CMA provisionally clears Amazon’s £442m Deliveroo investment over coronavirus April 17, 2020 A UK watchdog today provisionally cleared Amazon’s massive £442m investment into Deliveroo due to the risk the food delivery firm faces from coronavirus. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) called the situation “wholly unprecedented” but said the cash was “realistically only available from Amazon”. Deliveroo has seen a significant decline in revenues from the UK [...]
BREAKING: Competition watchdog probes capacity sharing deal between P&O Ferries and DFDS November 12, 2021 A capacity sharing agreement between P&O Ferries and DFDS is being probed by the UK competition regulator. In May, the two ferry operators entered a mutual space charter agreement on the Dover-Calais route in an effort to shorten freight customers’ waiting times. The agreement was also intended to help improve the flow of traffic on [...]
Ofcom widens net for Big Tech probe September 22, 2022 Ofcom will be widening the scope of its probe into Big Tech, digging into competition concerns surrounding the cloud services space. The media regulator said this morning that it would launch a market study into the sector to ensure that markets are working well for people and businesses in the UK. Cloud services have exploded [...]
The week that was: St James’s Place and Reckitt lead painful few days for the City March 2, 2024 A week in which 50 firms posted their final results was always going to produce some news. St James's Place and Reckitt defined a bruising few days for the Square Mile.
Cost of living: Morrisons follows Tesco and Asda in announcing fuel price cut of 6p per litre August 3, 2022 Morrisons is the latest supermarket to announce it is slashing the price of fuel, as households struggle to stay afloat amid a cost of living crisis. The retailer said on Wednesday that it had cut the cost of unleaded and diesel by an average of six pence a litre over the last week at all [...]
Microsoft’s $16bn Nuance bid secures EU antitrust approval December 21, 2021 Microsoft's $16bn (£12bn) bid for AI company Nuance has won approval from the European Commission following an antitrust probe.
Morrisons mulls sale of warehouses and fisheries in £600m deal June 12, 2022 Morrisons’ private equity owner is scouting for a buyer for its estate of warehouses, fisheries and food manufacturing hubs in a sale worth more than £600m. The New York private equity titan is mulling a sale-and-leaseback transaction in an endeavour to power returns from its £7bn takeover of the British grocer, according to a report [...]
Best of this week in our opinion pages: from the call for a more inclusive job market to flooding and big tech mergers December 4, 2021 As the tense exchanges between the UK and France over migration remain on top of the news, Eliot Wilson looks at Home Secretary Priti Patel’s management – or mismanagement – of the Channel crisis. To achieve a long-term solution and avoid further tragedies, the government should firstly stop the dangerous crossings, and secondly modernise the [...]
Fuelling the fire: Independent retailers ignite petrol price war to attract motorists July 21, 2022 Petrol retailers have kickstarted a price war, with independent vendors slashing costs at the pumps to lure in motorists as the cost of living crisis deepens.
Facebook’s $400m acquisition of Giphy could be blocked based on fruitless antitrust claims September 9, 2021 The Competition and Markets Authority have threatened to dissolve Facebook’s £289m acquisition of Giphy based on fruitless allegations the merger would be anti-competitive. The only catch is: Facebook and Giphy are not competitors. Breaking up this deal on antitrust grounds will have international consequences. Regulators across the world are becoming increasingly hostile towards Facebook, as [...]