City handed tough start to Premier League title defence June 18, 2014 CHAMPIONS Manchester City have been handed a tricky start to the 2014-15 Premier League season with head-to-heads against the rest of last season’s top four in their first five games. After travelling to Newcastle when the campaign kicks off on 16 August, City then host last season’s runners-up Liverpool in their opening game at the [...]
Marx was wrong (cont): Corporate giants are inherently fragile June 17, 2014 ONE of Karl Marx’s big theories was that capitalism had an inherent tendency towards monopoly and would thus self-destroy. The idea remains widely held, and is one reason countries operate stringent anti-trust regulations. But it’s a little more complicated than that. First, many monopolies or quasi-monopolies are actually created by the state, rather than resulting [...]
Three rules the West must remember when responding to the crisis in Iraq June 16, 2014 Like everyone in Washington who worked on Iraq for the past decade and hoped the nightmare had ended, my immediate reaction to the stunning recent reports was simple: “Oh my God, no.” For the news is as bad as it could be. A small, but hardened fighting force of 800 members of the Islamic State [...]
Uber app wins the heart of EU commissioner after taxi protests June 12, 2014 Smartphone app Uber has found a new champion in the form of EU digital affairs commissioner Neelie Kroes. After protests against the San Francisco startup swept Europe yesterday, Kroes wrote "we cannot address these challenges by ignoring them, by going on strike, or by trying to ban these innovations out of existence." “The disruptive force [...]
Air conditioning pioneer Volution Holdings airs out plans for listing June 11, 2014 The British manufacturing firm that installed extractor fans for Sir Winston Churchill during the Second World War is heading to the London stock market after unveiling plans for a £300m listing. Volution Holdings, which owns Vent-Axia – the engineering firm famed for supplying ventilation to 10 Downing Street during the war – will raise £72m [...]
This is how far Tesla’s Model S electric car will get you across the UK June 9, 2014 This weekend, Elon Musk brought his electric car to the UK. Obviously we already have electric cars, but the Model S – the luxury saloon of Tesla, Musk's company – is a cut above the rest. And in a matter of months, it'll get you across most of the UK and Europe. Speaking at the [...]
Entrepreneurs flock to London June 9, 2014 LONDON dominates a new league table showing the hottest neighbourhoods for start-up companies, with all but three of the UK’s top 20 areas for business creation located within the capital. Topping the list, published by accountancy firm UHY Hacker Young, is the postcode EC1V – home to the so-called tech city cluster of digital companies, [...]
Entrepreneurs flock to London June 9, 2014 LONDON dominates a new league table showing the hottest neighbourhoods for start-up companies, with all but three of the UK’s top 20 areas for business creation located within the capital. Topping the list, published by accountancy firm UHY Hacker Young, is the postcode EC1V – home to the so-called tech city cluster of digital companies, [...]
Artificial intelligence is on the rise – and humans must adapt June 9, 2014 FOR the first time ever, a computer programme has managed to dupe experts into thinking that it was a 13-year old boy. This is a major milestone in the progress of artificial intelligence, and thus a hugely important development for labour markets, for the global economy and for all of us. The Russian computer programme [...]
Operations chief on track for top job at bookmaker William Hill June 9, 2014 WILLIAM Hill is poised to name operations director James Henderson as its new chief executive, replacing departing boss Ralph Topping. Topping is due to step down from his role at the FTSE 100-listed bookmaker by the end of next year, but is said to be happy to leave sooner once a successor has been chosen. [...]