Record demand for smartphone chips lifts ARM October 23, 2012 ROCKETING interest in Apple products meant sales at chip designer ARM Holdings have increased by a fifth over the last year, sending shares in the Cambridge-based firm up more than 10 per cent yesterday. The company beat market expectations to see revenue hit £145m in the third quarter of the year, up from £120m in [...]
Mo and Usain help Virgin Media draw in record new customers October 23, 2012 A HIGH-PROFILE advertising campaign by Olympic champions Mo Farah and Usain Bolt helped pay-TV group Virgin Media to sign up a record number of net new cable customers in its third quarter and boost its profitability. Virgin, which provides pay-TV, broadband and telephony, said yesterday it had added 39,500 customers in the three months to [...]
CSR to return Samsung cash to investors October 23, 2012 SHAREHOLDERS in British chipmaker CSR will get a special payout before the end of the year after the completion of the sale of its handset technology to South Korean electronics leader Samsung. Details of the $285m (£178.5m) tender offer to shareholders will be announced during the fourth quarter, the company said yesterday. The group booked [...]
Magners maker goes stateside as rain waters down UK sales October 23, 2012 IRISH cider maker C&C said yesterday it would buy US firm Vermont Hard Cider for $305m (£191m) as part of a bid to tap into a fast-growing market and offset weakness in its core UK business, where sales of its flagship Magners brand slumped during a wet summer. Sales of Magners in the US leapt [...]
WPP expands growth in China October 23, 2012 ■ Advertising giant WPP has continued its expansion into China with the purchase of communications agency ArtM. The Beijing firm, which has offices in three other major Chinese cities, will be absorbed by WPP subsidiary Grey. The acquisition is the latest Chinese buy from WPP, which counts the country as its third-largest market. ArtM’s price [...]
London Capital sees revenue drop October 23, 2012 ■ Spread betting firm London Capital Group yesterday announced a third quarter adjusted loss after revenues were hit by low trading volumes. The Aim-listed company, which also offers financial services, said trading volumes had been “suppressed” over the quarter. It means the group’s adjusted profit before tax until 30 September is £0.6m. The board said [...]
Avacta grows but losses widen October 23, 2012 ■ Healthcare technology firm Avacta yesterday posted a 28 per cent rise in sales for the year to August, which it put down to improved performance in its animal healthcare division. However, the company’s losses widened to £1.6m from £1.1m last year. Avacta’s shares rose 4.4 per cent in trading yesterday. “Despite a challenging backdrop [...]
Barclays gets social savvy – on and offline October 23, 2012 AT this week’s Young One World summit in Pittsburgh, Barclays’ new chief executive Antony Jenkins revealed himself to be a Twitter devotee. Jenkins told delegates: “I have a screen in my office that tracks tweets about Barclays. The day after the Libor scandal broke, we had 10,000 tweets and my computer screen was scrolling so [...]
No shortage of literature for banking bookworms this month October 23, 2012 RECENT City A.M. award winner and property giant Westfield welcomed the Prime Minister’s wife to their Shepherd’s Bush store yesterday. Samantha Cameron, ambassador of Save the Children, gave a special reading of The Snail and the Whale at Foyles Bookstore to a group of children from Larmenier & Sacred Heart primary school. But for grown-up [...]
Arden Partners shrinks board with shake-up October 23, 2012 ARDEN Partners, the small and mid cap market broker, yesterday reshuffled its board by appointing a new chief executive and saying goodbye to non-executive chairman Lord Howard Flight, who has decided to leave the firm. The board of the Alternative Investment Market-listed broker will be reduced in size by two seats. Lord Flight will leave [...]
