Office space provider IWG takes £156m hit on coronavirus crisis August 4, 2020 Office space provider IWG announced it will take a £156m hit due to the coronavirus pandemic as it shrinks its portfolio by four per cent amid a home-working boom. IWG’s share price dropped more than five per cent today after it announced it will accelerate its office closure plans due to the Covid-19 crisis, with [...]
Russian hackers ‘stole’ US-UK trade deal papers from Liam Fox’s email August 3, 2020 Classified US-UK trade documents were “stolen” from former trade minister Liam Fox’s email account by Russian hackers, according to reports. The papers, which were leaked ahead of the December General Election last year, were accessed via several hacks on Fox’s account between 12 July and 21 October, according to Reuters. Several sources declined to name [...]
The City View: Thames Clippers’ CEO on getting London back to work August 3, 2020 Subscribe to The City View Podcast: Apple / Google / Spotify / RSS Christian is joined by Sean Collins, co-founder and CEO of London’s riverboat service, Thames Clippers, as the transport provider grapples with life under lockdown. Last year the company carried nearly 5 million passengers, many of them commuters, and today they’re operating at around 25 per cent of that. Despite the [...]
Big Tech cashes in on worst day for US economy since Great Depression July 31, 2020 The world’s four largest tech firms yesterday announced blockbuster earnings for three months to June, despite the US economy facing its darkest day since the Great Depression. Facebook, Google, Amazon and Apple, worth more than $5 trillion ($3.81 trillion) in total, smashed expectations as they all posted record profits yesterday. The upbeat results were met [...]
Give people seeking asylum the right to work in Britain July 30, 2020 The Prime Minister has said he wants the UK to build back better as the country and economy recover from the Covid-19 pandemic. That’s a worthy goal — and the good news is that there are thousands of people in our communities with a wide variety of skills who are desperate to help. They are [...]
Let’s not squander this unique opportunity to harness the benefits of a new model for work July 30, 2020 It’s no stretch to say that, without remote working, thousands of businesses would have ground to a halt over lockdown. The mass work-from-home experiment over the past four months has not only saved them, but shown that it is possible to fundamentally shift ways of working while continuing to be productive and deliver results. Before [...]
Rio Tinto touts ‘V-shaped’ China recovery as it beats profit expectations July 29, 2020 Rio Tinto said today it saw a sharp V-shaped recovery in China as stimulus spurred industrial activity, helping its first-half profit handily beat market expectations. Rio Tinto is the first of the major iron ore miners to report results from a first half marked by coronavirus-induced disruptions but also by high iron ore prices. “We [...]
Corruption in politics? It’s just business as usual July 28, 2020 Robert Wood Johnson IV is not a name which necessarily springs even to the more well-informed lips. “Woody”, as he is far better known, is the American ambassador to London — a post he assumed almost three years ago at the request of Donald Trump. His background is not in diplomacy: he is part of [...]
Want a recovery that works for everyone? Fix the injustices in the tax system July 27, 2020 The lockdown shone a spotlight onto a two-speed, two-nation Britain, where better-paid white-collar professionals worked from home, while less well-off key workers had to keep travelling to work, often on crowded public transport, to do riskier jobs. Even worse, it turned out that those less well-off key workers were paying much higher tax rates than [...]
3D printing takes on new dimensions July 24, 2020 3D printing’s evolution has dished up developments galore to chew over recently. Six months ago a company ‘making’ a (plant-based) steak captured headlines, with the BBC asking: ‘would you eat a ‘steak’ printed by robots?’. The same firm – a Barcelona start-up, NovaMeat – was in the headlines again a couple of months ago, unveiling [...]