Australian rules may dent Murdoch’s home advantage June 20, 2012 AFTER the calamitous failure of its BSkyB bid, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation has decided to advance its pay TV ambitions in his birth country, bidding A$1.97bn (£1.27bn) for Australia’s Consolidated Media Holdings. If the deal is accepted and gains the necessary regulatory approval, it will double the media giant’s stake in Foxtel, the island continent’s [...]
INDITEX BUYS FLAGSHIP ZARA STORE IN WEST END FOR £155M June 18, 2012 Inditex, the world’s largest fashion retailer, yesterday announced it has bought the flagship Zara store at the heart of London’s West End for £155m. The Spanish-listed group, which owns Zara, said it had bought the 7,000 square-metre property at the intersection of Oxford Street and New Bond Street from German fund manager Deka. Last year [...]
Bring the family to the Cheapside Fayre on Saturday June 17, 2012 WHEN people talk of cities as playgrounds, they tend not to be thinking about swings and roundabouts, but bars, restaurants and the like. It’s not exactly child-friendly. However, families are at the heart of Celebrate the City and a significant proportion of the festival programme has been built with them in mind. “When it comes [...]
Moyes in frame as Redknapp leaves Spurs June 13, 2012 TOTTENHAM manager Harry Redknapp’s reign came to an abrupt end last night. Redknapp and Spurs chairman Daniel Levy had been due to meet in an attempt to resolve increasingly tense discussions over a new contract. But rather than mend his differences with the north London club’s hierarchy, Redknapp has parted company with them, despite a [...]
Plans unveiled for revival of Midtown area June 10, 2012 MAJOR BUSINESSES and political figures will meet tomorrow to discuss plans to rejuvenate London’s Midtown, an area wedged between the City and the West End, and drive investment over the next five years. Inmidtown, the business improvement district with authority over the area, will showcase a new framework aimed at restoring it as a commercial [...]
The Innkeepers is a bog-standard horror outing but Woody Allen film fascinates June 7, 2012 FILM THE INNKEEPERS Cert 15 | By Natasha Culzac ** AN EMPTY, rustic, provincial hotel is the setting for Ti West’s latest indie horror flick, The Innkeepers. New England’s The Yankee Pedlar Inn, which is said to harbour paranormal forces in real life as well as fiction, is closing down – presumably customers grew tired [...]
Jubilee attracts two million to West End June 6, 2012 SOME two million visitors flocked to the West End over the bank holiday weekend, as the capital went into full swing celebrating the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. Theatres, hotels, restaurants and retailers are together expected to have made more than £120m over the four-day weekend, according to the New West End company, which represents 600 firms [...]
How an explosive setback put one legal firm on the path to international growth June 5, 2012 TWENTY years ago, you’d have been hard pressed to find anyone prepared to bet that Norton Rose – one of London’s oldest City law firm’s – would eventually rank in the top five largest international practices in the world. Unless perhaps you’d asked Peter Martyr, the firm’s group chief executive. Back in 1992, he was [...]
Squad rotation in Test cricket is here to stay June 5, 2012 ENGLAND’S top fast bowler James Anderson is understandably frustrated at being rested for tomorrow’s third Test against West Indies. He’s bowling beautifully and I would have selected him – but this kind of rotation is set to become common in first-class cricket. In football the story is familiar; you hear of players like Wayne Rooney [...]
Jaguar Land Rover roars to record profits May 29, 2012 THE RECOVERY in Britain’s car industry accelerated yesterday when Jaguar Land Rover posted record annual profits of £1.51bn. The group sold 314,433 vehicles in the 12 months to 31 March, its highest ever figure and up by 29.1 per cent. Indian parent company Tata Motors also said it would increase investment in the firm to £2bn [...]