicator.
[1] In 315 BC he waged war against Astacus and Chalcedon, which failed in the face of a relief army sent by Antigonus I Monophthalmus.
[2] In 301 BC, after Antigonus' death, he attacked again, and was victorious, but Astacus was destroyed in the war.
He lived to around the age of seventy-six, and left behind him four children, the eldest of whom, Nicomedes, succeeded him.
His successors adopted this date as the first year of the Bithynian calendar, which was used in some places as late as the 5th century AD.