Barclays’ Canary Wharf offices rocked by morning bomb scare May 1, 2014 STAFF at banks including Barclays and HSBC were briefly shut in their offices yesterday morning as a suspicious package was investigated in Canary Wharf. An area including the Waitrose supermarket was closed off by police at around 9am when police were called to Barclays’ headquarters, near Churchill Place. Officers sent in a robot to study [...]
Majority Songbird shareholders Glick, China Investment Corporation and Morgan Stanley back £2.6bn Canary Wharf bid by Qataris January 28, 2015 Three major shareholders of Canary Wharf owner Songbird intend to accept a takeover offer from the Qatari sovereign wealth fund. Songbird has said it understands its three largest shareholders, not including the Qatari group which already holds a 28.6 per cent stake in the firm, intend to accept the offer of 350p per share made [...]
Both a friend and a voice August 12, 2015 Mencap is a partner and voice for people with learning disabilities Mencap’s Head Office has always sat on the edge of the City of London — between Old Street and the Barbican — but this year Mencap are determined to make sure our message gets heard loud and clear right to centre of the Square [...]
Walkie Talkie signs up two more tenants May 1, 2014 CANARY Wharf Group and Land Securities’ Walkie-Talkie skyscraper is now 87 per cent let after the developers confirmed they had secured two new tenants yesterday. US insurance firm CNA and law firm DWF have agreed to take 35,000 square feet (sq ft) and 43,000 sq ft respectively, joining ten other companies that will soon move [...]
Qatari hires veteran banker Ken Costa to board of Songbird December 11, 2014 The Qataris have brought in one of the City’s best-known rainmakers to help win control of the Canary Wharf Estate. The Qatar Holding Shareholder Group said it had appointed Ken Costa as a director of Songbird, the owner of the east London financial district, taking its representation on the board back to three. South African-born [...]
Songbird Estates share price falls after £1.6bn Qatari takeover bid for Canary Wharf is rejected November 7, 2014 A £1.6bn takeover offer for Songbird Estates has been rejected by the Canary Wharf owner. The offer, at 295p per share, was made by the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) and US investor Brookfield Property Partners. The Qatari sovereign wealth fund already holds a 29 per cent stake in Songbird, whose investment portfolio is [...]
Focus on Hammersmith: The town where prices have grown by half February 26, 2015 When it comes to neighbours, Hammersmith has struck lucky. There can’t be another location in London that’s surrounded by such a cluster of affluent residential neighbourhoods. With Kensington to the east, Chiswick to the west, Fulham to the south and Shepherd’s Bush to the north, it’s a wonder this area is still known primarily as [...]
Silicon Roundabout costs are on the rise: East end property tech bubble pricing out small businesses March 4, 2015 The property tech bubble in London’s east end is pricing small businesses out of the market. Shoreditch, Clerkenwell, Aldgate and Whitechapel: over the last decade these places have become the breeding ground for media and tech start-ups, as well as larger blue-chip companies looking to grow their digital operations. However, East London’s success at [...]
A third bolt just snapped on the Leadenhall building, aka the Cheesegrater January 14, 2015 Not a great couple of weeks for the capital's skyscrapers. After Londoners discovered their promised "park in the sky", aka the Walkie Talkie's Sky Garden, will be ticketed – and moaned vociferously about it – another bolt has snapped on close neighbour the Cheesegrater. That's the third to break so far. Eeeek. British Land, the [...]
How London is leading the charge on a radical employee rent scheme February 5, 2015 Two years ago, Vodafone became one of the first big businesses to issue a warning over Britain’s housing costs. It said that the sheer cost of renting was making it harder for firms to attract talent. Within weeks, its concerns were echoed by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) and KPMG’s London Business Survey. London’s [...]