Neil Woodford fund breaches rules after Guernsey delistings July 31, 2019 Embattled fund manager Neil Woodford has breached fund restrictions after two of his major investments delisted from the Guernsey stock exchange. Woodford has been battling to reduce his Equity Income fund’s investment in illiquid securities after it was suspended following a spike in investor redemption requests. Read more: Neil Woodford’s flagship fund to stay frozen [...]
UK leads EU venture capital, but Brexit could threaten its dominance July 31, 2019 The UK is continuing to dominate European venture capital (VC) deals thanks to a rise in mega rounds but uncertainty over the movement of talent post-Brexit could hit the sector hard, a new report has cautioned. UK VCs totalled 63 per cent of Europe-wide deals during the first half of the year, driven by a [...]
Saudi Arabian wealth fund set to invest in digital health startup Babylon July 30, 2019 Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund is said to be in late-stage talks over an investment in British startup Babylon Health. The investment, which would come as part of a funding round worth hundreds of millions of dollars, could be announced later this week, the Financial Times reported, citing people with knowledge of the matter. Read [...]
Twitter shares rise on second quarter revenue boost July 26, 2019 Twitter has posted a strong rise in revenue for the second quarter as its user numbers jumped, pushing shares up more than 10 per cent. The social media firm reported an 18 per cent increase in revenue to $841m (£677m), while monetisable daily active users rose 14 per cent to 139m. Read more: Twitter buys [...]
Softbank launches new $108bn Vision Fund for AI investment July 26, 2019 Softbank has unveiled its second mammoth Vision Fund, which it said will have $108bn (£87bn) to invest in AI-focused tech firms. Read more: Softbank earns $11bn for selling some of its huge Alibaba stake Softbank said it has received backing from a string of companies including Apple, Foxconn, Microsoft and Standard Chartered, while the Japanese [...]
Is India the world’s future investment hub? July 23, 2019 Could the investment profession's future be in India?
Politicians need to wake up to the risks of artificial superintelligence July 23, 2019 Politicians aren’t very good at thinking about more than one thing at a time. Take Brexit as an example, if you needed one. Everything other than our proposed exit from the European Union – and who will be the Prime Minister to lead us through it – has been downgraded to an inconvenient side-show. This [...]
Data is our NHS’ most precious asset – the next Prime Minister must protect it July 23, 2019 Britain is about to have a new government. And in a few months’ time, there could be a General Election resulting in the third government of 2019. On top of this, Brexit has still not been resolved. But in the fog of these political crises, we must not lose sight of innovations which, if adopted [...]
Microsoft invests $1bn in OpenAI to create artificial intelligence that can solve humanity’s worst problems July 22, 2019 Microsoft is set to pour $1bn (£800m) into OpenAI to develop general artificial intelligence, effectively by turning its Azure cloud into a supercomputer. The pair have agreed a multi-year exclusive partnership to develop a supercomputer of “unprecedented scale” to train and run ever-more advanced AI software. Read more: Microsoft opens flagship London store just minutes [...]
Game of drones: The founder of SenSat on solving construction problems by simulating reality July 22, 2019 “The internet connects all human knowledge, and for the first time in history, we can connect that human knowledge to the actual world we live in through our computers.” It’s at this point during my conversation with James Dean, the cooly-named co-founder of SenSat, that I start to grasp how ground-breaking his technology really is. [...]