Virgin Media 02 could bag up to £750m from selling stake in masts business April 20, 2023 Telecoms company Virgin Media O2 has reportedly started the process to sell part or all of its stake in Cornerstone, the operator of Britain’s largest mobile tower network. Virgin Media O2 is set to sell at least half of its 25 per cent stake in the company and will use the funds to fuel its [...]
NDT Broadgate: £40m generated for UK economy by ‘revolutionary’ City of London arts project April 19, 2023 A piece of City of London land offered for free to 8,800 independent artists for twelve months has generated £40m in revenue for the UK economy. The NDT Broadgate initiative ran for twelve months in 2021 and 2022, providing rehearsal spaces, writing rooms, co-working areas, recording booths, studios and workshops to the creative community free [...]
Exclusive: Telford Homes to sign Gove’s cladding pledge after threat of ban March 16, 2023 Property developer Telford Homes has capitulated to threats from Michael Gove and signed a pledge to fix faulty cladding similar to that which led to the fire at Grenfell Tower. One of London’s largest residential developers was one of 11 firms told they would be prevented from building new properties unless they signed the pledge, [...]
Amanda Blanc on Desert Island Discs: Aviva chief speaks out against misogyny March 12, 2023 Aviva chief executive Amanda Blanc has spoken out on the iconic BBC show Desert Island Discs about the misogyny she experienced as chair of the Welsh Rugby Union and at her FTSE 100 firm’s AGM last year. At the shareholder meeting ast year Blanc said that she was the target of a number of sexist [...]
What do Aviva’s results mean for the insurer’s share price? March 9, 2023 British insurance giant Aviva today set out plans to buy back £300m worth of its own shares from investors, after posting what analysts and the firm itself described as “strong” results for 2022. Aviva’s announcement saw its share price jump by almost four per cent in trading this morning, before settling at a rate almost [...]
Retail groups call apprenticeship levy a ‘£3.5bn mistake’ and call for urgent reform February 6, 2023 Kate Nicholls, chief executive of UKHospitality, said a “much-needed” overhaul of the system would enable businesses to go even further in their skills investment.
Caffe Nero shrugs off inflation as Brits’ coffee habits drive sales of £150m January 30, 2023 Caffe Nero generated UK sales of £150m for the first half of the financial year, averaging 104 per cent of pre-pandemic levels and an increase of 17 per cent for the same period in 2021. The coffee chain added Deliveroo and Just Eat to its delivery partner service last year, which it said helped secure [...]
London AI startup InstaDeep bought by BionTech in half-a-billion deal January 11, 2023 London based AI startup InstaDeep has been bought out by biotechnology giant BioNTech in a half-a-billion pound deal. InstaDeep focuses on machine learning and artificial intelligence, and has raised nearly £100m across four seed rounds. The deal will allow BioNTech to use InstaDeep’s machine learning to “improve its drug discovery process, including developing personalised treatments tailored [...]
Darktrace shares down over 10 per cent after firm cuts revenue forecast January 11, 2023 British cyber-security company Darktrace cut its full-year revenue forecast on Wednesday after prospective customers turned more reluctant to run product trials due to the worsening economic environment. The company, which listed in April 2021, said it now expected its constant currency annual recurring revenue (ARR) to increase by between 29.0 per cent and 31.5 per [...]
BMW: How supply chain issues and China lockdowns have impacted its bottom line January 10, 2023 BMW’s sales have slumped in 2022 due to supply chain issues and the now-scrapped zero-Covid policy in China. A byproduct of the pandemic, supply chain issues such as chip shortages and higher raw material costs were magnified by Beijing’s decision to implement severe lockdown measures for the good part of last year. The German automotive [...]