The UK’s “upmarket Airbnb” Onefinestay just got bought by a major hotel group for millions April 5, 2016 A UK startup which offers luxury Airbnb-style holiday rentals has been acquired by a major hotel group for a multi-million pound sum. French hotel group AccorHotels has snapped up Onefinestay for £117m. “Onefinestay has successfully captured a sweet spot: a combination of needs that neither traditional hotels nor new actors of the sharing economy can meet," said Accor's [...]
Barclays customers can now use Apple Pay… finally April 5, 2016 It's been a long old wait, but Barclays has finally jumped on board the Apple Pay bandwagon. Barclays is the last of the major banks to support Apple Pay in the UK, letting customers pay with just the swipe of their iPhone or Apple Watch. “Since we introduced contactless to the UK in 2007, it’s [...]
Who leaked the Panama papers? April 4, 2016 How do you leak 2.6 terabytes of data? That's 11.5m records, 4.8m emails and 2.1m PDFs – 40 years worth of data, about 214,000 offshore entities and numerous famous names and faces and how they secretly arranged their taxes. The Panama papers leak is the biggest in history – but how did it ever get leaked and who was [...]
Twitter’s share price jumps on Mastercard interest April 4, 2016 Shares in social media firm Twitter jumped by over nine per cent today on news that payments firm Mastercard would be interested in a tie-up with the company. "We see companies like Facebook and Twitter occupying a really good space in social media and we are always over in Silicon Valley talking to those companies," said Ann Cairns, president [...]
UK financial services executives back London to become world’s fintech hub April 4, 2016 UK-based financial services executives are backing London to become the world's fintech hub. Some 92 per cent of those surveyed by Robert Half Financial Services said the UK has the ability to become the field’s worldwide leader. Read more: These are the most influential people in UK fintech Six per cent of the 100 executives surveyed [...]
Groupon share price rises as Groupon lands multi-million dollar investment from Atairos April 4, 2016 Who said daily deals were dead? Quite a few people, actually, but Groupon is proving that's not quite the case with a new multi-million dollar investment. Investment firm Atairos has ploughed $250m into the daily deals site. "Our partnership with Atairos will help accelerate our transformation while better positioning us to execute on our strategy and mission [...]
Police have warned people not to use these Santander cash machines April 4, 2016 The public has been warned not to use Santander cash machines in Lancashire after ATMs were targeted by criminals, according to police. Security at Santander ATMs in Lancs has been compromised. Advice is not to use them. If you have lost money please contact the bank and 101. — Lancashire Police (@LancsPolice) April 3, 2016 Lancashire [...]
London black taxis vs Uber: This is cabbies’ big plan to save the industry – and they want the new Mayor of London on board April 4, 2016 London's black cab drivers want to offer superfast WiFi to passengers travelling across the capital and have taxi ranks outside every Night Tube stop as part of new efforts to keep the taxi industry competitive. Under increasing pressure from upstart Uber, a new group has been formed bringing together cab drivers, the company manufacturing black cabs – the London Taxi [...]
Here’s how we’re spending with contactless since the limit went up to £30 April 4, 2016 Millions of pounds have been spent by people simply swiping a card or mobile device after an increase to the limit on how much people can spend using contactless pay. There have been 36m cashless transactions worth nearly £900m since the limit went up from £20 to £30 in September last year. Transactions between £20 and £30 have grown at a rate of [...]
Why the greatest potential of virtual reality lies in business – and why not acting now could mean getting left behind April 4, 2016 We're only a quarter of the way through the year, and it’s already clear that the rise of virtual reality (VR) is one of the most talked about trends of 2016. Research from Deloitte shows that, while the technology may still be in the early stages of its commercialisation and development, it has reached a pivotal [...]