Six things we learned from Warren Buffett after Berkshire Hathaway’s annual meeting: From AI and driverless cars to what happens if the sage of Omaha dies May 7, 2017 The sage of Omaha Warren Buffett took to the stage at the Berkshire Hathaway annual general meeting along with right hand man Charlie Munger. And the ever straight talking star investor did exactly that, discussing how he missed out on some of the biggest tech bets in recent years and what happens when he’s no [...]
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 [...]
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 Echo Look: It’s latest voice device is a crazy Clueless-style digital wardrobe with an Alexa activated camera and style assistant April 26, 2017 Amazon has unexpectedly launched a new Echo smart assistant device that lets users take pictures of their outfits to create a digital wardrobe in a modern day, real-life version of Clueless. The famous scene in the hit 90s movie showed the main character Cher pick outfits from a database of images on her computer. Now, [...]
Responsible Business Week 2017: Business must use technology responsibly or risk exacerbating society’s divides April 25, 2017 Some people might think that Responsible Business is a contradiction in terms; that this week’s Business in the Community Responsible Business Week will leave companies free to act as selfishly as possible on the other 358 days of the year. I certainly don’t believe that’s how it works. And yet we are living in a [...]
VAT fraud and error on online marketplaces like Amazon and Ebay costs the UK £1bn, National Audit Office says April 19, 2017 The UK is losing up to £1bn a year in VAT because of fraud or error by sellers on websites like Ebay and Amazon. The National Audit Office (NAO) said the consumer regulator Trading Standards found companies failed to remove sellers often based in China that were flouting VAT rules, even after being informed about [...]
Uber granted appeal in landmark legal case over employment status of drivers as workers or self-employed April 19, 2017 Uber has been granted an appeal in a landmark legal battle over the employment status of its drivers in the UK. The multi-billion dollar startup will return to court later this year to argue against an employment tribunal ruling which last year said that Uber drivers should be classed as workers and are not self-employed. [...]
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 [...]
Airbnb, Amazon, peer to peer lending and universities: There’s a simple reason why no sector is immune from radical change April 10, 2017 If you were to ask an economist why financial institutions or food retailers exist, I wonder if the answer would go beyond that which would be offered by a random person travelling on the Tube. Answers might include “to provide bank loans, insurance and savings products” and, in the case of food retailers, “to provide [...]
Fintech: three truths and two myths April 7, 2017 Neal Cross is the chief innovation officer of DBS, Singapore’s largest bank. His role affords him a unique perspective on many issues in fintech. We had a fascinating conversation on the subject. Below are some of the thoughts he shared with me. Myth 1: Fintech start-ups are at war with banks. Neal Cross: I think [...]