Taking on Sky is a risky Vision for BT August 9, 2010 INthe run up to the new football season there is a fascinating encounter taking place off the field as BT Vision tries to take on the might of BSkyB in the showing of live football. BT Vision, boosted by a ruling from the regulator on the price that Sky can sell its sports channels to [...]
NICK BOOTHTECH TALK August 4, 2010 I’VE seen the future of British youth – it’s half man, half desk. Why? They can’t relate to anything unless it’s writ large on a glowing screen at chair level. But now the school PCs and whiteboards have been powered off, could we entice our next generation humans into the garden of real-life high definition? [...]
M&B investors should tell Lewis to get serious January 13, 2010 THE row between Mitchells and Butlers’ largest shareholder Joe Lewis and the pub group’s management shows no sign of abating, making the firm’s stock hard to value. If Lewis wants to make a bid for the company, he’d probably have to offer around 340p, making the shares – which closed at 275.5p yesterday – look [...]
How AirAsia boss Tony Fernandes shrugged off the global recession September 5, 2010 IF Tony Fernandes, the chief executive of pioneering low-cost carrier AirAsia, ever suffered from shyness as child, he is certainly cured of it now. The UK-educated Malaysian entrepreneur, who founded the short haul airline in 2001 and its longhaul sister AirAsia X six years later, dominates the meeting room of his West End PR agency [...]
BT strikes up a footy deal with BSkyB June 28, 2010 BT HAS finalised a deal with BSkyB to offer its subscribers top-flight football next season. The move, which means football fans can watch their teams on BT Vision for the first time, could rock Sky’s dominance of the pay TV market after decades controlling the lion’s share of subscribers. It follows a controversial Ofcom ruling [...]
THE TIPSTER June 6, 2010 THE FTSE 100 index was vacillating around the 5,200 level at the end of last week, eventually closing at 5,126 on Friday. But this is still some 10 per cent below the blue-chip index’s 2010 highs. However, the German Dax 30 index is only 3 per cent off its highs for the year so the [...]
SUMMER’S SET TO SIZZLE AS CITY’S GOT TALENT MAKES A COMEBACK July 18, 2010 IT’S SUMMERTIME, and if you’re looking for a ray of sunshine to penetrate the daily grind of City life, look no further. Regular readers of this column will remember last year, when The Capitalist whipped the financial world into a frenzy with a rundown of the top ten hunkiest gentlemen and loveliest ladies the City [...]
Cable is cool on NewsCorp BSkyB probe June 27, 2010 VINCE Cable has said there “would need to be a lot of evidence” for him to become involved in NewsCorp’s attempt to acquire BSkyB, in remarks that are sure to alienate anti-Murdoch Liberal Democrats. As business secretary, Cable could announce an investigation into the takeover on public interest grounds. He would then have the ultimate [...]
Mitchells & Butlers profits rise by 50pc May 20, 2010 PUBS group Mitchells & Butlers (M&B) has seen a surge in half-year profits – but its boss warned yesterday that cheap supermarket deals were threatening the industry. The owner of the All Bar One and O’Neill’s pub chains said pre-tax profits for the six months to 10 April were £73m, up from £47m the year [...]
The rising star of online retail July 15, 2010 YOU’VE just given birth and one of the first things your husband asks you to do is to sign a cheque for your new boutique (Powder, based in Crouch End. ) That was Sarah Curran’s experience of the first hours of motherhood to son Jake, now seven-years old. It is no surprise that Curran says [...]