Premiership takeover: A sports lawyer explains the questions rugby union clubs are pondering September 12, 2018 The shareholders of Premiership Rugby Ltd agreed on Tuesday that the sale of a majority stake to global private equity firm and former Formula One owners, CVC Capital Partners, is not their “preferred option”. The deal would have seen CVC purchase a 51 per cent stake in the Premiership for a reported £275m. The result [...]
SEO opportunity still there for PR agencies. But will they take it? March 6, 2018 Just over a year ago, I argued that the UK PR industry was missing the search engine optimisation (SEO) boat as data implied the number of agencies offering SEO services had dropped markedly. One year on, I take a look at how the market is developing. If you’re new to search marketing, how Google – [...]
Google Home review: Can Google’s smart speaker overthrow the Amazon Echo? April 19, 2017 When the singularity is reached and our robot servants finally turn on their human masters, rebelling against their programming to flay us alive in our beds, future mecha-historians will point with metal fingers to 2017 as the year it all began. Google Home is a voice-controlled smart speaker condemned to sit in the corner of [...]
Why pockets of retailers are thriving in London July 10, 2018 The obituary of high street retail, according to the press, has been written. Physical stores are closing at a rapid rate. We don’t think this tells the whole story. The daily announcements of retailer bankruptcies points to an ever-decreasing pool of occupiers. However, we argue that the pendulum of pessimism in investment markets often swings [...]
Schroders Global Cities 30 index: Seattle’s boom is about far more than Amazon May 5, 2017 The Schroders Global Cities Index ranks the fastest growing urban economies in the world, focusing on the potential for property investment. Read more on the Global Cities Blog. On this post, we examine Seattle’s success and its future prospects . Why Seattle? Sitting at no.25 in the Global Cities Index, we rate Seattle as a [...]
Amazon’s Alexa totally infiltrated CES this year January 5, 2017 Amid gimmicky gadgets that may never make it to the shelves (smart whistle, anyone?) Amazon's Alexa artificial intelligence voice assistant has stealthily become the stand out winner of the Consumer Electronics Show. The technology which first appeared in Amazon's own smart home speaker Echo and Echo Dot made surprise appearances almost everywhere, from fridges and cars to robots and baby monitors. [...]
Amazon’s creating 100,000 new jobs in the US January 12, 2017 Amazon is planning to create a whopping 100,000 new jobs in the US over the next 18 months. Yep, you read that number correctly: It's roughly the equivalent of the entire population of West Dorset. The additions will mean Amazon's total staff in the US will shoot past the quarter of a million people mark to 280,000. It [...]
The ASA watchdog is regulating the Wild West of online marketing and advertising October 29, 2018 It goes without saying that the web has revolutionised the global economy. As a source of knowledge and information, as well as a marketplace for trade, it has created jobs, fuelled innovation, and accelerated productivity (well, it has when we’re not browsing Twitter or watching Netflix). The internet has also changed advertising. The digitisation of [...]
Morrisons earnings preview: Grocery chain faces uphill battle amid Asda-Sainsbury’s merger May 7, 2018 Grocery chain Morrisons is set to announce its first quarter trading results on Thursday, and the company may have a lot to prove. Analysts at Barclays forecast sales growth of 1.7 per cent, below the company’s figures for the fourth quarter of 2017. If so, it would be the lowest sales growth since the end [...]
Confronting the Robots December 13, 2018 Professor Peter Fleming, formerly of Cass Business School, wrote an article for Demos Quarterly which argued that the age of automation is unlikely to lead to a utopian world of play, but doesn't necessarily mean a proliferation of rubbish jobs. You can read the article in full here. Dr Simone Stumpf, Senior Lecturer in the Department of [...]