What to Expect at Google I/O: Beyond mobile… and reality May 17, 2016 This week the eyes of the technology industry are all on Google’s annual developer conference – Google I/O occurring from 18-20 May. The first conference since the creation of Alphabet has a brand new outdoor home – Shoreline Amphitheatre in San Francisco. While tech blogs are already awash with rumours, I’d like to share some areas to look [...]
Central banks aren’t out of antidotes, but beware the dangerous tonic of helicopter money May 17, 2016 After years of unconventional monetary policy but stubbornly low inflation, investors are asking whether central banks are out of ammunition. But central banks are not soldiers fighting a war; they are doctors trying to cure a disease. As traditional medicines fail, they try ever more experimental cures. After the standard dose of rate cuts proved [...]
Five challenges Amazon faces plotting its own-brand products May 17, 2016 Reports that Amazon is branching out into private-label groceries make sense for the retail giant. In a sluggish market own label is one of the few healthy areas, growing by 1.5 per cent in the first quarter of 2016. Retailers aren’t seen as credible without an own label range, but developing a strong offer takes time and Amazon will [...]
Christine Lagarde is wrong: Here are four economic positives from Brexit May 17, 2016 IMF chief Christine Lagarde said last week she has “not seen anything positive” about Brexit in terms of economics. Even for the head of a global body which we might expect would dislike major political disruption to the international order, and a good friend of the chancellor, this shows a remarkable lack of imagination. Suffering [...]
The Prince’s Trust’s 40th anniversary: How business is helping deprived young people flourish May 17, 2016 Today Buckingham Palace hosts a garden party to mark the fortieth anniversary of The Prince’s Trust, the Prince of Wales’ oldest and largest charity. It will be attended by some of the thousands of young people whose lives have been turned around by this amazing organisation, along with volunteers, supporters and staff. As chairman of [...]
Lessons from New York: Bigger is no longer better in the new world of ambitious scaleups May 17, 2016 Every business is a hypothesis based on a bet. And if you want to bet big, grow small. That’s the lesson I learned on a recent visit to New York to meet the scaleup businesses aiming to become tomorrow’s titans. Of course, think New York and you think big. The Big Apple, big business and [...]
After it hosted a major Osborne speech, is Ryanair risking its own reputation by openly backing Remain? May 17, 2016 Michael Jacobides, associate professor of strategy and entrepreneurship at London Business School, says Yes. At a time of heightened political sensibility and populist bashing of “big business”, it feels risky for a corporation to take a clear stance on a key political debate. Brexit campaigners have already targeted Mark Carney for taking a view, despite [...]
The decadence of Europe’s dismal elites is fuelling the populist surge across the EU May 16, 2016 “In the end more than freedom, they wanted security. They wanted a comfortable life, and they lost it all – security, comfort, and freedom… When the freedom they wished for was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again.” – Edward Gibbon on the fall of Athens As I have [...]
The City needs to talk about mental health to combat this silent plague May 16, 2016 Today marks the start of World Mental Health Awareness Week, during which the spotlight will be turned on an important issue that for too long has been relegated to the shadows. Across the world, hundreds of millions of people are affected by mental health conditions. Here in the UK, for example, one in four people [...]
Why purpose is key to success in twenty-first century business May 16, 2016 How should businesses make decisions? The textbook answer is to do a calculation – to trade off the costs and benefits. For investment decisions, this is difficult, because the benefits are uncertain. But for tangible investments, such as building a factory, you can still get a reasonable handle on the benefits – estimate the number [...]